Hand grenades were another weapon that was heavily used by armies throughout the First World War during assaults on enemy trenches. When soldiers arrived a few metres away from enemy positions, they would hurl these grenades and cause heavy damage with their explosions. The Grenadiers were responsible for these attacks and their task was to advance towards enemy lines after teams of wire cutters would have breached gaps in the wire netting set up by the enemy. Hand grenades were also on a large scale to eliminate the enemy from caves, shelters and tunnels.
Hand grenades could be activated in two ways: they could be timed (with a fuse) or in percussion mode. For practical reasons soldiers preferred by far the first type because percussion hand grenades could explode even before being thrown at the enemy, by an accidental collision during an assault or as a result of a distraction.
Although they were invented several years earlier, during the First World War hand grenades underwent considerable improvements and increasingly became deadly offensive weapons. In 1915 the British also added metal splinters to the explosive which, upon their release, caused severe injuries to soldiers inside the trenches. The Germans fitted some models with gas and poisonous liquids and in this way linked an explosive weapon with a chemical substance while the French army managed to develop grenades that could be launched with a rifle at a distance of 400 metres.
The Italian forces were supplied with several different types of hand grenades. The type that was most widely used was the so called Snipe rubbing that was operated by means of a trigger that produced heat. A second type of grenade that was widely used was the Thévenot that was distributed to the Arditi and used during assaults a few metres away from enemy positions. This was not really a proper bomb but rather a petard which, with its powerful blast, left soldiers stunned and unable to fight. Finally along the Italian front there was also the "ballerina": this too consisted of a Thévenot to which a wooden handle and a piece of cloth (similar to the skirt of a ballerina) were added, thus giving greater stability at the moment of the launch of the grenade.
