Columnar smoke German anti-aircraft weapon

[EdStevens]

Here's a curiosity, and I wonder if anyone knows what the heck it refers to. I was reading my copy of "An Airman's Outings" and came across the following reference to a weird form of German AA:

"Soon we were treated to a display of the family ghost of the clan Archibald, otherwise an immense pillar of grey-white smoky substance that appeared very suddenly to windward of us. It stretched up vertically from the ground to a height about level with ours, which was then only five and a half thousand feet. We watched it curiously as it stood in an unbending rigidity similar to that of a giant waxwork, cold, unnatural, stupidly implacable, half unbelievable, and wholly ridiculous. At the top it sprayed round, like a stick of asparagus. For two or three months similar apparitions had been exhibited to us at rare intervals, nearly always in the same neighbourhood. At first sight the pillars of smoke seemed not to disperse, but after an interval they apparently faded away as mysteriously as they had appeared. What was meant to be their particular brand of frightfulness I cannot say. One rumour was that they were an experiment in aerial gassing, and another that they were of some phosphorus compound. All I know is that they entertained us from time to time, with no apparent damage."

Any expert out there on German anti-aircraft got any idea what this was?

FLAMING ONIONS.
Quote from "The Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-1918, Vol VIII. The Australian Flying Corps" F M Cutlack.
Glossary.
A form of incendiary and illuminating shell much used by the Germans. In appearance it was a string of fireballs. This shell was used both in order to point out the location of a machine to German Anti Aircraft batteries, and also against the machines themselves as a means of setting them on fire."

[EdStevens]

Unfortunately, this description is not of flaming onions, which gave the impression of a string of green balls slowly ascending towards the target. This one sounds more like the trail of a rocket, with an exploding warhead, but I am not aware of any rockets being used as anti-aircraft during the Great War (except Le Prieurs, of course).

Does anyone out there have the book entitled "Flak: German Anti-Aircraft Defenses 1914-1945" (Edward B. Westermann, 2001, University Press of Kansas)? I wonder if it contains any reference to experimental AAA that might be the culprit.

[GrzeM]

Though I know nothing about that subject, let's check this photo:
http://www.wwi-models.org/Photos/Arti/UFO/...CanDSCF5081.JPG
Caption says "British or German balloon gun" but it is only a supposition.
G.

[EdStevens]

Well, if nothing else it has me wondering what the poor fella positioned halfway up the barrel did to deserve that seat!

It's certainly an odd contraption. I can't really figure out how the breech works assuming it's a cannon. I guess the lever(s) on the side must cam the breech open partway up from the bottom? Or could it actually be something other than a conventional cannon?

[Vigilant]

Someone has been having you on, GrzeM. This exhibit is in the Imperial War Museum in London and is labelled (IIRC) as a German telescopic periscope - for viewing the front line from a safe distance.

Vig.

It is certainly a subject deserving more study.
Thinking for a while, I find that it is not Flaming Onions after all, which was the first thing I thought of;
unlikely to be poison gas as the wind was toward German lines most of the time;
perhaps just a smoke column marking a British aircraft for scouts or Ack ack guns;
or a (marine distress) rocket fired merely to mark a British plane.
If the column did mark a plane at the top, it also marked German positions at the bottom, and invited shellfire.

That gizmo is not a gun, as Vigilant says it's a battlefield periscope.

The Australian War Memorial has one on display as well.