Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume I.djvu/828

792 ARTILLERY and rifled became useful and valuable pieces Although the French artillery board rejected the breech-loading system as a needless com- plication for field guns, they were quick to adopt it for heavy ordnance as economizing space, greatly increasing the ease and rapidity of loading, and affording more protection to the cannoneers. The principal French naval guns are the 6-inch, 7^-inch, 9-inch, and 10|-mch breech-loading rifles, consisting of a core of cast iron with a reenforce of steel hoops made of a double series of steel rings, one over the other, so as to break joints. In the aper- ture of the bore a female screw of 15 or 16 threads is cut into the metal of the gun, which receives a cylindrical screw or breech plug, mounted in front, with an elastic steel cup or gas check. That time may not be wasted at each discharge by screwing and unscrewing the whole length of the plug, its surface, as well as that of the female screw in the breech, is divided into six equal parts, from three of which the threads are removed ; when the breech is to be closed the threaded portions of the plug are presented so that they come oppo- site the smooth parts of the hole, and vice versa ; the plug or stopper is then pushed in, and a third of a turn with the handle brings the screws of both parts together. No further changes were made in the materiel of the field batteries before the war with Prussia in 1870, where the French guns for the first time in history were found far inferior to those of their opponents in range, accuracy, and power of execution, the weakest points about them being the want of flatness in the trajectory and the rapidity with which enlargements and lodg- ments occurred in the soft metal of the bore. Their projectiles, too, were not effective, many bursting in the air or burying themselves in the ground without producing any effect, while the German percussion shells almost invariably ex- ploded on touching the object. The striking superiority of the Prussian batteries with the Krupp breech-loaders was freely admitted by the French, and had a most important bearing upon the issue of the war. In this struggle the mitrailleuse or machine gun was introduced and extensively used by the French, in batte- ries of ten pieces each, and with most destruc- tive effects. The weapon is on the same gen- eral principle as the Montigny mitrailleuse, which has 37 barrels fitted and soldered into a wrought-iron tube, with a movable breech piece worked by a lever, and so arranged that the barrels can be fired simultaneously or at any interval, reloading taking five seconds, and ten discharges per minute being maintained if necessary. The Galling mitrailleuse, adopted by the United States several years previously, has not been actually employed in war. Seve- ral hundred new bronze breech-loading sevens were made in Paris during the siege and used with effect, and great attention has been paid since the war to the reorganization of the French batteries, it being intended to suppress the old muzzle-loading guns as soon as a definite breech- loading system can be determined upon. The regimental organization of artillery, which has been always maintained by the French and other great European powers, was abolished in Eng- land in 1859, brigades of horse, field, and gar- rison artillery taking its place; each brigade consists of eight batteries, the terms troop ami company being done away with. In 18(52 the royal artillery was consolidated with that of the Indian army, the artillery establishment being then divided into 5 horse artillery brigades and 25 field and garrison brigades ; it now con- sists of 6 horse, 8 field, 14 garrison, and 8 mixed brigades of field and garrison artillery ; to these must be added one depot and one coast brigade. The Armstrong system was adopted in 1859, after the unsuccessful debut of the Lancaster guns in the Crimea, and up to 1864 nearly $13,000,000 were expended in its development. Experience showed, however, that it was too complicated and would not stand the test of active service; the fermature of the breech- loaders, 40, 20, 12, 9, and 6-pdrs., proved very defective, and the lighter calibres have been lately superseded by muzzle-loading rifles, 7, 9, and 16-pdrs., except in the horse batteries, where a few Armstrong guns are still retained. The heavier calibres, muzzle- loading 600, 300, 150, and 70-pdrs., have been replaced since 1867 by guns of the Frazer sys- tem ; these new guns are 600, 400, 250, 180, and 115-pdrs., the corresponding calibres being 12, 10, 9, 8, and 7 inches; they are all rifled on the Woolwich system, the twist being uniform in the 7-inch, but increasing in the higher cali- bres; a 700-pdr. of 35 tons has been recent- ly made, its calibre being 11 inches. The 64-pdr. muzzle-loading rifled gun is of various constructions, Armstrong, Frazer, and Palliser converted cast-iron, the last being rather heavier than the others. All the heavy guns fire the Palliser chilled shot, cast-iron projec- tiles with gun-metal studs, except in those common to the various 64-pdrs., which have copper studs. During the past 20 years a number of different systems of rifled ordnance have been invented in England, the two most prominent being the Armstrong and Whitworth. Armstrong guns are both muzzle-loaders and breech-loaders, the fennature being only strong enough to apply to the smaller calibres. The latter are made by welding together at the ends wrought-iron tubes, made of spiral cords formed by twisting a square bar around a man- drel and then welding; two additional thick- nesses or tubes envelop it in rear of the trun- nions to give it more strength, the outer of the same material as the inner, the inner one formed of an iron slab bent into a cylindrical shape and welded at the edges ; the breech is closed by a vent piece slipped into a slot and held in its place by a breech screw, which presses against it from behind ; the screw is tubular, so that the charge can be passed into the cham- ber when the vent piece is withdrawn ; the