Wooden Machine Gun Bullets?

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Prof Young

New member
Am reading Beyond Band of Brother. Richard Winters writes about overtaking a German machine gun "nest" and finding belts of wooden bullets in with the live ammo.

Anyone know what that's all about?

Prof Young
 
Wooden practice ammo was used in field manoeuvers to reduce the chances of injuries where live ammo would be fired. They were supposed to be fired with a muzzle attachment that shredded the bullets as they exited the muzzle. It's possible that some of that practice ammo was issued to front line troops.
 
Interesting

First heard about these, from some old WW-II vets and not sure how credible it is. This time it was the Japanese forces that were using them, on our GI's. Supposedly it would and eventually kill the wounded. Also, it took more recourses to attend the wounded. I recall seeing these bullets but do not "really" know where they came from .... :confused:

Be Safe !!!
 
I have read about them and guess they would make sense if you try and conserve Resorces. I don't think they would be my first choice.
 
Any intentional combat use is pure BS. The wood bullets were essentially blanks for MGs, as they would allow recoil-operated MGs to function.
 
My Grandfather had a 30-06 cartridge with a wooden bullet in his gun cabinet. It fascinated me over 50 years ago. The bullet constantly fell out because lack of neck tension.

I’m sure the primer was either a dummy or expended. It was clear the wooden bullet had not traversed a barrel. So… I saw one when I was a kid. My grandfather served in WWI.
 
Interestingly, I've never heard of wooden bullets as machine gun ammo. What I have heard of, and even have some of are wooden bullet training rounds in 6.5mm.

They are intended for use in bolt action rifles. The wooden bullet was there so the rounds would feed. I know the Swedes did that, and yes, there was a muzzle device that splintered the wooden bullet on firing. That's why some Swede rifles have the threads at the muzzle.

I believe the Dutch also used some, and while I'm not certain, I think the Japanese might have used them as well. That would explain the stories of the "bamboo bullets" (wood bullets) told by some GIs.

They were NEVER intended as combat ammunition. That doesn't mean they never got used by someone in a desperate situation, only that there's nothing official about it.

The rounds I have are Dutch, I think, I know they're not Swede, the case is too small, the bullets are a purple color, long and RN. And they're on a Mauser stripper clip.
 
Weren't wooden bullets used for launching rifle grenades? I can't recall if that was WWI or II before they switched to a bakelite type.
 
Training ammunition pressed into service in the absence of regular ball. I've numerous accounts of the Germans using them in my upcoming book on WW2 sniping. Strictly short range stuff.
 
They might have been issued to a Volksturmunit, when the Third Reich was crumbling and falling apart and issuance of weapons and supplies became haphazard.
 
I did some asking around, and it seems that the incidents of finding wooden bullet machine gun ammo in fighting positions comes from Normandy. I have not, yet, found any reports from Gis in Europe finding wood bullet machinegun ammo any where else.

SO, what I think likely is that, in the rush to man their fighting positions, some groups simply grabbed ALL the ammo they had, and took it to the MG position(s). This would explain finding the wooden bullet ammo there, and do note, that any wood bullet ammo found, had not been fired...

I can easily imagine a German MG gunner or loader, opening a can of ammo and discovering it was wood bullet training ammo, and tossing it aside until he got to the real ammo, leaving it to be found by GIs when they took the position, and assuming that it was actually being used by the guns against them.

Personally, I don't think I'd use the wood bullet training ammo in combat unless it was the very last ammo belt I had, and I'm damn sure I wouldn't try to take it with me if I had to abandon the position....
 
Found this:

https://en-academic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/6030239

"It was a copy of the German Schiessbecher grenade launcher. Two grenades were produced for the launcher: a 30 mm calibre grenade and a larger 40 mm calibre grenade, both designated Type 2. The launcher sits over the end of the barrel, held in place with a clamping device. A special crimped blank cartridge or wooden bullet is used to fire the grenades."
 
While a wooden bullet could be used to fire grenades, did they ever use a MG platform do it? My suspicion would be in the waning days of the war, the Nazis using anything and everything they had left.....and that wasn't much.
 
Interesting thread, learned something completely new here.

Would Be interesting if someone fired these into ballistic gel.
 
While a wooden bullet could be used to fire grenades, did they ever use a MG platform do it?
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While I've learned to "never say never" when it comes to this kind of thing, I seriously doubt that they ever used a machine gun to fire rifle grenades. Simply because there is no evidence that any of the machine guns were ever fitted with the rifle grenade launching device. There was simply no point to doing so. if you've got rifle grenades, odds are really good somone handy has the rifle to fire them.

Likewise, I've never seen any information about any German MG that was fitted with a bayonet. Kind of pointless. pardon the pun.

The Japanese, on the other hand, DID have an LMG that took their rifle bayonet.

Would Be interesting if someone fired these into ballistic gel.
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You can perhaps, find a modern equivalent in the W.German training ammo used during the 70s (no idea if it is still in use today).
7.62mm NATO, it was a plastic case which included the bullet, as one piece, attached to a brass case head (for function). When fired the plastic bullet tore off and went down the barrel at tremendous speed, 5,000 fps or so I heard. BUT, being very light (something like 17gr) it lost speed very rapidly (and accuracy was about zilch). We were told it was lethal to about 15 feet or so, so it wasn't harmless, but it wasn't dangerous at longer ranges. I did get told that if you got hit by one at 25m it hurt like a sumbitch...:eek::D but I have no personal experience with that. :rolleyes:

A wooden bullet would be a little bit heavier, so wouldn't go quite as fast and would likely be dangerous a bit further out than the plastic ones. Fired into ballistic gel, I would expect very shallow penetration and very rapid veering off in some direction, assuming the wooden bullet didn't simply shatter immediately.
 
In the Normandy Campaign the Germans deployed a number of "Ost" battalions of "volunteers" from East Europe, the USSR. Even the Germans considered them unreliable, perhaps that's what those GIs encountered.
 
there were a number of "Hiwi"s in Normandy. These "helpers" (Hilfswilligen - willing helpers, aka volunteers) were NOT combat troops. Generally they were pows, primarily from the eastern front, who volunteered to work for the Germans to get out of the pow camps. They were issued a version of the German uniform, and used as step and fetch labor and construction labor, primarily. Few of them could speak or read more than a few words of German.

This does not mean they never saw combat, as in Normandy (and some other places) the war came to them, and they were, of course at the bottom of the German priority list for movement resources.

I can easily see a situation where these laborers are told to load a truck, and putting every box of ammo on it without knowing (or caring) what was in the boxes. So training ammo could very easily have found its way to the front lines, or just could have been there, when the front lines came to it.
 
there were a number of "Hiwi"s in Normandy. These "helpers" (Hilfswilligen - willing helpers, aka volunteers) were NOT combat troops. Generally they were pows, primarily from the eastern front, who volunteered to work for the Germans to get out of the pow camps. They were issued a version of the German uniform, and used as step and fetch labor and construction labor, primarily. Few of them could speak or read more than a few words of German.
Click to expand...

There's a Korean language film (English subtitles) called My Way that follows a Korean conscript and the son of the Japanese general who was in charge of Korea as they grow up, compete against each other in marathons, then fight the Russians.
SPOILER ALERT
They end up in a Russian POW camp, forced into the Russian army, fight against the Germans, end up in the German army, and are found by the allies at Normandy. Apparently based loosely on a true story.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1606384/
 
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