The Williams Gun

[RebelWeber]

 

[Nathan Stuart]

Would this breech-loading, rapid-fire weapon be more properly classified as an infantry armament than as an artillery piece?

Was this weapon ever used in active service during a CW engagement?

 

[RedRover]

Would this breech-loading, rapid-fire weapon be more properly classified as an infantry armament than as an artillery piece?

Was this weapon ever used in active service during a CW engagement?

The Williams gun was first tested in action during the Battle of Seven Pines. Captain H.T. Owens of the Confederate army noted...

A battery of them, Schoolfield's battery, were employed with Giltner's brigade in Southwest Virginia and East Tennessee.

They used them in combat a number of times, including he battle of Blue Springs, Tennessee, in 1863. Captain Theodore F. Allen of Cincinnati, Ohio, who after the war studied the subject of these guns, recalled...

But according to former brigade adjutant Capt. T.M. Freeman, the Williams guns were taken out of field service, as with the heat from the rapid firing, the breech metal expanded and would not fully lock in place for safe firing. This was confirmed by Captain Schoolfield...

One of the Williams guns was captured in the raid on a Confederate camp at Ivyton, in McGoffin County, Kentucky in March, 1863 by Captain Reuben Patrick's company of Home Guards.

Below, Union veterans, including Captain Patrick, pose post-war with the Williams gun captured by Captain Patrick in 1863...

That Williams Gun is currently on display in the Kentucky Military Museum.

Captain Reuben Patrick and the Williams Gun

Captain Reuben Patrick and the Williams Gun The story of Captain Reuben Patrick's capture of the famous Williams Gun in Eastern Kentucky du...

us14thky.blogspot.com

 

[Nathan Stuart]

Thanks for this information, RedRover. (It looks like a rapid-fire machine gun).

 

[RedRover]

Thanks for this information, RedRover. (It looks like a rapid-fire machine gun).

Here's a replica demonstrating the function of the breech mechanism, with the percussion cap cone on the left...

The description of Captain Schoolfield being that the crew loaded the cartridge into the breech, and capped the cone, simultaneously, at which the cranking continued through firing and re-opening the breech, and over and over again for some potentially rapid firing.