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The Bofors 40 Millimeter Automatic Cannon
The Bofors 40 millimeter automatic cannon is a modified version of the M1 air-cooled version originally produced for the U.S. Army. Maximum range is 10,750 yards. Anti-aircraft ceiling is 23,500 feet. Ammunition is loaded from the top in 4 round clips. A complete round weighed 4.75 lbs.; the high explosive projectile it fired weighed 1.985 lbs. The rate of fire is 120 rounds per minute.
The Oerlikon 20 Millimeter Automatic Cannon
The Oerlikon 20 millimeter automatic cannon was fielded by the U.S. Navy in 1942 to replace the M2 Browning machine gun. The ammunition is in a 60 round drum magazine that fits on the top of the gun. The most common ammunition fired was a high explosive-tracer or high explosive-incendiary which weighed approximately one half pound. The maximum range was 4,800 yards with a ceiling of 10,000 feet. When aiming manually, the effective range against aircraft rarely exceeded 1,000 yards. The practical rate of fire was between 250 and 320 rounds per minute.
The Commander
The commander of the boat, known as the “skipper”, operated the PT boat from the cockpit seen here. Two PT boat skippers received the Congressional Medal of Honor in World War II. John D. Bulkeley was awarded the Medal of Honor for the operation that took General Douglas MacArthur, his family and Philippine officials from Corregidor to the southern Philippines as the islands fell to the Japanese. Bulkeley retired in 1988 as a Vice Admiral after 59 years of active duty. Arthur Murray Preston was awarded the Medal of Honor for the rescue of a downed Navy pilot off Halmahera Island. This rescue took place within 200 yards of heavily defended Japanese positions and his boat was under fire for over two hours.
Other famous PT boat skippers included John F. Kennedy, 35th president of the United States; Douglas Fairbanks Jr., movie actor; Howard Baker, White House Chief of Staff under President Reagan; Robert Montgomery, movie actor; Alfred and George Vanderbilt, millionaires and Byron White, Supreme Court Justice, retired 1993.
Information courtesy of The World War II PT Boat Museum and Archives: Germantown, Tennessee.
The museum’s advisor on the PT-309 exhibit is Captain Ken Prescott, USN (Ret), skipper of PT-48 and PT-61.
