An Examination of the Machine Gun

Weapon number one is The Musket Rifle, the primary weapon for the Union and Confederate soldiers for fighting in battlefields fair in this deadly war. The rifle barrel now has a curved cylinder inside so the bullet will have more accuracy and better range. (www.brainpop.com/socialstudies/civilwar )

As most of us know, machine-guns inflicted appalling casualties during the First World War. Thousands of men, charging towards the enemy line, were mown down by the rapid fire of these devastating weapons.

Early bullets were designed to be placed in this new loading system. The classic way of having the powder and pellets separate was too slow and messy. This early design of the bullet is very similar to the simple modern one. It had a metal casing with powder placed behind the pellets or in some cases one large pellet (Hogg 54). With these being loaded from the side on the new rifles they were capable of firing a shot much faster then the gun of a hundred years earlier. Even though the gun had become more powerful the Civil War was still a political war.

Calcium floodlights were mainly used by the Union soldiers as made it easy to see and they soldiers were able to blind Confederate soldiers (8 Unusual Civil War Weapons"). One of the more creative weapons was a blanket used by Confederate soldiers (8 Unusual Civil War Weapons"). As strange as this sounds, the Confederate soldiers used the blanket to catch explosives and throw it back in the enemy's direction. My personal favorite weapon used was a hot air balloon. It was shocking when it say that hot air balloons were used to give a large view of the battlefield. (Appendix A) This was more commonly a Union weapon as the Confederacy lacked good, quality materials to build a durable balloon (“8 Unusual Civil War Weapons"). Like the machine guns and swords, rockets were actually used in the Civil War (“8 Unusual Civil War Weapons"). Although there were very few appearances from rockets, they still did help play a part by doing their job! The Confederacy used Congreve rockets as well (“Weapons”). They were around three feet and two inches long and filled with gunpowder. Although they could be powerful, they missed quite often and were pretty useless (“Weapons”). Used by both the Confederacy and the Union, underwater mines were useful to blow up the opponent's ship. Although the Union tried the underwater mines, the Confederacy had more success as they blew up dozens of the Union’s ships while the Union blew up only six Confederate ships (“8 Unusual Civil War

Hiram Maxim created Machine Gun and in 1883, he created the first multi bullet-firing weapon. This lead to wider development of automatic weapons which were later used in war. (Note: the 1862 Gatling gun which was ran by hand cranking.)

It was like the modern day machine gun. As one Historian quoted “But Gatling soon improved on the original six-barrel, .58 caliber version of the gun, which fired 350 rounds a minute.” The gun was easily the most powerful gun during this time. It also didn't have to be reloaded as often so it helped the gun fire faster and also had less bugs in the machine. The only downfall to this weapon was that it was extremely expensive to make and is why the Union mainly used the Gatling gun.

     Riffles were another major contribution to the war, as far as weapons were concerned. The union forces had One of the most popular riffles was the Model 1861 Springfield Musket. The Springfield Musket weighed 9.25 pounds, had a twenty-one inch socket bayonet, and fired a .58 caliber mine ball traveling 950 feet per second. Riffled Muskets, which were also known as Enfields, were the second most popular riffles in the war. These Enfields, had a bore diameter of .557 inches, and weighed nine pounds three ounces. They were accurate at 800 yards, and could travel up to 1,100 yards without any difficulty. During the course of the war, 400,000 Enfields were sold to the Union troops, whereas a mere 20,000 were purchased by the confederate army. Although this weapons wasn’t as popular as the Springfield, the Enfield still packed a powerful punch at 1,100 yards (Ripley 43).

In his understanding of war, Bloch taunted the idea that war is an instrument for justice. If anything, it was an instrument for creating destructiveness through military development. And, considering the damage of the two world wars alone, military improvements in the first part of the twentieth century brought more horror rather than achieved victory. Although military innovations began decades prior to World War I, its emergence was the first actual opportunity to test improved technology. High explosive shells, Chlorine gas, machine guns increased lethality. Those facing new types of horror were the actual soldiers whose experience of war left many of them lethargically uncooperative once war ended. Bloch anticipated that the present incessant growth of armaments must either call forth a war, ruinous both for conqueror and for conquered and ending

A lot of men see the differences in generations within the military, but few can see that early military formed everything in to the way the military is today. The purpose of this essay is to compare and contrast the Marine infantryman’s basic weapons of the 1940s and today, to include the rifle, machine guns and anti-tank weapons.

During the American Civil War (1861), Richard J. Gatling invented a firearm weapon that aided with loading, reliability, and the firing of sustained bursts. Born and raised in Hertford County, North Carolina Gatling grew up to be a physician and became involved in many organizations such as the Order of American Knights. The Gatling gun is a machine gun composed of multiple barrels that rotates around a central axis that has the ability of firing at a rapid speed. Before his invention, he followed the path of an inventor and soon after he devoted himself to the perfection of firearms. After his invention of the machine gun he then founded the Gatling Gun Company.

The Civil War was the United States versus United States. It was the one of the best times when it came to weapon advanstments. Most of the weapons used took about thrity seconds, at the fastest, to reload a Springfield Model 1861. Having a fast reload time was very important. Being caught without ammo was not a good thing. Most men had bayonets on their rifles to stab the oncoming attackers. Even with a bayonet you were running a real risk getting so close to the enemy. With factors inclueding reload spead, typical range and weight. Including all of those factors the Colt 1855 revolving rifle is the best rifle during the civil

With two determined armies in the midst of a civil war, the development of weaponry is extremely important. This importance can be seen in the American Civil War. Before the American Civil War, muskets dominated the battlefield. These weapons were inaccurate and had a low firing rate. Unusual weapons were sometimes used, but were still uncommon. Other weapons showed great usefulness, and eventually began to replace older weapons. Among these were the Minié (Minie) ball and the Spencer repeating rifle.

At the beginning of the Civil War, the Regular Army Soldiers were generally armed with primarily the 1842 Springfield, a .69 caliber smoothbore musket, and with whatever weaponry that was purchased by state authorities. This included other various types and calibers of domestic and foreign smoothbore guns and the longer rifled muskets. In 1861, a shortage of rifles on both sides forced the Northern and Southern governments purchase weapons from European nations. Also widely used was artillery including cannons. Some of the new weapon technologies used in the civil war include rifled gun barrels, the Minie ball and repeating rifles. (Parker 2005-20016)

The repeating rifle was a new type of weapon had a greater range and was more accurate than the muskett. Tese were unable to be used in war until the 1850s because the bullet and the barle were so close in size. In 1848, the Minié bullet was invented. They could be loaded faster and they were more accurate. Because stopping to reload was dangerous, in 1863 Repeating rifles were invented. The most famous, the Spencer carbine, could fire seven shots in 30 seconds. Hydrogen passenger balloons were used to spy on confederate camps by the union. Ironclads were also used by the union to patrol the coast and keep ships from going in or out. The Confederates counteracted this by inventing their own weapon, the submarine. The first one, The USS Hunley sank the Housatonic in 1864.

American army officer Omar Bradley once said,“If we continue to develop our technology without wisdom or prudence, our servant may prove to be our executioner.” The meaning of this quote lies in the destruction and devastation of humanity and geography during war. If we do not stop advancing in ways of killing and causing suffering, we will soon face the consequences of these technologies. Throughout World War I and World War II, there was a ginormous technological boom in which countries were competing to invent new weapons or vehicles used in warfare. Specifically, World War I could be blamed for the start of the creating of new technologies used in warfare even today. These technologies were often invented or created during World War I,