The Vickers machine gun or Vickers gun is a water-cooled .303 British (7.7 mm) machine gun produced by Vickers Limited, originally for the British Army. The gun was operated by a three-man crew, but typically required more men to move and operate it: one fired, one fed the ammunition, the others helped to carry the weapon, its ammunition, and spare parts. It was in service from before the First World War until the 1960s, with air-cooled versions of it on many Allied World War I fighter aircraft.
The weapon had a reputation for great solidity and reliability. Ian V. Hogg, in Weapons & War Machines, describes an action that took place in August 1916, during which the British 100th Company of the Machine Gun Corps fired their ten Vickers guns to deliver sustained fire for twelve hours. Using 100 barrels, they fired a million rounds without breakdowns. "It was this absolute foolproof reliability which endeared the Vickers to every British soldier who ever fired one. It never broke down; it just kept on firing and came back for more.""The Vickers gun accompanied the BEF to France in 1914, and in the years that followed, proved itself to be the most reliable weapon on the battlefield..."
History
The Vickers machine gun was based on the successful Maxim gun of the late 19th century. After purchasing the Maxim company outright in 1896, Vickers took the design of the Maxim gun and improved it, inverting the mechanism as well as reducing its weight by lightening and simplifying the action and using high strength alloys for certain components. A muzzle booster was also added.
The British Army formally adopted the Vickers gun as its standard machine gun under the name Gun, Machine, Mark I, Vickers, .303-inch on 26 November 1912. There were shortages when the First World War began, and the British Expeditionary Force was still equipped with Maxims when sent to France in 1914. Vickers was threatened with prosecution for war profiteering due to the exorbitant price demanded for each gun. As a result, the price was much reduced. As the war progressed, and production numbers increased, it became the British Army's primary machine gun, and was used on all fronts during the conflict. + Vickers machine gun production during WWI1914 (Aug.–Dec.) 1915 1916 1917 1918 Total 266 2,405 7,429 21,782 39,473 71,355 When the Lewis Gun was adopted as a light machine gun and issued to infantry units, the Vickers guns were redefined as heavy machine guns, withdrawn from infantry units, and grouped in the hands of the new Machine Gun Corps. When heavier calibre machine guns appeared, the tripod-mounted, rifle-calibre machine guns such as the Vickers were further re-classified as "medium machine guns". After the First World War, the Machine Gun Corps (MGC) was disbanded and the Vickers returned to infantry units.
Before the Second World War, there were plans to replace the Vickers gun as part of a widescale change from rimmed to rimless rounds; one of the contenders was the 7.92mm Besa machine gun (British-built Czech ZB-53 design), which eventually became the British Army's standard tank-mounted machine gun. However, the Vickers remained in service with the British Army until 30 March 1968. Its last operational use was in the Radfan during the Aden Emergency. Its successor in UK service is the British L7 variant of the FN MAG general purpose machine gun.
Use in aircraft
In 1913, a Vickers machine gun was mounted on the experimental Vickers E.F.B.1 biplane, which was probably the world's first purpose-built combat aeroplane. However, by the time the production version, the Vickers F.B.5, had entered service the following year, the armament had been changed to a Lewis gun.
During World War I, the Vickers gun became a standard weapon on British and French military aircraft, especially after 1916, initially in a single gun configuration (Nieuport 17, SPAD VII, Sopwith Triplane), increased to a twin-gun standard in later war fighters (Nieuport 28, SPAD XIII, Sopwith Camel), with exceptions such as the S.E.5, which had a single synchronized Vickers and a Lewis gun mounted above the upper wing. Although heavier than the Lewis, its closed bolt firing cycle made it much easier to synchronise to allow it to fire through aircraft propellers. The belt feed was enclosed right up to the gun's feed-way to inhibit the effect of wind. Steel disintegrating-link ammunition belts were perfected in the UK by William de Courcy Prideaux in mid-war and became standard for aircraft guns thereafter. From 1917 to 1919, French Manufacture d'armes de Châtellerault produced under license .303 Vickers machine guns (240 were delivered before the Armistice) but most of the French aircraft Vickers machine guns were British-made.
By 1917 it had been determined that standard rifle calibre cartridges were less satisfactory for shooting down observation balloons than larger calibres carrying incendiary or tracer bullets; the Vickers machine gun was chambered in the 11mm Vickers round, known as the Vickers aircraft machine gun and sometimes the "Balloon Buster", and was adopted by the Allies as a standard anti-balloon armament, used by both the British and French in this role until the end of the war.
The famous Sopwith Camel and the SPAD XIII types used twin synchronized Vickers, as did most British and French fighters between 1918 and the mid-1930s. In the air, the weighty water-cooling system was rendered redundant by low temperatures at high altitude and the constant stream of air passing over the gun (and lack of any need for sustained fire such as employed by ground troops); but because the weapon relied on boosted barrel recoil, the (empty) water-holding barrel jacket or casing was retained. Several sets of louvered slots were cut into the barrel jacket to aid air cooling, a better solution than that which had initially been attempted with the 1915-vintage lMG 08 German aircraft ordnance.
In 1918 the slotted modified original barrel jacket was replaced with a slimmer jacket on the Mk. II version, and in 1927 a muzzle flash suppressor was added on the Mk. II*.
As the machine gun armament of US and UK fighter aircraft moved from the fuselage to the wings in the years before World War II, the Vickers was generally replaced by the faster-firing and more reliable Browning Model 1919 using metal-linked cartridges. The Gloster Gladiator was the last RAF fighter to be armed with the Vickers, later replaced by Brownings. The Fairey Swordfish was fitted with the weapon until production ended in August 1944.
Several British bombers and attack aircraft of the Second World War mounted the Vickers K machine gun or VGO, a completely different design, more closely resembling the Lewis gun in external appearance.
Vickers machine guns, designated as models E (pilot's) and F (observer's, fed from a pan magazine) were also used among others in Poland, where 777 of them were converted to 7.92×57mm Mauser cartridge in 1933–1937.
Use in armored vehicles The water-cooled Vickers Mark VI, Mark VI* and Mark VII were versions of the Mark I for use in tanks. They were introduced in 1936 and declared obsolete in 1944 (though they and the vehicles they were installed in were still in reserve use until the 1960s). They could be installed with either a left-hand or right-hand feed block. The Mark VI and VI* Tank Patterns were conversions of old stock Mark Is while the Mark VII Tank Pattern was new production.
Variants
The larger calibre (half-inch) version of the Vickers was used on armoured fighting vehicles and naval vessels. The Gun, Machine, Vickers, .5-inch, Mk. II was used in tanks, the earlier Mark I having been the development model. This entered service in 1933 and was obsolete in 1944. Firing either single shot or automatic, it had a pistol type trigger grip rather than the spades of the weapon.
The Gun, Machine, Vickers, .5-inch, Mk. III was used as an anti-aircraft gun on British ships. This variation was typically four guns mounted on a 360° rotating and (+80° to −10°) elevating housing. The belts were rolled into a spiral and placed in hoppers beside each gun. The heavy plain bullet weighed and was effective for the range. The maximum rate of fire for the Mark III was about 700 rpm from a 200-round belt carried in a drum. They were fitted from the 1920s onwards, but in practical terms, they proved of little use. During the Second World War, the naval version was also mounted on power-operated turrets in smaller watercraft, such as Motor Gun Boats and Motor Torpedo Boats.
The Mark IV and V guns were improvements on the Mark II. Intended for British light tanks, some were used during the war on mounts on trucks by the Long Range Desert Group in the North Africa Campaign.
Foreign service
The Vickers was widely sold commercially, and saw service with many nations with their own ammunition. It was modified for each country and served as a base for many other weapons. For example: 6.5×50mmSR Arisaka 6.5×52mm Carcano 6.5×53.5mmR (.256 Mannlicher) 7×57mm Mauser and 7.5×55mm Swiss 7.62×51mm NATO 7.62×54mmR 7.62×63mm (.30-06 Springfield) 7.65×53mm Argentine — In very small numbers with Argentina and Belgium. 7.7×58mm Arisaka — Licensed as the Type 89 "fixed type" machine gun 8×50mmR Lebel — 2,000 ordered by France in 1914, but only 52 delivered.
Service after World War II
The Union of South Africa retained a large inventory of surplus Vickers machine guns after World War II. Many of these were donated to the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) and National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) during the Angolan Civil War. Angolan militants were usually trained in their use by South African advisers. Small quantities re-chambered for 7.62 mm NATO ammunition remained in active service with the South African Defence Force until the mid-1980s, when they were all relegated to reserve storage. Six were withdrawn from storage and used by a South African liaison team operating with UNITA during the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale, after which the weapons were finally retired.
In the mid-1960s, the Vickers machine gun remained in service in countries such as India, Israel and Egypt. It saw action with the Ceylon Army in the 1971 JVP insurrection.
In the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine the Vickers machine gun has repeatedly been used by the Ukrainian National Guard to destroy Russian HESA Shahed 136 drones.
Colt–Vickers M1915
By the early 1900s, the U.S. military had a mixed collection of automatic machine guns in use that included M1895 "potato diggers", 287 M1904 Maxims, 670 M1909 Benét–Mercié guns, and 353 Lewis machine guns. In 1913, the U.S. began to search for a superior automatic weapon. One of the weapons considered was the British Vickers machine gun.
Field tests were conducted of the Vickers in 1914, and the gun was unanimously approved by the board for the army under the designation "Vickers Machine Gun Model of 1915, Caliber .30, Water-Cooled". One hundred twenty-five guns were ordered from Colt's Manufacturing Company in 1915, with an additional 4,000 ordered the next year, all chambered for .30-06. Design complexities, design modifications, and focus on producing previously ordered weapons meant that when the U.S. entered World War I in April 1917, Colt had not manufactured a single M1915.