The Australian Short 25pdr pack howitzer

- Australian Artillery -

Australian built QF25Pdr field gun

The experience in Papua battling the Imperial Japanese had obviously shown the need for an air-portable artillery gun. On the suggestion from the Director of Artillery in September ’42 Brig O’Brien began to modify the standard 25pdr, (see photo above) reducing the weight by having it easier to pack and transport, by shortening the barrel and could be broken down into fourteen assembled parts.

As the push grinded its way forward the entrenched Japanese in strong concrete bunkers were being stubborn, but this time however the Diggers had their own "secret weapon". Two Australian designed and manufactured short calibres 87.6mm projectile firing howitzer guns, dismantled and manhandled, led up the track from Port Moresby and poured seven hundred rounds into the invading enemy positions. The wild screaming of soldiers and the yelling of Japanese orders bore adequate testimony to the audacity of the fire mission in disrupting the enemy and coolly directed by an observation officer only three hundred yards from the target area.

By early ’43 the modified guns began proper operational trials on the fields of tropical New Guinea with the 2/1 Fld Rgt and a year later to other artillery units up in the jungle covered hills and razorback spurs of the mountainous terrain. At the 2/7 Fld Rgt the historian reckons that the "baby" 25pdr – ‘the short – was admired for its innovation and appreciated for the pack transport arrangement but had its limitations…."it swung when fired and using Charge III the sights would go off line"…. It seems the Short was an excellent jungle addition to the traditional 25pdr yet wouldn’t replace the original.

The AIF 7 Division entered Lae 16 September ’43 with substantial artillery support and the campaign here at Nadzab, Lae New Guinea, was the first operational use of the short 25pdr. One gunner recalled; "had little confidence in accuracy of the stubby, each time it fired the gun leapt and tried to stand on its tail, came down off line, embedded in the mud, with cut off barrel the charge was still firing after the shell left the muzzle, the crew seemed to suffer shell-shock after lengthy firing".

The AIF 9th Division after an amphibious landing, experienced jungle warfare for the first time, and having to cross several flooded rivers yet the subsequent landing and advance was an achievement in securing a springboard for the next operation. The Short had a shorter range than the original 25pdr and 18/25pdr with expediently improvised gun carriage, but could be dismantled and reassembled rapidly, transported on a wooden barge, watercraft or small vehicle, the US Jeep and trailer, and pack horse or mule train.

The 7th Division, having already campaigned through the jungles of Papua, commanded by an ex-artilleryman Maj-Gen Vasey, had the light section of 4 officers and 30 others formed into a parachute unit armed with two of the new short 25pdrs for an operational drop. So when the C/O of the US 503rd Parachute Regiment heard their were troops to adorn a chute and that had not volunteered the para’s traditional way, he addressed them and stated that anyone wished to withdraw take a pace forward….he waited….not a gunner flinched. Anyway the Light artillery Section, and its disassembled two short 25pdrs, boarded the allocated five C-47 Dakotas, headed into the wild blue yonder, at 600feet over the Markham Valley, got that sinking feeling at the command ‘Stand To The Door ! Lieut Pearson the commanding officer was first followed by the others, then the weapons & equipment and the pusher-out’ers last of all. One para-gunner was injured, one short 25pdr was assembled, ready, registering ranges at targets within half an hour and the second parachuted artillery piece took five days to find and to gather the parts together.

The AIF 25Bde, including 54 Bty with an array of eight ordinary 25pdr guns, air landed at Nadzab to support the capture of Lae. Horner points out the difficulty of moving large calibre guns through the jungle covered mountains, to supply them sufficiently with heavy ammunition to support the infantry against resolute Japanese defensive positions. In June ’44 the review on the order of battle (OOB) for an ‘Jungle Division was changed to include a new artillery deployment scheme, two field artillery regiments each with two battery’s of authentic 25pdrs and one battery of the modified short 25pdr – Corps troops had one medium artillery regiment, one field artillery regiment and one tank attack regiment (towed 6pdrs), one Light Anti-Aircraft regiment. By July ’45 there were thirteen field regiments in action as well as a mountain battery, three tank attack Rgts and several AA rots & Btys.

At Bougainville on the west coast at Torokina area, after MacArthur moved Uncle Sam north to return to the Pi, the first Australian battalion to take the fight to the Japanese up in the steep hills in the north was supported by a battery of the 4 Fld Rgt equipped with eight short 25pdrs, in action 25 November ’44. By the time the advancing Australian infantry reached extreme range the strange shortened artillery pieces were replaced by standard 25pdrs in mid-Jan ’45. And because of the steepness of the terrain trees had to be cleared for a fire mission over the crest of the forward escarpment at Japanese defended lines of resistance. The 2nd Mountain Battery had four 75mm pack howitzers and carried by hand and foot on somebody’s back forward to Pearl ridge, from which you can see both sea-sides to the resource rich island. Then the artillery unit advanced with the forward battle line troops onwards fighting towards the east coast in turn relieved by conventional 25pdrs early June ’45. At the amphibious landing on the south east coast of Borneo at Klandasan beach, Balikpapan.

The 9 Bty, 2/5 Fld Rgt from the complete AIF 7 Division, landed first after the assault wave and had difficulty moving the Australian Short 25pdr guns forward through the soft sand and destroyed debris. We must pay tribute to the hard work, perspiration and blood of the artillerymen whose efforts in getting the big guns up the oozing mud, jungle tangled, back breaking mountain ranges, and was one of the many highlights of the Papua-New Guinea Campaign here marked by the mastery of the impossible.