I've only seen 1 - 2 rounds per minute quoted which sounds about right. The Morser firing cycle was fairly slow because the barrel had to be brought down to 0 deg to load the projectile. The projectile weighed about 112 kg so it had to be stretchered onto the loading table and rammed into the breech by a bunch of guys on a long rammer. I guess a well trained gun crew could shave a few seconds off the firing cycle but the main consideration is that everything is done correctly - you don't shortcut drills when you're handling large amounts of explosive.
Regards,
Charlie
-- Edited by CharlieC on Friday 9th of September 2011 08:08:16 AM
Judging from this image (http://landships.activeboard.com/t38720856/21cm-mrser-m1016-and-drkopp-artillerie-kraftschlepper) from Drakegoodman it looks like the crew for a 21cm Morser would have been 14 - 16 men.
Now you have me wondering about crew size. There is no telling how many of the soldiers, if any, are part of the crew for the 21cm howitzer in the image. For all we know, they could be members of the tranport unit that is moving the gun. However, it is quite common to see images of heavy artillery with lots of soldiers in the scene, particulalry when moving the piece, which may mean that several gun crews are present to help get the gun in or out of postion. Yet, it seems to me that to keep up a sustained rated of fire requires quite a few crewman to service the gun and handle the munitions.
There are a couple of images of 21cm Morsers and the crews on Landships II - http://landships.info/landships/artillery_articles.html?load=/landships/artillery_articles/21cm_Morser_m10.html. A count of the number of crew in shot gives 12-14 men.
