Literally, ‘We don’t worry because we will have them with that’. Hommage to the famous French 75 mm quick-firing field gun, introduced in 1898, and recognised as the first true modern artillery piece.
And you get two for the price of one today, as here’s an earlier French card (reverse below), once again ‘To the Glorious 75’. On firing, its hydro-pneumatic recoil system kept the gun’s wheels still, allowing subsequent shots to be fired without re-aiming; average crews could fire fifteen rounds per minute, experienced men, for a short period of time, close to thirty!
The Poilus would have won the ‘beard’ war too!
No question!
That’s one helluva rate of fire! I bet there were more than a few injuries trying to reload that fast. Must have been quite something to see them in action
Mustn’t it just. The gun, and by extension its crews, was widely admired by the Germans.
I suggest the “with that” being pointed to by the Poilus means they’ll smoke ’em out of the trenches and wherever. That’s some pipe.
Ah, but the Germans had Meerschaums with which to counterattack…….
So… it was all really the Battle of the French army issue Vuillard versus the Meerschaums – we know who won even though I would have put my smoking money on a cool smoke Meerschaum to woo the low quality army issue loose tobacco Vuillard smokers out of the trenches.
Seriously – a future topic could be about “Tobacco in the trenches” of WW1. My basic research on WW1 tobacco, pipes and cigarettes found some interesting comments on British, French, German, Russian and American attitudes and ration issues. Pipes ranged from the elaborate Regimental designs to French army issue. The Brits for example, abandoned their Peterson pipes in favour of cigarettes which were used as currency – two fags for a trench haircut.
Yeah, I will consider it. Although the schedule is very full, even without these postcards. As you will see soon, there’s Part Two of the Dirty Bucket Camp explosion coming soon, and I have found out loads more since the Red Farm post.
Bonjour Monsieur MagicFingers,
Merci beaucoup mon homme!
Tried to find Miss Page. Had no luck. 63 Lupus St., Pimlico, SW1, City of Westminster, is Andrew Reeves Estate Agency. On the other side of Ranelagh Rd, where Number 65 should be, is a fenced off empty block of land which presumably in May 1915 was a row of houses, much like numbers 53 – 61. Or perhaps Miss Page was involved with the Churchill Gardens Primary Academy?
Note my online French language lessons having an impact…
À plus tard… peut-être!
Daisy.
Bonjour Daisy. Je suis vraiment impressionné!!! Et vous êtes les bienvenus. Pity you had no luck with Miss Page – there will doubtless be others in the future, should you wish to delve.