Inventions in the Century

by William Henry Doolittle

It would not do to conclude this sketch of antique cannon and fire-arms without referring to Puckle’s celebrated English patent No. 418, of May 15, 1718, for “A Defence.” The patent starts out with the motto:

“Defending King George, your Country, and Lawes,
Is defending Yourselves and Protestant Cause.”

It proceeds to describe a “Portable Gun or Machine” having a single barrel, with a set of removable chambers which are charged with bullets before they are placed in the gun, a handle to turn the chambers to bring each chamber in line with the barrel, a tripod on which the gun is mounted and on which it is to be turned, a screw for elevating and turning the gun in different directions, a set of square chambers “for shooting square bullets against Turks,” a set of round chambers “for shooting round bullets against the Christians;” and separate drawings show the square bullets for the Turks and the round bullets for the Christians. History is silent as to whether Mr. Puckle’s patent was put in practice, but it contained the germs of some modern inventions.

Among the first inventions of the century was a very important one made by a clergyman, the Rev. Mr. Forsyth, a Scotchman, who in 1803 invented the percussion principle in fire-arms. In 1807 he patented in England detonating powder and pellets which were used for artillery. About 1808 General Shrapnel of the English army invented the celebrated shell known by his name. It then consisted of a comparatively thin shell filled with bullets, having a fuse lit by the firing of the gun, and adapted to explode the shell in front of the object fired at. This fuse was superseded by one invented by General Bormann of Belgium, which greatly added to the value of case shot.

In 1814 Joshua Shaw of England invented the percussion cap. Thus, by the invention of the percussion principle by Forsyth, and that little copper cylinder of Shaw, having a flake of fulminating powder inside and adapted to fit the nipple of a gun and be exploded by the fall of the hammer, was sounded the death knell of the old flint-locks with which the greatest battles of the world had been and were at that time being fought. The advantages gained by the cap were the certain and instantaneous fire, the saving in time, power, and powder obtained by making smaller the orifice through which the ignition was introduced, and the protection from moisture given by the covering cap. And yet so slow is the growth of inventions sometimes that all Europe continued to make the flint-locks for many years after the percussion cap was invented; and General Scott, in the war between the United States and Mexico in 1847, declined to give the army the percussion cap musket. The cap suggested the necessity and invention of machines for making them quickly and in great quantities.

The celebrated “Colt’s” revolver was invented by Colonel Samuel Colt of the United States, in 1835. He continued to improve it, and in 1851 exhibited it at the World’s Fair, London, where it excited great surprise and attention. Since then the revolver has become a great weapon in both private and public warfare. The next great inventions in small arms were the readoption and improvement of the breech-loader, the making of metallic cartridges, the magazine gun, smokeless powder and other explosives, to which further reference will be made.

To return to cannons:—In 1812 Colonel Bomford, an American officer, invented what is called the “Columbiad,” a kind of cannon best adapted for sea-coast purposes. They are long-chambered pieces, combining certain qualities of the gun, howitzer and mortar, and capable of projecting shells and solid shot with heavy charges of powder at high angles of elevation, and peculiarly adapted to defend narrow channels and sea-coast defences. A similar gun was invented by General Paixhans of the French army in 1822. The adoption of the Paixhans long-chambered guns, designed to throw heavy shells horizontally as well as at a slight elevation and as easily as solid shot, was attended with great results. Used by the French in 1832, in the quick victorious siege of Antwerp, by the allies at Sebastopol, where the whole Russian fleet was destroyed in about an hour, and in the fight of the Kearsarge and the doomed Alabama off Cherbourg in the American civil war, it forced inventors in the different countries to devise new and better armour for the defence of ships. This was followed by guns of still greater penetrative power. Then as another result effected by these greater guns came the passing away of the old-fashioned brick and stone forts as a means of defence.

In an interesting address by Major Clarence E. Dutton of the Ordnance Department, U.S.A., at the Centennial Patent Congress at Washington in 1891, he thus stated what the fundamental improvements were that have characterised the modern ordnance during the century:

1. The regulation and control of the action of gunpowder in such a manner as to exert less strain upon the gun, and to impart more energy to the projectile.

2. To so construct the gun as to transfer a portion of the strain from the interior parts of the walls which had borne too much of it, to the exterior parts which had borne too little, thus nearly equalising the strain throughout the entire thickness of the walls.