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61-515: The inspiration to this project came from Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach , the chairman of the Reichsverband der deutschen Industrie , and Martin Bormann . According to Speer, entrepreneurs were requested to contribute in appreciation for their profits from the economic boom. Bormann then distributed some of the donations to various party leaders on behalf of Hitler. At first it was

122-536: A 42 cm (17 in) calibre barrel, making it one of the largest artillery pieces ever fielded . The M-Gerät designed in 1911 as an iteration of earlier super-heavy German siege guns intended to break modern fortresses in France and Belgium and entered production in 1912. Test firing began in early 1914 and the gun was estimated to be finished by October 1914. When the First World War broke out,

183-512: A premature detonation and the other to British warships near Ostend in August 1917 and was rearmed with captured Russian 12 cm (4.7 in) howitzers. It and KMK Battery 10 were given the four Beta-M-Geräts made during the war in early 1918. For the German spring offensive , KMK Battery 8 was assigned to the 6th Army , Battery 6 to the 2nd Army, and Battery 3 to the 18th Army . The effect of

244-528: A specific portion of the M-Gerät, sans the gun carriage, which was its own wagon. These were towed by purpose-built, gas-powered tractors as the wagons were too heavy to be pulled by horses. To move across open country, the wagon wheels were fitted with articulated feet called radgürteln to reduce their ground pressure . Under optimal circumstances, the tractors and wagons could move at 7 km/h (4.3 mph). The 30.5-centimetre Beta-M-Gerät , called

305-677: A vast fortified zone on its border with Germany, while Belgium began construction of the National Redoubt in 1888. The German Empire also fortified its borders, but Chief of the General Staff Helmuth von Moltke the Elder desired the ability to break through Franco-Belgian fortifications. Although German artillery had been effective during the Franco-Prussian War , it had been allowed to stagnate. By

366-578: A voluntary donation, but during the following years it became more and more a forced contribution for some concerns. From the fund's inception through 1945 the NSDAP collected about 700 million  ℛ︁ℳ︁ (equivalent to €3 billion 2021). This German history article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Gustav Georg Friedrich Maria Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (born Gustav von Bohlen und Halbach ; 7 August 1870 – 16 January 1950)

427-635: The Gamma-Gerät began in 1906 and lasted until 1911. Although the Gamma-Gerät had the destructive power the General Staff required and could outrange French and Belgian fort guns, it could only be emplaced near rail lines and took 24 hours to prepare. As early as 1907, Krupp began development of siege artillery transported by gun carriage . Testing resulted in a 28 cm (11 in) howitzer transportable over road and countryside but it

488-590: The Beta-Gerät (Beta Apparatus) to disguise its purpose as a siege gun. Tests in the mid-1890s showed that the Beta-Gerät could not destroy French or Belgian forts, even with improved shells. Interest in a more powerful siege gun waned until the Russo-Japanese War , during which the Japanese Army used 28 cm howitzer L/10 (28 cm (11 in) coastal guns) brought from Japan to end

549-465: The M-Gerät would be complete by October 1914. Assembled and emplaced, the M-Gerät weighed 42.6  t (47.0 tons ), was 4.5 m (15 ft) tall, 10 m (33 ft) long and 4.7 m (15 ft) wide, and sat on a steel base with a spade for bracing. This spade could be lifted out of the ground while the M-Gerät was emplaced to move it, giving it a traverse of 360°. The gun

610-492: The schwere Kartaune L/30, was developed in late 1917 to replace M-Gerät guns that had been rendered inoperable by premature detonation of shells. To increase the range of the M-Gerät and lower the likelihood of premature detonation, the APK selected a 9 m (30 ft)-long, 16 t (16 long tons; 18 short tons) naval barrel to be mounted onto the chassis of the M-Gerät . Two large spring cylinders were added to

671-422: The 5th Army , which amassed a total of 24 siege guns, the highest concentration of them during the war. The Battle of Verdun was opened on 21 February 1916 with an intense, nine-hour long artillery bombardment. The 42-centimetre guns had to suppress the artillery of Forts Vaux , Douaumont , Souville and Moulainville  [ fr ] but were unable to penetrate the concrete of the modern fortresses. On

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732-463: The Fort de Pontisse on 12 August, which surrendered after two days. The battery next moved to the Fort de Liers but the fort surrendered as the battery was being emplaced. KMK Battery 3 relocated to the Fort de Loncin , where Gérard Leman directed the defence of Liège. Firing commenced on 15 August and lasted two hours, as the 25th shot fired struck a magazine and caused an explosion that destroyed

793-550: The Prussian State Council from 1921 to 1933. Krupp was an avowed monarchist , but his first loyalty was to whoever held power. He once left a business meeting in disgust when another industrialist, who was the one hosting the meeting, referred to the late President Friedrich Ebert as "that saddlemaker" (Der Sattelhersteller) . Krupp initially opposed the Nazis , yet, after Hitler became chancellor of Germany, at

854-517: The Tiger I tank, Big Bertha and the Paris Gun , among other inventions, under Gustav. Following World War II , plans to prosecute him as a war criminal at the 1945 Nuremberg Trials were dropped because by then he was bedridden, senile, and considered medically unfit for trial. The charges against him were held in abeyance in case he were found fit for trial. Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach

915-567: The Weimar government , Krupp secretly began the rearming of Germany with the ink barely dry on the treaty of Versailles . It secretly continued to work on artillery through subsidiaries in Sweden , and built submarine pens in the Netherlands . In the 1930s, it restarted manufacture of tanks such as the Tiger I and other war materials, again using foreign subsidiaries. Krupp was a member of

976-611: The Western Front with 240 men. On 4 August, the 1st Army arrived near Liège , Belgium , the first objective of the Schlieffen Plan and began the Battle of Liège . Although German troops entered the city on 7 August, its forts were firing upon the road to be taken by the 2nd Army and had to be reduced. Heavy artillery began their attack on 8 August. KMK Battery 3 was the first siege battery sent into battle to bombard

1037-581: The secret meeting with Adolf Hitler and leading German industrialists on February 20, 1933, he contributed one million Reichsmark to the Nazi party's fund for the March 1933 election , which enabled Hitler to take control of the government. After Hitler won power, Krupp became, as Fritz Thyssen later put it, "a super Nazi", and contributed to the Adolf Hitler Fund of German Trade and Industry which

1098-558: The 11-month long Siege of Port Arthur . In 1906, Helmuth von Moltke the Younger became Chief of the General Staff and instructed the APK to study and improve the performance of the Beta-Gerät . The APK recommended a more powerful gun, with a diameter as large as 45 centimetres (18 in), but the German Army opted for a 30.5-centimetre howitzer , the Beta-Gerät 09 and a 42 cm (17 in) gun. Design and testing for

1159-560: The 1850s provoked an arms race between artillery and military architecture. Rifled artillery could now fire out of range of fortress guns, so military architects began placing forts in rings around cities or in barriers to block approaching armies. These forts were vulnerable to new artillery shells, which could penetrate earth to destroy masonry underground. In response, star forts evolved into polygonal forts , mostly underground and made of concrete with guns mounted in armoured, rotating casemates . Combining rings and barriers, France created

1220-470: The 1880s the barrel diameter of the German Army's most powerful gun, the 21 cm (8.3 in) field howitzer, was no longer adequate against fortresses. Moltke began requesting more powerful guns that same decade. More powerful artillery became essential to his successor, Alfred von Schlieffen , who planned quickly to defeat France by sweeping through Belgium (the Schlieffen Plan ) in response to

1281-479: The 1893 Franco-Russian Alliance . To be able to reduce French and Belgian fortresses, the Artillerieprüfungskommission  [ de ] (Artillery Test Commission, APK) formed a partnership with Krupp AG in 1893. The first result of this partnership was a 30.5 cm (12.0 in) mortar , accepted into service four years later as the schwerer Küstenmörser L/8, but known as

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1342-691: The 42-centimetre guns. The name has since entered the public consciousness, for example being applied as a moniker to a line of Callaway golf clubs and a satirical French-language magazine and a bond-buying policy by Mario Draghi , President of the European Central Bank . Two M-Gerät guns were surrendered to the US Army at Spincourt in November 1918. One was taken to the United States, evaluated and then put on display at

1403-480: The German Army was reorganised in late 1918, only Battery 5 had M-Gerät guns, and schwere Küstenmörser (SKM) Battery 3 was assigned the remaining two Beta-M-Gerät guns. By June 1914, the prototype M-Gerät howitzers had returned to Essen for final adjustments and would have been formed into a reserve artillery battery on completion in October. On 2 August 1914, they were organised into KMK Battery 3 and sent to

1464-524: The German flank on 24–25 August and 9 September, prompting General Alexander von Kluck of the 1st Army to send the III Reserve Corps to seize Antwerp. It arrived and partially surrounded Antwerp from the south-west on September 27, and bombardment began the next day. KMK Battery 3 arrived on 30 September and opened fire on the Fort de Lier  [ nl ] , whose artillery narrowly missed

1525-535: The Germans occupied Maubeuge on 8 September. With Maubeuge taken, German siege guns were available for an attack on Paris , but Germany's defeat at the Battle of the Marne blocked the advance of the 1st and 2nd Armies, and the guns were instead sent to Antwerp . King Albert I had ordered a general retreat to Antwerp on 18 August, and his army arrived in the city two days later. From Antwerp, Albert made attacks on

1586-529: The Germans took and held forts X, Xa and XI against counter-attack, compelling the Russians to abandon Przemyśl. German troops entered the city on 3 June, then took the remaining forts two days later. From 8 August, KMK Battery 6 supported the XXXX Reserve Corps in its attack on Kaunas Fortress by bombarding Kaunas's three westernmost forts. Although the German siege artillery's shelling of Kaunas

1647-585: The Krupp company became a member and major funder of the Pan-German League (Alldeutscher Verband) which mobilised popular support in favour of two army bills, in 1912 and 1913, to raise Germany's standing army to 738,000 men. By World War I , the company had a near monopoly in heavy arms manufacture in Germany. At the start of the war, the company lost access to most of its overseas markets, but this

1708-484: The M-Gerät. Due to losses from faulty ammunition and Allied counter-battery artillery , a smaller-calibre (30.5 cm (12.0 in)) gun called the Beta-M-Gerät was built and fielded from 1916 until the end of the war. It had a longer and heavier barrel that was mated to the M-Gerät 's carriage but was found to be less effective than the base gun. The quick advancement of artillery technology beginning in

1769-507: The artillery bombarded them. A 42-centimetre shell struck German troops attacking Fort XV, resulting in heavy casualties but the Germans took the forts. The Russians abandoned the outer ring on 18 August, allowing the Germans to open a hole in the inner ring and capture Novogeorgievsk the next day. The Russians abandoned fortresses wholesale during the Great Retreat . At Grodno , KMK Batteries 3, 5, and 6 were not even fully emplaced when

1830-494: The battery. The fort was abandoned by its garrison on 2 October, allowing KMK Battery 3 to attack and destroy the Fort de Kessel  [ nl ] in a day. The battery then moved to attack the Fort de Broechem  [ nl ] , which was also destroyed within two days. From 7 to 9 October, the Belgian army fled from Antwerp and the city surrendered on 10 October. Early in 1916, all 42-centimetre guns were assigned to

1891-716: The city. Following the defeat of the Western Allies at Charleroi and at Mons , the British Expeditionary Force withdrew past Maubeuge , their base of operations after arriving in France. On 24 August 1914, the advancing Germans arrived at the fortresses of Maubeuge and began the Siege of Maubeuge and its garrison of 45,000 soldiers. The next day, the VII Reserve Corps were left behind

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1952-415: The company's bottom line rose through the armaments contracts and production. She referred to him as "that certain gentleman" (Dieser gewisse Herr) and pleaded illness when Hitler came on an official tour in 1934. Her daughter Irmgard acted as hostess. Krupp suffered failing health from 1939 onwards, and a stroke left him partially paralysed in 1941. He became a figurehead until he formally handed over

2013-464: The death of her father, Friedrich Alfred Krupp . German Emperor Kaiser William II personally led a search for a suitable spouse for Bertha, as the Krupp empire could not be headed by a woman. Gustav was picked from his previous post at the Vatican. The Kaiser announced at the wedding that Gustav would be allowed to add the Krupp name to his own. Gustav became company chairman in 1909. After 1910,

2074-566: The family's shipyard in Kiel . Krupp's estate, the Villa Hügel, had a suite of rooms for Wilhelm II whenever he came to visit. During the occupation of the Ruhr in 1923, the directorate of the Krupp works ordered its employees to cease work, in line with the German policy of passive resistance to the occupation. A French military court sentenced Gustav Krupp to 15 years forced labour, though he

2135-619: The first M-Gerät in July 1912, delivered the following December, and a second in February 1913. Another two guns were ordered before the First World War on 31 July 1914, and then two more on 28 August and another pair on 11 November. Krupp eventually built 12 M-Gerät howitzers. The M-Gerät had to be assembled for firing and for transport was dismantled and towed in five wagons. These wagons, weighing 16 to 20 t (16 to 20 long tons; 18 to 22 short tons) each, were designed to hold

2196-434: The following day with 400 pieces of artillery. KMK Battery 3 fired upon the Fort de Marchovelette , which was destroyed on 23 August by a magazine explosion. The battery shifted its fire to the Fort de Maizeret , already under bombardment by four Austro-Hungarian Skoda 30.5-centimetre guns , and compelled its surrender. With the eastern forts occupied, the Germans entered Namur and the remaining Belgian forces evacuated from

2257-480: The fort. The Germans carried Leman, unconscious, out of Loncin, and the last two forts, Hollogne and Flémalle , capitulated on 16 August. With Liège captured, the 1st Army continued north-west while the 2nd and 3rd Armies marched to Namur , whose forts were undermanned, unmaintained, and poorly stocked with ammunition. The 2nd Army arrived on 20 August 1914 to open the Siege of Namur , but began their main attacks

2318-676: The fortress was evacuated on 3 September. The last deployment of M-Gerät guns on the Eastern Front was in October 1915, when KMK Battery 6 was attached to the German 11th Army as it invaded Serbia . The nickname "Big Bertha" appeared early in the war, when German soldiers named the guns Dicke Berta at the Battle of Liège, a reference to Bertha Krupp , who had inherited the Krupp works from her father. The name spread to German newspapers and then to Allied troops as "Big Bertha" and became slang for all heavy German artillery, but especially

2379-477: The front of the gun to counterbalance the new barrel, which had to be carried in a new carriage weighing 22 t (22 long tons; 24 short tons). Fully assembled, the Beta-M-Gerät weighed 47 t (46 long tons; 52 short tons) and had a maximum range of 20,500 m (67,300 ft). The propellant used to achieve that range caused three of the four Beta-M-Gerät guns to explode, forcing their crews to limit its range by 4,000 m (13,000 ft), defeating

2440-482: The gun before firing via a lanyard . The kurze Marinekanone (KMK) batteries that formed with M-Gerät guns were 3 (2 August 1914), 5 (June 1915), 6 (Summer 1915) and 7 (early 1916). Battery 3 was split in half in April 1916 to form 10 with a single M-Gerät each. The four Beta-M-Gerät guns produced were fielded by KMK Batteries 8 and 10 after their M-Gerät gun barrels had been destroyed by premature detonation. When

2501-567: The last owner of Krupp (succeeded by his Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Foundation ). Big Bertha (Howitzer) The 42 centimetre kurze Marinekanone 14 L/12 (short naval cannon), or Minenwerfer -Gerät ( M-Gerät ), popularly known by the nickname Big Bertha , was a German siege howitzer built by Krupp AG in Essen , Germany and fielded by the Imperial German Army from 1914 to 1918. The M-Gerät had

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2562-618: The main German armies to take the city. Bombardment of the forts began on 30 August, with KMK Battery 3 tasked with reducing Ouvrage Les Sarts (Fort Sarts) but it mistakenly shelled an interval fortification in front of Sarts. By 5 September, a hole in the fortress ring had been opened by German 21-centimetre guns, but they had by now exhausted their ammunition. To widen that gap, the siege guns then expended their remaining ammunition against Forts Leveau, Héronfontaine, and Cerfontaine on 7 September, and destroyed them in quick succession. The two remaining French forts surrendered that same day and

2623-718: The next morning, Krupp suffered a fit from which he never recovered. Following the Allied victory, plans to prosecute Gustav Krupp as a war criminal at the 1945 Nuremberg Trials were dropped because by then he was bedridden and senile. Despite his personal absence from the prisoners' dock, however, Krupp remained technically still under indictment and liable to prosecution in subsequent proceedings. Krupp died at his residence near Werfen , Salzburg in Austria on 16 January 1950. His widow died in 1957. He had eight children including Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1907–1967),

2684-406: The purpose of the longer L/30 barrel. Only four Beta-M-Gerät guns were modified from two M-Gerät guns and two Gamma-Gerät guns (a one- to two-month-long process per gun), but 12 L/30 barrels were built. German siege artillery had three types of projectiles: armour-piercing , high-explosive and intermediate. The armour-piercing shell was designed to smash through concrete and metal armour but

2745-412: The real reasons which made me undertake the changeover of the plants for certain lines of production for I had to expect that many people would not understand me Hitler had tried to gain entry to the Krupp factories in 1929, but was rebuffed because Krupp felt he would see some of the secret armament work there and reveal it to the world. Bertha Krupp never liked Hitler even though she never complained when

2806-557: The remaining two M-Gerät howitzers, to the American Expeditionary Force . On 2 May 1915, August von Mackensen launched the Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive . By the end of the month, his forces neared Przemyśl , which had been captured by the Russians from Austria-Hungary on 22 March 1915. KMK Battery 6 took part in the bombardment of forts X, Xa, XI and XIa, opened on 30 March. Two days later,

2867-455: The rest of the old elites were in the grip of the Party; the movement they had hoped to ride back into power upon had instead ridden them. Always flexible, Krupp cooperated with the new dictatorship. I wanted and had to maintain Krupp, in spite of all opposition, as an armament plant for the later future, even if in camouflaged form. I could only speak in the smallest, most intimate circles about

2928-531: The running of the business to his son Alfried in 1943. Krupp industries, under both his leadership and later that of his son, was offered facilities in eastern Europe and made extensive use of forced labor during the war. On 25 July 1943 the Royal Air Force attacked the Krupp Works with 627 heavy bombers, dropping 2,032 long tons of bombs in an Oboe -marked attack. Upon his arrival at the works

2989-783: The second day of the battle, both of KMK Battery 7's M-Gerät guns were destroyed by premature detonations and KMK Batteries 5 and 6 both lost an M-Gerät each to the same cause. Most of the siege guns at Verdun were moved north in July to participate in the Battle of the Somme , and by September the only M-Gerät units left in Verdun were KMK Batteries 3 and 6. In the final two years of the war, KMK batteries that suffered losses of their big guns had them replaced with smaller–calibre weapons. Those that remained primarily shelled field works and often had low survivability due to malfunctions or Allied counter-battery artillery . KMK Battery 10 lost one M-Gerät to

3050-402: The siege guns was negligible. For Germany's final offensive in July 1918, KMK Batteries 5 and 6 were reassigned to the 7th Army at the Marne, while Batteries 3, 8 and 10 went to the 1st Army at Reims . The batteries again had little to no effect, and Battery 10 became the last German siege battery to fire on a fort, the Fort de la Pompelle . In November 1918, KMK Battery 5 surrendered its guns,

3111-459: The two M-Gerät guns, still prototypes, were sent to Liège , Belgium, and destroyed Forts Pontisse and Loncin . German soldiers bestowed the gun with the nickname "Big Bertha", which then spread through German newspapers to the Allies, who used it as a nickname for all super-heavy German artillery. The Paris Gun , a railway gun used to bomb Paris in 1918, has historically been confused for

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3172-431: Was breech loaded , using a horizontally-sliding breech block and had a 5.04 m (16.5 ft) barrel that could be elevated to a maximum of 65°. The M-Gerät had a muzzle velocity of about 815 m/s (2,670 ft/s) and a maximum range of 9,300 m (30,500 ft). Post-prototype M-Gerät guns had a crew platform in front of the blast shield, a detachable breech, and solid wheels. The APK ordered

3233-451: Was a German foreign service official who became chairman of the board of Friedrich Krupp AG , a heavy industry conglomerate, after his marriage to Bertha Krupp , who had inherited the company. He and his son Alfried would lead the company through two world wars, producing almost everything for the German war machine from U-boats , battleships , howitzers , trains, railway guns , machine guns, cars, tanks , and much more. Krupp produced

3294-587: Was born 7 August 1870 in The Hague, Netherlands , to American-born Gustav von Bohlen und Halbach , and Sophie ( née Bohlen). His paternal grandfather, Arnold Halbach , served as Prussian consul in Philadelphia from 1828 to 1838. He was a grandson of Henry Bohlen and related to Charles E. Bohlen and Karoline of Wartensleben on his mothers side. He married Bertha Krupp in October 1906. Bertha had inherited her family's company in 1902 at age 16 after

3355-794: Was established in June 1933 to support the NSDAP . As president of the Reichsverband of German industry he led the effort to expel its Jewish members. Like many German nationalists, Krupp believed that the Nazis could be used to end the Republic, and then be pushed aside to restore the Kaiser and the old elites. When all parties were abolished and civil liberties suspended following the Reichstag fire and Hitler's grab for absolute power , Krupp found that he and

3416-494: Was fitted with a ballistic tip for range and accuracy. Shells for the 42-centimetre guns were generally 1.5 m (4 ft 11 in) long, weighed between 400 and 1,160 kg (880 and 2,560 lb), and were propelled via primer loaded into the gun with a brass casing. Siege artillery shells were produced in limited runs of varying quality. Beginning in early 1916, German siege guns began to suffer internal explosions due to faulty ammunition. Crews were required to disembark from

3477-405: Was largely ineffective against reinforced concrete. High-explosive shells were fitted with two charges and could be set to have no delay, a short delay or a long delay. If set to "no delay" the shell burst on impact. If set to a delayed detonation, it could penetrate up to 12 m (39 ft) of earth. Finally, the intermediate, or "short shell", weighed half as much as the high-explosive shell and

3538-475: Was more than offset by increased demand for weapons by Germany and her allies ( Central Powers ). In 1902, before Krupp's marriage, the company leased a fuse patent to Vickers Limited of the United Kingdom . Among the company's products was a 94-ton howitzer named Big Bertha , after Krupp's wife, and the Paris Gun . Gustav also won the lucrative contract for Germany's U-boats , which were built at

3599-600: Was rejected by the APK, as was Krupp's 30.5-centimetre model. Finally, in late 1911, Krupp and the APK developed a wheeled 42-centimetre howitzer, the 42-centimetre kurze Marinekanone 14 L/12 or Minenwerfer-Gerät ( M-Gerät ). The APK ordered its first M-Gerät in July 1912 and another in February 1913. Tests of the gun's mobility began in December 1913 and found that gas-powered tractors were best for pulling it. Test firing, at one point observed by Kaiser Wilhelm II , began in February 1914, and Krupp estimated that

3660-460: Was released on parole after six months once the German government abandoned its passive resistance strategy. The Versailles Treaty prevented Germany from making armaments and submarines , forcing Krupp to significantly reduce his labour force. His company diversified to agricultural equipment, vehicles and consumer goods. However, using the profits from the Vickers patent deal and subsidies from

3721-401: Was slow, the fortifications were outdated and were easily destroyed. The city fell on 18 August. To the south, KMK Batteries 3 and 5 participated in the siege of Novogeorgievsk , which the Germans had surrounded on 10 August. On 13 August, KMK Batteries 3 and 5 attacked with the siege guns from the north, shelling forts XIV, XV and XVI. On 16 August, German infantry stormed forts XV and XVI as

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