Big Bertha (howitzer)

Big Bertha
One of the first Big Berthas being readied for firing
Type	Heavy siege gun
Place of origin	German Empire
Service history
Used by	Hungarian-Austrian empire and German Empire
Wars	World War I World War II
Production history
Manufacturer	Krupp
No. built	12
Specifications
Weight	47 tn (94,000 lb)
Length	5.88 m (19.3 ft)
Shell	HE; 820 kg (1,807 lbs)
Calibre	420 mm (16.5 in)
Elevation	+40° to +75°
Traverse	4°
Muzzle velocity	400 m/s (1,312 ft/s)
Effective firing range	12.5 km (7.8 mi)

Big Bertha (German: Dicke Bertha, lit. 'Fat (or heavy) Bertha') is the name of a type of super-heavy howitzer developed by the armaments manufacturer Krupp in Germany on the eve of World War I. Its official designation was the L/12, i.e., the barrel was 12 calibre in length, 42 cm (16.5 in) Type M-Gerät 14 (M-Equipment 1914) Kurze Marine-Kanone ("short naval gun", a name intended to camouflage the weapon's real purpose).

The howitzer was mainly designed by Krupp's Director of design, Professor Fritz Rausenberger, and his predecessor, Director Max Dreger (1852–1929). Many sources say that Bertha is a reference to Bertha Krupp, heiress and owner of the Krupp industrial empire. ("Dicke", meaning fat or big in German, is apparently not a reference to the physical aspect of Mrs. Krupp.) However, not all accept this connection, and the Germans gave numerous other nicknames to the M-Device.

Although the name "Big Bertha" subsequently came to be applied generically by the Allies to any very large German gun, such as the railway-mounted battleship guns known as "Langer Max" and the ultra-long range "Paris Gun", strictly speaking, Dicke Bertha, or Big Bertha, is only applicable to the 42-cm M-Gerät howitzer.

The Big Bertha had its genesis in the lessons learned by the Germans (and Austrians) from the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905. During the war, the Japanese had dismounted some of their coastal defence 28-cm howitzers and used them to help break the defences of the fortified Russian naval base at Port Arthur. This was a complete novelty as, until that time, it had been assumed by military experts that the largest transportable siege guns were around 20 cm in calibre. Nevertheless, most Europeans completely failed to draw the lessons the Japanese had taught—apart from, as mentioned, the Germans and Austrians (the latter also developed a series of road-mobile superheavy guns, including the 30.5-cm Schlanke Emma howitzer, the 38-cm Barbara and Gudrun howitzers, and their own 42-cm howitzer).