Monday, October 23, 2017

Rockwall Gun Club Presents Famous Guns in History: Gatling Gun

Odds are you won’t see a Gatling Gun in action very often, however this iconic weapon certainly notable in the series of Famous Guns in History.  Many historians are quick to point out that our country may never have known President Teddy Roosevelt if not for this famous machine.


The fast-firing mounted gun served to help the Rough Riders and Buffalo Soldiers when they made their charge up Kettle Hill and later San Juan Hill.  The Gatling fired over 18,000 rounds on the Spanish defensive positions in a very short period of time causing President Roosevelt to remark, “They folded like jackrabbits.” 

The Gatling gun is one of the most well-known early rapid-fire, spring-loaded, hand-cranked weapons and is the forerunner to the modern machine gun.  Its namesake comes from being the brain-child of Dr. Richard Gatling.  Dr. Gatling wrote that he created the weapon in an effort to reduce the size of militias and thus reduce the number of deaths by combat, and to show how futile war can be. 

The original Gatling gun was a field weapon which used multiple rotating barrels turned by a hand crank, which fired loose metal cartridge ammo through a hopper.  The multiple barrels limited overheating, and the rotating mechanism coupled with a gravity-fed reloading system that allowed unskilled operators to achieve a very high rate of fire, a necessary achievement considering the gunner was a top target for sniper fire.

During the Civil War the utilization of the Gatling gun was not as common as Dr. Gatling thought it would be, however the weapon saw increased action during the siege of Petersburg as well as on Gun Boats.  Union Commanders had to personally purchase the weapon for their units as the U.S. Army did not accept them until early in 1866 after a sales rep demonstrated the effectiveness of the gun in live combat, greatly impressing the Generals enough to purchase over 200 units. 

The gun was used as a “shock-and-awe” tool during the draft dodger riot in July of 1863 after being brought in by the National Guard from Philadelphia. 

General Custer owned four Gatling Guns, but refused to bring them during his march to Little Big Horn due to their large size, making them difficult with which to travel. 

This now famous weapon was eventually sold world-wide between 1870 & 1890.  In 1885 it was used by the Canadian Military against Metis rebels during the Northwest Rebellion, and saw action for the British during the Zulu encounters in Africa before becoming the main weapon used to expand European Colonial Empires.  The down-side to the Gatling was its heavy weight and cumbersome artillery carriage, making it hard to keep up with advancing troops, particularly in area such as Cuba where roads were non-existent.  In 1893, the Gatling was adapted to fire a new .30 Army smokeless cartridge laying down between 800-900 rounds per minute. 

The Gatling Gun was eventually replaced by newer machine guns, but its name and iconic status endures today.  150 years later, the design of the Gatling lives on in the form of the M134 mini-gun and auto-cannons such as the GAU-8 that is used on the United States Air Force’s A-10, making it much more than museum attraction.


Stay tuned for more Famous Guns throughout History presented by the Rockwall Gun Club, and be sure to visit them online at http://www.rockwallgunclub.com or call 972.551.0470 for more information.

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