In 1841, the U.S.& Army fielded the first U.S. designed & manufactured artillery. The 1841 model six pound cannon & 12 pound howitzer were light & very mobile. The extremely expensive bronze used to cast those guns was a result of trials using cast iron guns of the same caliber. Both of the iron guns were extremely heavy. Of the six horses that were hitched to artillery pieces, only four provided the vast majority of the pulling power. The fifth & sixth horses were spares. On the march, they were often hitched to the rear in order to keep them fresh. A few hundred pounds more or less made a big difference in how well the horses performed. Bronze had the additional advantage in that a worn out gun could be melted down & recast easily.
The tactical basis for having both cannon & howitzers has to do with the nature of how they were used. A 6" cannon could only elevate 5 degrees. A 12" howitzer used the same charge as the six pounder. The howitzer breech is a dimple shape that accepts the charge which is smaller than the bore. Rather than pounding the wall to pieces, the howitzer sent shells in arching trajectories to explode over or onto targets.
The two guns were designed to do two different tasks in attacking a fortification, e.g. The bore of the six pounder was not large enough for a powerful explosive shell. It fired case shot, which contained a relatively small bursting charge & had a hand full of balls that exploded above infantry. The rain of pieces of the casing & balls, traveling at just below the speed of sound, was a vicious combination. It was invented by Sir Henry Shrapnel. The howitzer would lob shells into the forts or onto formed troops or structures.
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A three gun section of two 1841 six pounders & 12 pound howitzer at a living history battery program at Stones River National Battlefield. These guns were the types that were essential to the victory in the war with Mexico. They were far more mobil & hard hitting than the types that came before.
With the advent of rifled cannon, the tactical situation changed dramatically. As the Confederates at Fort Pulaski were the first to discover, a rifled gun could hit harder, longer & more accurately than anything that had come before. If you visit the National Park near Savannah, walk around to the other side of the upper gallery from here. Down at the base of the wall is where an over hit, leaving a perfect impression of the blunt nose of a solid 30 pound rifle bolt.
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The walls of Fort Pulaski still show the impact of 30 pound Parrott rifle fire at a range of about two miles. The fort's construction was supervised by Robert E. Lee & was considered impregnable. Guarding the mouth of the Savannah River, there was no dry land within range where an attacker could mount their batteries. The defenders literally laughed when they saw the foolish Yankees mounting their guns so far out of range. The red brick, camera left, is the repair that replaced the breach where the thick masonry wall collapsed. These casements were where the Immortal 600 were held.
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30 pound Parrott rifles like this one were siege & fortification weapons. They were extremely powerful, accurate & hard hitting, but were not mobile. It was the 10 pound Parrott & ordinance rifles replaced the six pound 1841 pound smoothbores that were the new. standard batteries.
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This battery of two rifles & two six pound cannon shown firing by piece form the left at Stones River National Battlefield display the crazy quilt of guns that made up the batteries during that battle. Imagine the challenge of supplying ammunition to 58 guns firing 12 pound howitzer, 12 pound Napoleon, 2.9" Parrott rifle, 3" ordinance & Parrott rifle, 14 pound Ames rifle, & Weird rifle rounds. Note, the the gun crews' reflect the erect posture of Civil War drill.
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A 12 pound Napoleon gun-howitzer that is a veteran of the battle is sited where a battery of these versatile guns were deployed during the first day of the Battle of Stones River. Their fire shattered desperate Confederate Infantry attacks & saved the day for General Rosecrans.
General Roscrans' solution to his impossible artillery logistical challenge was to convert his collection of smoothbore howitzers & cannons was a gun developed by the French army during the reign of Napoleon III. Three 1841 model six pounders were melted down & recast as 12 pound gun-howitzer. The Napoleon, as it is popularly known, could do the job of both of the guns in a traditional battery. With a relatively minor increase in weight, the Napoleon needed the same number of horses & men to serve it. Mr. Newton's laws being what they are, the increase from 6 to 12 pound cannon ammunition was exponentially more powerful.
In time, four gun half batteries consisting of either 10 pound rifles or 12 pound Napoleon smooth bores replaced the four rifle & four smoothbore Napoleon full battery. An eight gun battery, deployed in column, was a mile long. Even when doubled, it was challenging to bring into action. Eventually, the half battery of homogenous guns was halved again, two gun sections were found to be nimble & tactically more effective than the more ponderous battery could ever be.
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This image taken at Fortress Rosecrans in Murfreesboro, Tennessee shows the fate of the six pounders that contributed to the Union victory at the Battle of Stones River. Look carefully, there is a mark on the barrel & a chunk out of the wheel where a solid shot hit the gun. In the background, a crew is drilling with a preposterous 70 pound howitzer. The sponge rammer looks like a prop from a Three Stooges movie. Needless to say, the living history cannoneers at Stones River N.B. are more than ready to demonstrate one of those babies... needless to say, our adult supervision does not share our boyish enthusiasm. Fort Negley in Nashville had six pounders & a single 30 pound Parrott. Other obsolete curiosities were mounted in works scattered all over backwaters of the war.
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Mortars were not field guns. Their job was to lob huge shells over the walls & destroy the interior of fortifications. The shell camera right clearly shows the hole where the fuse was inserted. The sparking trail left by the shell as it sailed up & over in its 45 degree trajectory was a sight that nobody who saw it ever forgot. At Vicksburg, Union troops improvised wooden mortars that tossed 12 pound shells into Pemberton's works.
Needless to say, this is just the merest coat of paint over the subject of Civil War artillery, but I think it answers the question posed.
Apart from the historic images, all photos are by the author.
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