How long it took to repair the gun is not known but it was apparently returned to service with the Boers in the eastern Transvaal. Only once the war had ended was the gun discovered by Colonel Urmston’s column, near Roos Senekal. From the inscription on this gun it is safe to say that this was the Surprise Hill howitzer, the gun that was
damaged and remade at the Z.A.S.M. workshop. This photograph shows the gun at Peninsula Barracks, Winchester, the site of the headquarters of The Rifle Brigade and its sister regiments. It dates probably from the 1930’s but the gun is no longer there. What eventually happened to it can only be guessed at. In 1941 during the darkest days of the Second World War, Winston Churchill made an appeal for the British population to turn in all metal items to assist the war effort. All kinds of things went into the melting pot – including pots and pans, fence posts and railings, indeed anything of metal that could be used to make armaments. Numbers of trophy guns around the country suffered this fate and the 12cm Krupp was probably melted down and turned into guns for another war.
damaged and remade at the Z.A.S.M. workshop. This photograph shows the gun at Peninsula Barracks, Winchester, the site of the headquarters of The Rifle Brigade and its sister regiments. It dates probably from the 1930’s but the gun is no longer there. What eventually happened to it can only be guessed at. In 1941 during the darkest days of the Second World War, Winston Churchill made an appeal for the British population to turn in all metal items to assist the war effort. All kinds of things went into the melting pot – including pots and pans, fence posts and railings, indeed anything of metal that could be used to make armaments. Numbers of trophy guns around the country suffered this fate and the 12cm Krupp was probably melted down and turned into guns for another war.
