What makes a James cannon a James?

historicus

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I did a thread on Howitzers and a thread on Napoleons. Now it's time for James Cannons.

One of the six cannons on display at the Visitor's Center at Chickamauga National Park is a James Cannon. It is a bronze cannon that was originally a smoothbore, but it was retrofitted with rifle grooves. Is the definition of a James cannon a bronze cannon that was originally a smoothbore and was later retrofitted with rifle grooves to become a rifled cannon? If not, what makes a James cannon a James as opposed to a Howitzer, a Napoleon, or any other type of cannon?
 
Charles Tillinghast James the designer of the gun(s) and ammunition that bears his name. There are a number of guns: Parrotts, James, Brookes, Blakleys, Whitworths, Dahlgrens that are named after their designers.
 
James didn't originally invent the cannon named for him, but a type of exploding shell. Somewhat stupidly, he didn't have any particular cannon to shoot it out of, so took old smoothbore six-pounder guns and rifled them! Next he designed a bronze 3" rifled gun with a "soda-bottle" shape to use. BOTH are properly James Guns.
 
James didn't originally invent the cannon named for him, but a type of exploding shell. Somewhat stupidly, he didn't have any particular cannon to shoot it out of, so took old smoothbore six-pounder guns and rifled them! Next he designed a bronze 3" rifled gun with a "soda-bottle" shape to use. BOTH are properly James Guns.
You are correct, the guns were rifled using the James Method. Their greatest shortcoming seemed to be how quickly the bronze rifling wore out.
 
Example of James rifling. Below is a 3.8" Hotchkiss bolt I recovered with the telltale signature of the 15 land and grooves from a James rifle.

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Technically speaking, there is no such thing as a James Rifle; McClellan and Halleck got into a ridiculous argument when McClellan asked for some James rifles and Halleck pretended not to know what he was talking about. As redbob pointed out, it is the type of rifling and the type of shell that makes it a James.

Here at Shiloh we have a number of smoothbore guns which were later rifled in the James manner, thus making them James Rifles. These guns have the outward appearance of a Model 1841 6 pounder and look nothing like the rifles cast in the profile of the ordnance rifle.

This cannon in the photo is a 3.8" James that was captured by the Confederates at Shiloh and the recaptured during the Battle of Corinth by Company C, 1st US Infantry. It is in the lobby of the Corinth Civil War Interpretive Center, just yards from where it was captured.

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As a irony of life, James was killed in 1862 in an explosion of one of his own shells while he was demonstrating it to potential buyers.
 
Technically speaking, there is no such thing as a James Rifle; McClellan and Halleck got into a ridiculous argument when McClellan asked for some James rifles and Halleck pretended not to know what he was talking about. As redbob pointed out, it is the type of rifling and the type of shell that makes it a James.
@redbob and @TomP are both spot on. The shells were James and the guns were then rifled to fire the round.
 
@redbob and @TomP are both spot on. The shells were James and the guns were then rifled to fire the round.
But I don't think the guns were limited to just using James shells. I at least have some evidence of Hotchkiss rounds in use with the guns as well, unless I'm misreading the land and grooves on sabot I've recovered.
 
But I don't think the guns were limited to just using James shells. I at least have some evidence of Hotchkiss rounds in use with the guns as well, unless I'm misreading the land and grooves on sabot I've recovered.

That's one thing that made the Hotchkiss popular as with the lead sabot it had it could be fired in any field cannon with the same size bore.
 
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The picture directly above is a typical rifling example of a rifled 6-pounder that is/are often referred to as James Rifles. These are not "true" James Rifles but merely bored or patterned similarly to them.

The first picture, with the 15 Lands and grooves, is generally accepted as the true James Rifle or Type 1 James.

This is my understanding but may have my facts wrong. If anyone knows more along these lines let me know.
 
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There are actually six different types of James cannon which are defined in Field Artillery Weapons of the Civil War by Hazlett, Olmstead and Parks (Chapter 13). A James can have 15, 10, or 7 rifled grooves. These photos are of the Type 2 Series 1 weapon at the Corinth Civil War Interpretive Center. Only six of these 7 groove guns were cast, and two are at Shiloh. The stamps on the top of the reinforce make it very clear it is indeed a James. This particular gun was captured by the Confederates at Shiloh and recaptured by the Union during the Battle of Corinth. Shiloh has 83 James rifles in the 229 gun collection.
Tom P
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Thanks. Yeah, but in regards to Type 1, they are only found with 15 lands and grooves. And I failed to mention in my earlier post regarding the Type 1, that it's not a true James unless it has a 3.8" bore diameter in addition to that. (Unfortunately, It's too late for me to "edit" that into my previous post.). Anyhow, that's my take on the Type 1 for easy identification and to distinguish between rifled 6-pounders that are often called James. Type 1 James cannon don't have "James" or "Ames" or any other identifying marks stamped on them (I don't think). So, again, I was offering a short cut to identifying them as opposed to the rifled 6-pounders.

I think all Type 2's, such as the one you posted, are labeled "James" or "Ames" or other such identifiers and are easier to identify because of that. Though their rifling indeed varies, I think they too only have 3.8" bore diameter.

Regards
 
"James" or "Ames" can make things confusing. The N.P. Ames Foundries in Springfield and Chicopee, Mass made the lion's share of the James style rifles. I read somewhere that they were the "sole" provider of James cannon but this statement is not true. Miles Greenwood in Cincinnati cast several and the Cyrus Alger Foundry in Boston converted some 6 lb smoothbores to James rifles.
 
Alger Foundry in Boston converted some 6 lb smoothbores to James rifles.

I guess what I'm thinking is that if these converted 6-pounders retained their 3.67" bore diameters, they are not true James rifles, but mimick the "style."
 
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