Rail logistics

[Markus Becker]

How far away from a railhead could the various powers fight a battle? Particularly the Germans on the Western front. 

I'm not sure but I think it might have been less then 20km. 

The Entente in 1918 could probably better because they had more trucks at that time. 

[sunday]

Some WWI's armies had narrow gauge tracks almost to the front line trenches, and on our visit to the Vimy Ridge battlefield the docent stated that there were underground railroads to support assaults.

Of course, that is in a stationary front.

[Leo Niehorster]

3 hours ago, Markus Becker said:

How far away from a railhead could the various powers fight a battle? Particularly the Germans on the Western front. 

I'm not sure but I think it might have been less then 20km. 

The Entente in 1918 could probably better because they had more trucks at that time. 

WWII US Army, example: "Red Ball Express" in West Front 1944. OK — granted, it was from a beach head.

WWII Germany, for example, "Grossraumtransport" East Front:
Assuming half-way decent roads, the large capacity truck transport regiments days marching,. including loading and unloading of goods, stops and rests, averaged 300 km, but at times achieved up to twice as much.

Don't know exactly the distances involved, but I'm pretty sure the Afrika Korps trucks were covering a LOT more than 20 kilometers from port to front.

Leo

 

[Markus Becker]

We are in the other World War. The Prequel. 

[DougK]

3 hours ago, sunday said:

Some WWI's armies had narrow gauge tracks almost to the front line trenches, and on our visit to the Vimy Ridge battlefield the docent stated that there were underground railroads to support assaults.

Of course, that is in a stationary front.

One episode of some serialized documentary on trains in war covered this in some detail (the narrow gauge rail to front line support and artillery). 

[Stuart Galbraith]

This is a world war 1 armoured simplex. This was used by the British Army to take supplies up to the front line on the western front, hence the reason why the locomotive is fully enclosed. Must have been murder on a hot day.

 

The usual method was to use standard gauge locomotives to haul the stuff to a railhead, then use the light rail to take it forward as far as they could. I think this was primarily for hauling artillery rounds. Considering you had the supply trenches, there would have been no actually need to take it as foward as the actual firesteps. I would imagine as far back as the guns was a beaten zone however.

The main line locomotives would have been stuff like this, or Dean goods. This one is in the marking sof the Railway Operating Division, and this actual locomotive seems to have been actually used in that unit.

 

[Argus]

On 7/7/2025 at 4:23 AM, Markus Becker said:

How far away from a railhead could the various powers fight a battle? Particularly the Germans on the Western front. 

I'm not sure but I think it might have been less then 20km. 

The Entente in 1918 could probably better because they had more trucks at that time. 

WWI rough rule of thumb; horse drawn radius from a rial head was 7-10 miles, motor transport 30ish miles. It's basically how far can you get as a round trip in a day with a full load.  Youtube for ' Rob Thompson WWI ' and you'll get a good slug of WWI logistics  

[Markus Becker]

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