Talk:Beneath Hill 60

Unknown Shotguns

I think I can perhaps shed some light on these. They are cut-down/sawn-off Lee-Enfield rifles which the tunnelers have, no doubt, modified for use in the confined spaces in which they work. Whilst I have come across some discussions over whether such field-modifications were made in reality (revolvers or pistols might have been a better option, but given the ingenuity of some soldiers...), cut-down rifles were mounted on the outside of tanks in the Second World War and used to discharge smoke munitions as you can see from the following image link:

http://www.diggerhistory.info/images/tanks/tank-matilda-smoke.jpg

Hope this helps out, I saw the film only last week and dearly enjoyed it, it seems to me that Australian war films seldom put a foot wrong, I have not seen a bad one. Stransky 12:50, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

No Kidding

Thanks a lot mate, I didn't know they used sawn-off .303 rifles. It's really hard to make them out because you can only see them in the dark tunnels, it took me a while to get the two screenshots I used. Anyway, appreciate it!

...No problem, I think you can just make out the trigger and magazine on the second screenshot you posted. It is rather interesting that shotguns weren't really brought up to the front by the British/Commonwealth forces given the ammount of commercially available shotguns in Great Britain (it is perhaps for this reason that the Germans didn't risk using shotguns either). One could imagine how effective they might have been in sweeping trenches clear. Of course, the United States didn't have such reservations later on when it came to the various models of "Trench-Gun". Stransky 10:36, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I heard somewhere that both the Germans and Commonwealth had men quipped with shotguns whose job was specifically to kill enemy carrier-pigeons. I can't say for sure if that's actually true though. Jimmoy 12:28, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

I've come across the same information as well. I've also read that the Germans kept the practice of killing enemy carrier-pigeons in WWII. --Jcordell 17:49, 26 November 2010 (UTC)