No. 77 Smoke Grenade

A Number 77 hand grenade is a smoke grenade containing phosphorus in the main body. 

Phosphorus is a chemical that, once exposed to air, instantly catches fire and burns through everything that it touches. The only way to extinguish it is to stop air getting to it, eg to be totally under water.

This hand grenade is fitted with a Number 247 All-ways fuze. It is called an All-ways fuze as it works at any angle or position.

It would have been used to generate a smoke screen to allow Auxiliers to escape, or against enemy gun positions, pillboxes, vehicles and aircraft, fuel and ammunition dumps.

To throw this grenade, the Bakelite cap was unscrewed and removed but the cloth tape must stay in place. After the hand grenade is thrown, the cloth tape, which has a weight on the end of it, starts to unwind and pulls out the safety pin. The cloth tape and safety pin fall completely away from the grenade. The grenade is now armed and when it hits something the steel ball in the All-ways fuze pushes the firing pin forward to set the grenade off.

These were stored and transported in a B167 green box . A B167 box contains 9 cardboard tubes. In the end of one of these tubes is the double ended, wooden bodied detonator holder, which held the detonators for arming the No. 77 grenades. This meant the B167 box contained everything that is needed to use the No 77 grenades. Grenades are never stored fully ready and armed for safety, so they cannot be accidentally set off.