French 1920s Automatic 100mm Cannon?

[MakPengn]

Hello all,

I was recently looking through Ruelle's numerical repertoire of naval gun plans and found something almost too fantastical to believe on page 11:



The years on the right side appear to indicate that the project dates back to the 1920s. Have I misread things, or is this a mistake within the document? I could not find anything about a supposed 1920s automatic 100mm naval gun. Does anyone know anything about this?

 

[DWG]

If it's not a mistake, then the obvious question in an English-language source would be 'do they mean automatic, or just a semi-automatic breech?' (Which the 100mm/45 Mle 30 and 33 had). But I don't know whether Mitrailleur has the same mixed usage in French.

And of course just because something was a project doesn't mean it was a project that worked.

 

[Baumstein]

Hello all,

I was recently looking through Ruelle's numerical repertoire of naval gun plans and found something almost too fantastical to believe on page 11:

View attachment 779147

The years on the right side appear to indicate that the project dates back to the 1920s. Have I misread things, or is this a mistake within the document? I could not find anything about a supposed 1920s automatic 100mm naval gun. Does anyone know anything about this?

I did some research and even went to my local library (they rent a lot of military books) but nothing states about the usage or projects for a 100mm autoloaded gun from the 20s. the earliest for such type of gun being used by the french was the 50s, so this is kinda weird.

 

[fortrena]

For what it's worth, around 1930-35, the expression canon-mitrailleur seemed to be used in conjunction with automatic weapons of relatively small caliber (20 to 40 mm).

 

[Dilandu]

Could it be just the early designation for 100 mm/45 (3.9") Model 1930? AFAIK, this gun havr semi-automatic breech and rammer functions.

 

[MakPengn]

Almost a year later, I have decided to revisit this topic.

Apparently, it isn't a mistake; there's a file in the SHD listed as "CANON MITRAILLEUR de 10cm contre AVIONS".

https://www.servicehistorique.sga.defense.gouv.fr/ark/1658221

It is listed as a 1923-27 project; unfortunately, it doesn't appear to be digitized. Interestingly, it was last modified on 27/7/25, just two days after this thread was made.