Volley gun

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Organ gun in Konrad Kyeser's Bellifortis , around 1405
The dead organ in the Vienna HGM , 1678
Volley gun from the 17th century

A volley gun (also volley rifle or volley pistol, depending on the size of the weapon) is a firearm in which many rifle barrels are combined to form a tube bundle. In association with an organ , such weapons are also referred to as organ gun , dead organ or organ cannon . The rifle barrels are loaded manually and fired either simultaneously or sequentially. In the English-speaking world, the weapons are called volley guns .

In practice, the larger specimens could be used in a similar way to the grapefruit ammunition of artillery . Volley guns were usually mounted on a carriage analogous to a normal cannon , making their mobility and accuracy just as cumbersome as that of the cannons. The many tubes required a relatively long time to reload compared to cannons. Furthermore, volley guns were more expensive than cannons due to their complexity, as each barrel had its own ignition device and each barrel had to be serviced and cleaned individually.

Volley guns of the 15th century

The Ribauldequin was a medieval variant of a volley gun. The tubes were arranged in parallel. The first versions of this firearm were used by the army of King Edward III during the Hundred Years War (1337-1360) . used by England in 1339.

Volley guns of the 17th century

In the Vienna Army History Museum there is an organ gun, which was built in 1678 by the imperial piece caster and kitman of the city of Vienna Daniel Kollmann. The gun comprises 50 musket barrels in three compartments and two layers built on top of each other, which were loaded with finished cartridges from the rear in the manner of the chamber lock and locked by iron rails. The pipe box made of sheet iron is clad with brass plates, the front and rear walls of the trapezoidal box can be opened. The year 1678 is cut out and riveted on the box , in between is the coat of arms of the Counts of Montecuccoli, surrounded by the collar of the Order of the Golden Fleece . In the middle, between two siren- shaped handles , there is a double-headed eagle with the coats of arms of Hungary , Bohemia and Austria . The gun is mounted on a two-wheeled, wooden cart with two drawers and has a total weight of 180 kg. The designer of the gun, Daniel Kollmann, did a great job at the Second Siege of Vienna by the Turks in 1683 and died in 1701 as the imperial gun captain and equipment manager of the city of Vienna, after he met the Archduke and later Emperor Charles VI in his later life . had introduced the knowledge of artillery . With the construction of this gun, Kollmann succeeded for the first time in producing a volley or organ gun with a breech-loading function. Nevertheless, the charging process was so time-consuming even with this design that it stayed with this unique prototype. The gun is located in Hall I of the museum and is open to the public.

19th century volley guns

Two notable artillery-sized volley guns were developed in the 19th century, although none were used successfully. In 1860, General Origen Vandenburgh of the New York Militia developed the Vandenburgh, a firearm with 85 parallel rifle barrels in .50 caliber, arranged in a honeycomb shape. After he failed to sell the weapon to England, he is said to have offered it to the American southern states. However, there is no record of any use of this weapon in action, although one was found at Fort Fisher, North Carolina . The mitrailleuse was also developed in France around 1860 . She could fire her rifle salvos either all at the same time or in quick succession and was used with little success in the Franco-German War (1870–1871) due to poor tactical decisions.

A couple of hand-held volley rifles or volley pistols were also developed in the 18th and 19th centuries. A prominent variant was the "duck-foot" volley rifle, a pistol with .45 caliber barrels arranged in a spread shape so that the weapon could fire stray fire with one volley. The basic idea behind it was that a person could defend himself against a group of opponents. The weapon was therefore popular with bank guards, prison guards and sea captains in the 18th and 19th centuries. The British Royal Navy used the Nock rifle during the Napoleonic Wars . The gun had seven barrels and fired seven .50 caliber pistol pellets at once to repel enemy troops or to clear an enemy deck for your own troops. The shooter of such a volley rifle often risked a broken shoulder when firing the weapon due to the enormous recoil force. The weapon became known through the "Sharpe novels" by Bernard Cornwell , in which the friend of the fictional character "Richard Sharpe" Pat Harper wielded a Nock volley rifle. In addition to the very large recoil of the weapon, reloading the weapon took almost two minutes, even by experienced soldiers.

Modern versions

In modern times, several firearms powered by exploding powder gases or otherwise powered have been developed, which have similarities with the volley guns of the 18th century, in particular by using several tubes that can be fired simultaneously or in volleys. However, none is currently in use. The Australian company Metal Storm is currently a leader in the development of such weapons to build a weapon with 36 tubes in which multiple projectiles arranged successively in a run with a theoretical cadence be fired one million rounds per minute. Various types of this type of weapon have been developed, including as an on-board weapon of an aircraft that fires downwards, or as a hand-held artillery system. The Spanish Navy also uses a type of volley gun for the anti-aircraft defense of their ships, the Meroka Flak , in which 12 20-mm machine guns are combined into one gun, arranged in 2 × 6 guns. The system has an extremely high rate of fire with a short burst of fire. Therefore, the weapon is mainly used for missile defense and anti-aircraft guns .

Also, multiple rocket launchers , like the Soviet Stalin organ or German Nebelwerfer of World War II, are sometimes called salvo cannon called. The Royal Navy used the similarly constructed during World War II concealed rocket launchers for air defense.

Examples

Web links

Commons : volley guns  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wilhelm John , Wilhelm Erben : Catalog of the kuk Heeresmuseum , Vienna 1903, p. 381.
  2. Heeresgeschichtliches Museum (Ed.): The Heeresgeschichtliches Museum in Vienna . Vienna / Graz 1960, p. 62.
  3. ^ Army History Museum / Military History Institute (ed.): The Army History Museum in the Vienna Arsenal . Verlag Militaria , Vienna 2016, ISBN 978-3-902551-69-6 , p. 20
  4. ^ "Sieg Heul" in: DER SPIEGEL 20/1968