The French 75 was designed as an anti-personnel weapon system for delivering large volumes of time-fused shrapnel shells on enemy troops advancing in the open.

In typical use the French 75 could deliver fifteen rounds per minute on its target, either shrapnel or melinite high-explosive, up to about 8,500 m (5.3 mi) away.

Its firing rate could even reach close to 30 rounds per minute, albeit only for a very short time and with a highly experienced crew.

Several thousand were still in use in the French Army at the opening of World War II, updated with new wheels and tires to allow towing by trucks rather than by horses.

The forerunner of the French 75 was an experimental 57 mm gun which was first assembled in September 1891 at the Bourges arsenal under the direction of Captain Sainte-Claire Deville.

This 57 mm gun took advantage of a number of the most advanced artillery technologies available at the time: The only major design difference between the 57 and 75 that would emerge was the recoil system.

But even before the 57 entered testing, in 1890 General Mathieu, Director of Artillery at the Ministry of War, had been informed that Konrad Haussner, a German engineer working at the Ingolstadt arsenal, had patented an oil-and-compressed-air long-recoil system.

Krupp would later reject Haussner's invention, due to insoluble technical problems caused by hydraulic fluid leakage.

After reviewing the blueprints in February 1892, the French artillery engineers advised that a gun should be produced without purchasing the Haussner invention.

Hydraulic fluid leakage was typical of this experimental phase of artillery development during the 1890s, as Haussner and Krupp had previously experienced.

Two young military engineers from Ecole Polytechnique, Captains Etienne Sainte-Claire Deville and Emile Rimailho, continued development and introduced an improved version in 1896.

These and other modifications achieved the desired result: the long-term retention of hydraulic fluid and compressed air inside the recoil system, even under the worst field conditions.

The independent sight had also been perfected for easy field use by the crews, and a nickel-steel shield was added to protect the gunners.

The barrel was attached near the breech to a piston rod extending into an oil-filled cylinder placed just underneath the gun.

That second cylinder contained a freely floating piston which separated the surging oil from a confined volume of compressed air.

Each recoil cycle on the French 75, including the return forward, lasted about two seconds, permitting a maximum theoretical firing rate of about 30 rounds per minute.

They had been designed for the specific purpose of inflicting maximum casualties on enemy troops stationing or advancing in the open.

In 1918, a boat-tailed shell (with a superior ballistic coefficient) which could reach 11,000 metres (12,000 yd) was deployed for use during the latter part of the war.

[8] This rate of fire, the gun's accuracy, and the lethality of the ammunition against personnel, made the French 75 superior to all other regimental field artillery at the time.

All the essential parts, including the gun's barrel and the oleo-pneumatic recoil mechanisms were manufactured by French State arsenals: Puteaux, Bourges, Châtellerault and St Etienne.

The total production of 75 mm shells during World War I exceeded 200 million rounds, mostly by private industry.

[citation needed] In the case of Verdun, over 1,000 French 75s (250 batteries) were constantly in action, night and day, on the battlefield during a period of nearly nine months.

The total consumption of 75 mm shells at Verdun during the period February 21 to September 30, 1916, is documented by the public record at the Service Historique de l'Armée de Terre to have been in excess of 16 million rounds, or nearly 70% of all shells fired by French artillery during that battle.

However, its shells were comparatively light and lacked the power to obliterate trench works, concrete bunkers and deeply buried shelters.

Thus, with time, the French 75 batteries became routinely used to cut corridors with high-explosive shells, across the belts of German barbed wire.

Britain also purchased a number of the standard 75 mm guns and adapted them for AA use using a Coventry Ordnance Works mounting, the "Centre Trunnion".

During his service with the American Expeditionary Forces, Captain (and future U.S. President) Harry S. Truman commanded a battery of French 75s.

During the 1930s, most M1897A2 and A3 (French made) and M1897A4 (American made) guns were subsequently modernized for towing behind trucks by mounting it on the modern carriage M2A3 which featured a split trail, pneumatic rubber tires allowing towing at any speed, an elevation limit increased to 45 degrees, and traverse increased to 30 degrees left and right.

[29] When the French Army discarded its 105 HM2 howitzers to replace them with MO-120-RT mortars,[30] only 155 mm artillery pieces remained, for which no blank cartridges were available.

The 75 was also innovatively used to mitigate avalanche risk at Alta Ski Area by Monty Atwater after returning from service in WWII.