flaming onions?

what is this, white phosphorous charges? Was this a particularly German delicacy? Did this actually hurt anybody? Just how effective was it?
I've heard rumours about it, but I was curious as to where I could find tangible documentation of these munitions and as to their deployment.
Jarrod

[BillyH]

Greetings Jarrod: The 'flaming onion' was the descrition Allied airmen gave to the string of the balls of light (20 in nnumber) fired by what the Germans called 'Licht pucker' or light spitter. This gun was designed as a five barrel revolving gun along the style of our Gatling gun, previously mentioned in my thread of yesterday. This gun produced in 1895 could fire standard 37mm shells or pyrotechnical shells. These guns were usually deployed as air defense for balloons vs attackers, and could reach an altitude of about 5K feet. Elliot Springs thought that if one of those onions hit, you'd be hamburger meat. Luke was hit by a standard 37mm round and it killed him. There is a picture of this gun in one of the issues of OTF, and a schematic in a military book catalog, Shiller's I believe, on German artillery 1870 to 1910. Billy H.01/17/99.

At the time many allied airmen thought these "balls of light" were attached to each other by wire cable and intended to shred an aircraft. It was probably the most feared weapon used agaist them.

[Michael Skeet]

Revolving cannon were originally developed in the 1880s for use on capital ships as anti-torpedo boat weapons. The French were the first, I believe, and the original Hotchkiss revolving cannon was still being used in WWI, albeit not in its original form. If I recall correctly, the first aircraft-mounted cannon in French service consisted of modified single barrels taken from the three-barrel Hotchkiss.

My understanding of "flaming onions," though, is that the glowing balls were actually the 37mm tracer rounds fired to aid in aiming with this early flak gun.

[Lufbery]

Billy,

You said Luke was hit by a standard 37mm cannon shell and that's what killed him. If you're talking about Frank Luke, I always thought that he was shot down and then killed by rifle fire when he refused to surrender.

I'm an infrequent visitor to this board, so I hope you'll forgive me if this has already been discussed in great depth.

-Drew

groovy... it makes more sense... since they'd be about the size of fiery lil' onions anyway, I suppose. ouch, 37 mm, huh... and yeah, I think I recall Luke getting killed by a lot of munitions... now that you mention it. Luke was pretty good... but does anybody ever mention his compadre Joe very much... he had a pretty impressive, albeit short, string of victories too. Willy Coppens had the biggest tally for the balloons, am I right?
anyway
thanks again.

[BillyH]

Greetings Drew: The affidavit of 1962, taken by Colonel Royal Frey from eyewitnesses to FL's demise has Luke hit by a 'revolver gun' meaning that 37mm gatling type described in first reply to Jarrod's thread. This wound forced him to land, and the witnesses say that the Jerries never fired at him; that he was DOA. If you want more details on this, ask Barrett Tillman to lend you his review copy of my book, The September Rampage, which I should have titled "Everything you wanted to know about Frank Luke..." EOM: Billy H; 01/19/2000.

[BillyH]

Friend Jarrod: I do not know what Coppen's balloon tally was, but believe it was spread out over one or two years. What makes Luke's score of 14 Bs in 8 days is that he depleted the German Balloon Line in the Meuse-Argonne so quickly that the Germans could not replace them in time to stall the second phase of our offensive there. Refer to my reply to Drew and see if you can get Barrett to lend you my book, as it has all of the details. EOM, Billy H: 01/19/2000.

My belief was that the flaming onion effect was caused by the quick rate of fire of the gun, hence several rounds close together making the effect. I remember reading about Robert Little attacking one in a Pup, something about a falling leaf spin, a quick strafing run then heading home. Sorry no exact details on that one.

Mark

willy coppens scored all of his victories from 25 April 18 to 14th october 18. the first ballon victory was 8th may 18.He shot down 3 balloons in one day on 3 occasions and 2 Ballons in one day on
4 different dates.on the 22nd july 18 he shot down 3 balloons in 6 minutes...He lived through the war losing his leg on 14 october 18 as a result of his last battle.
Hardly a flash in the pan!

chris