Artifacts recovered from German wreck in Kolobrzeg - video

The workers of the Museum of Polish Arms in Kołobrzeg can be proud of another success. This time, they succeeded in lifting an anchor windlass and a German Oerlikon anti-aircraft gun together with its naval base from the seabed. The work was carried out on Friday, November 9th, as part of the “Wraki Kołobrzegu” project, which we have already described.

[blockquote style=”2″]”The German wreck, which sank in 1945 near Kołobrzeg, provides the Museum of Polish Arms with many interesting exhibits, including a Polish cannon from September 1939 and now a German Oerlikon anti-aircraft gun on a naval base. We are tempted to say that we have excavated the “Independence Cannon” from the sea and thus the Museum of Polish Arms in Kołobrzeg inaugurated the 100th anniversary of regaining independence by Poland in a rather original way,” said Aleksander Ostasz, the director of the Museum of Polish Arms in Kołobrzeg.[/blockquote]

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The German Oerlikon gun is actually a 20mm calibre automatic cannon. It was designed in 1914 by Reinhold Becker, and the best proof of how good a design it turned out to be is that, with some modifications, it has been used, and still is, in many armies around the world.

The history of this armament is extremely interesting. The first user was the German Empire Army, fighting on the fronts of the First World War. However, as a result of the defeat, under the Treaty of Versailles, the Reich lost the right to produce the armament, and the cannon patent was bought by the Swiss company SEMAG, which was later taken over by Werkzeug Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon.

In the 1930s the Oerlikon was produced under licence in many European countries. Interestingly, it enjoyed great popularity among the Allies. After the fall of France in 1940, representatives of the Oerlikon-Bührle company smuggled the design plans to Great Britain and the USA.

The Poles also had their own episode in the case of this weapon. Our engineers working in Great Britain simplified the whole construction and produced a version under the name Polsten.

It was most popular on Royal Navy and US Navy vessels, although there were cases of the Oerlikon being mounted on aircraft or as an anti-tank weapon. Its popularity only waned with the mass transition to the 40mm calibre cannon of the legendary Swedish brand Bofors.

[blockquote style=”2″], “I invite everyone to cooperate and appeal for help in saving memorabilia of people who created the widely understood “Polish Maritime Economy”, we are also looking for forgotten or unwanted monuments of maritime technology. We are interested in old equipment, photographs and documents. Our activities are guided by the idea of saving as many relics of maritime technology as possible”. – appealed A. Ostasz.[/blockquote]

We also add our voice to this appeal. We hope that it will reach as many recipients as possible and translate into further successes of the Museum of Polish Arms in Kołobrzeg.

Source: museum, wikipedia.org
Photo: Museum of Polish Arms