25 mm Hotchkiss anti-tank gun

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canon de 25 mm SA mle 1934
The 25 mm SA mle 1934 anti-tank gun at Saumur Armour Museum.
TypeAnti-tank gun
Place of originFrance
Service history
Used byFrance France
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany
 United Kingdom
 Italy
 Finland
Romania Romania[1]
Republican Spain
WarsSpanish Civil War
Winter War
World War II
Indochina War
Production history
Designed1934
ManufacturerHotchkiss
No. built6,000
VariantsSA-L mle 1935
SA-L mle 1937
Specifications
Mass480 kg (1,058 lbs)(modèle 1934)
Barrel length1.8 m (5 ft 11 in) 72 caliber
Crew4
Shell25 × 193.5 mm R, AP
Shell weight320 g (.70 lbs)
Caliber25 mm (0.98 in)
CarriageSplit-trail
Elevation-5° to +21°[2]
Traverse60°
Rate of fire15–20 rounds/min
Muzzle velocity918 m/s (3,012 ft/s)
Effective firing range1 km (3,300 ft)
Maximum firing range1.8 km (1.1 mi)

The 25 mm Hotchkiss anti-tank gun was a French anti-tank gun from the 1930s, built by the Hotchkiss arsenal, that saw service in the Spanish Civil War, the Second World War and the Indochina War.

Light and mobile, it could be improvised into a portée weapon by its users.

Development[edit]

25 mm Hotchkiss anti-tank gun 25 SA 34, on display at Saumur Général Estienne museum.

By the early 1920s the French Army had come to the realization that the armour-piercing capability of the 37 mm TRP infantry gun would be insufficient against modern tanks. In 1926 Hotchkiss proposed a 25 mm in-house design developed by its design office. This model was accepted for service in 1934 under the designation canon de 25 mm semi-automatique modèle 1934 ("25 mm semi-automatic gun model 1934", generally shortened to canon de 25). At the outbreak of World War II, it was the main anti-tank weapon of the French infantry. By May 1940, there were reported to be 6,000 in service with the French Army, although some formations were still waiting for their full allocation.[3]

A canon de 25 being towed by a Renault UE prime mover with trailer, 25 July 1940.

In action in the Battle of France in 1940, it was found that the projectile had little effect against tanks. It did often penetrate the German tanks of 1940 (which had no more than 30 mm armour plate thickness), but destroyed or killed little inside, as it had no exploding charge. German tank crews were often able to bail out of a tank under 25 mm fire and return to their perforated tank later, to continue operations. It remained capable of penetrating armoured cars and other light armoured vehicles throughout WW2.[4] In 1935 the Hotchkiss 25 mm anti-tank gun was purchased for evaluation by the US Army.[5] Turkey bought 400 examples of the gun during the interwar period.[6] During the Spanish Civil War, a few examples of the Hotchkiss gun reached the anti-Franco Republican forces. Some were mounted on captured Panzer I tanks.[7]

French soldiers serving a Hotchkiss antitank gun during the Phoney War, January 1940.
French prisoners from the 158th Infantry Regiment, pass by a damaged 25mm Hotchkiss AT gun in Thulin, Belgium, 23 May 1940.

Variants[edit]

  • 25 AC mle 1934: So-called de forteresse (fortress version), adopted to equip the Maginot Line. The 25mm gun was not used alone but as a mixed weapon. It was therefore associated with a twinning of Reibel machine guns sharing the same ball joint in a "trumelage"[8] which had a single sight, common to both types of weapons. The length of the tube was reduced depending on the type of bell in which the trumelage was to be mounted, the length of the field gun being kept by the mounting in the casemate.[9]
  • 25 APX SAL 35: Shortened version, designed in 1935 in the Puteaux workshops (hence the acronym APX) to equip the Panhard 178 armoured car.
  • 25 APX SAL 1937: a lengthened 77 caliber derivative designed by the APX with a much lighter 300 kg (660 lb) carriage.[10] Some examples were used by the Romanian Army.[11]

Combat use[edit]

France[edit]

At the outbreak of World War II, the 25 SA-L model 1934 was assigned to almost all armored and anti-tank units of the French army, while the 25 SA-L model 1937 was used in support companies of the infantry battalions.[10]

Men of the British Expeditionary Force train with a Hotchkiss 25mm anti-tank gun during the Phoney War, November 1939.

Despite its low caliber which forced its crew to target precisely the weak points of the opposing tanks, it remained for the time a powerful anti-tank gun against the Panzer II, III and IV which constituted the majority of the German tanks during the invasion of France by the Nazi regime. The 25 illustrated itself at the Battle of Stonne, during the first combat of May 15, 1940 where a single 25mm gun laying in ambush on the edge of the village neutralized 3 Panzer IV tanks in 5 minutes.[12] During the defense of Rouen on June 9, 1940, when one of them located at the foot of the old Corneille bridge placed in its line of sight the German tanks which descended the rue de la République and fired several shots, destroying two panzers.[13] According to another version of the facts, a Renault R35 tank, laying in ambush near the barricade, would be at the origin of the destruction of one of the two panzers; in any case, it cannot have been caused by the Renault FT tanks as they were only equipped with machine guns.

Britain[edit]

When the British Expeditionary Force landed in France in 1939 it had insufficient numbers of anti-tank weapons such as the Ordnance QF 2 pounder. They were issued 300[6] canons de 25 which became known as Anti-Tank Gun, 25 mm. Hotchkiss, Mark I on 25 mm. Carriage, Mark I in British service. The BEF was fully mechanised and attempted to tow the weapon behind their vehicles, but quickly found that it was not robust enough because British troops had been issued with the hippomobile version of the cannon (designed to be towed by horses). The solution was to use the gun as a portée, that is, carried in the back of a truck. It was the first artillery piece to be used in this way.[14]

Germany[edit]

German gun crew of four men with a 2,5 cm Pak 113(f) in Northern France, 21 June 1942.

Falling in large numbers into the hands of the Germans after the defeat of 1940, the gun was put back into service with the Wehrmacht under the designation 2,5 cm Pak 112(f) for mle 1934 guns and 2,5 cm Pak 113(f) for mle 1937 guns, with the (f) for französische ("French").

Italy[edit]

Some captured guns also made it into Italian service in North Africa as alternatives to the Solothurn S-18/1000,[15] under the designation cannone da 25/72.

Finland[edit]

Finnish PstK/34 "Marianne" ready to fire during the Continuation War, 25 July 1941.

Finland purchased 50 French 25 mm APX M/37 anti-tank guns during the Winter War through Aladar Paasonen, but only 40 of them were delivered in February 1940 through Norway. The remaining ten guns were captured by the Germans when they invaded Norway in the spring of 1940. About half of the guns, which had arrived during the Winter War, saw front line service and three of them were lost in battle. During the Interim Peace the Germans sold 200 captured guns to Finland. 133 of them were model M/34s and 67 were model M/37s, and they were designated 25 PstK/34 and 25 PstK/37, respectively, bearing the nickname of "Marianne".[16] They then served in the Continuation War, until being withdrawn from front line service by 1943.[17]

Viet Minh[edit]

Some were used by the Việt Minh at the beginning of the First Indochina War.[18]

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ American Military Institute, 1996, The Journal of Military History, Volume 60, p. 720
  2. ^ Chamberlain, Peter (1974). Anti-tank weapons. Gander, Terry. New York: Arco Pub. Co. p. 4. ISBN 0668036079. OCLC 1299755.
  3. ^ Chapman, Guy (2013), Why France Collapsed, Bloomsbury Reader, ISBN 978-1448205134 (Appendix A)
  4. ^ Henry, Chris (2004). British anti-tank artillery 1939-45. Brian Delf. Oxford: Osprey Publishing. p. 11. ISBN 1-84176-638-0. OCLC 56644738.
  5. ^ Zaloga, Steven J. (2005). US Anti-tank Artillery 1941–45. Oxford: Osprey Publishing. p. 3. ISBN 1841766909.
  6. ^ a b Garraud, Philippe (2005), La politique française de réarmement de 1936 à 1940: une production tardive mais massive., Guerres mondiales et conflits contemporains, 4/2005 (n° 220), p. 97-113.
  7. ^ Parada, George (2007). "Panzerkampfwagen I". Achtung Panzer. Archived from the original on 5 April 2018. Retrieved 9 April 2021.
  8. ^ Mary, Jean-Yves (1980). La Ligne Maginot: ce qu'elle était, ce qu'il en reste. Paris: SERCAP. p. 143. ISBN 2-7321-0220-2. OCLC 12420190.
  9. ^ Truttmann, Philippe (1992). La Muraille de France ou, La ligne Maginot (3e éd ed.). Thionville, France: Gérard Klopp. p. 178. ISBN 2-906535-12-5. OCLC 28038113.
  10. ^ a b Beck, Alain. "Canon antichar de 25 mm SA-L modèle 1934". Matérials Terrestres 39/45: Seconde Guerre Mondiale au 1/35e. Archived from the original on 2015-04-02. Retrieved 9 April 2021.
  11. ^ "Puteaux ATG?". Romanian Military History Forum. Archived from the original on 2014-04-07. Retrieved 9 April 2021.
  12. ^ Becker, Loïc (April–August 2019). "Stonne, mai 1940: Échec à la « Großdeutschland » !". Magazine Ligne de Front (in French) (80): 19. Archived from the original on 2021-11-04. Retrieved 2021-04-09.
  13. ^ Le Trevier, Paul (2010). 9 juin 1940, ce jour où Rouen tomba. Bonsecours: Comever-de Rameau. ISBN 978-2-9522138-5-1. OCLC 887535422.
  14. ^ Bishop, Chris (1998). The encyclopedia of weapons of World War II. Chris Bishop. New York: Barnes & Noble Books. p. 190. ISBN 0-7607-1022-8. OCLC 40924461.
  15. ^ "Italian Divisional Organizations tipo Africa Settentrionale (A.S.)". Archived from the original on 2012-04-02. Retrieved 2012-04-02.
  16. ^ Käkelä, Erkki (2000). Marskin panssarintuhoojat: Suomen panssarintorjunnan kehitys ja panssariyhtymän panssarintorjuntayksiköiden historia [Marski's armor destroyers: the development of Finnish armor control and the history of the armor group's armor control units] (in Finnish). Helsinki: W. Söderström. pp. 120, 165, 228. ISBN 951-0-24638-7. OCLC 49530194.
  17. ^ "Finnish Army 1918-1945: Anti-Tank guns Part 1". Jaeger Platoon. Archived from the original on 2005-12-16. Retrieved 9 April 2021.
  18. ^ Windrow, Martin (20 Sep 2018). French Foreign Légionnaire vs Viet Minh Insurgent: North Vietnam 1948–52. Combat 36. Osprey Publishing. p. 26. ISBN 9781472828910.

References[edit]

External links[edit]

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