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Northover Projector
The Projector, 2.5 inch—more commonly known as the Northover Projector—was an ''ad hoc'' anti-tank weapon used by the British Army and Home Guard during the Second World War. With a German invasion of Great Britain seeming likely after the defeat in the Battle of France, most available weaponry was diverted to the regular British Army, leaving the Home Guard short on supplies, particularly anti-tank weaponry. The Northover Projector was designed by a Home Guard officer named Robert Harry Northover to act as a makeshift anti-tank weapon, and was put into production in 1940 following a demonstration to the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill.
The weapon consisted of a hollow metal tube attached to a tripod, with a rudimentary breech at one end. Rounds were fired with the use of black powder ignited by a standard musket percussion cap, and it had an effective range of between 100 and 150 yards. Although it was cheap and easy to manufacture, it did have several problems; it was difficult to move and the No. 76 Special Incendiary Grenades it used as one type of ammunition had a tendency to break inside the breech, damaging the weapon and injuring the crew. Production began in late 1940, and by the beginning of 1943 nearly 19,000 were in service. Like many obsolete Home Guard weapons, it was eventually replaced by other weapons, such as the 2-pounder anti-tank gun.
==Development==
With the end of the Battle of France and the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from the port of Dunkirk between 26 May and 4 June 1940, a German invasion of Great Britain seemed likely.〔Mackenzie, p. 20〕 However, the British Army was not well-equipped to defend the country in such an event; in the weeks after the Dunkirk evacuation it could only field twenty-seven divisions.〔Lampe, p. 3〕 The Army was particularly short of anti-tank guns, 840 of which had been left behind in France, leaving only 167 available in Britain; ammunition was so scarce for the remaining guns that regulations forbade even a single round being used for training purposes.〔
Given these shortcomings, any modern weapons that were available were allocated to the British Army, and the Home Guard was forced to supplement the meagre amount of outdated weapons and ammunition they had with ''ad hoc'' weapons.〔Mackenzie, pp. 90–91〕 One such weapon was the Northover Projector, the invention of Major Robert Harry Northover. Northover, an officer in the Home Guard, designed it to be an easily manufactured and cheap anti-tank weapon, costing just under £10 to produce, excluding the required tripod.〔Mackenzie, p. 94〕 The Major wrote directly to the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, with his design and arranged for Churchill to attend a demonstration of the Northover Projector. The Prime Minister approved of the weapon and gave it his personal endorsement, ordering in October 1940 that the weapon be mass-produced on a scale of one for every Home Guard platoon.〔
抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』
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