Gen. Washington’s Long Range Sniper rifles,The use of wall guns and rampart guns date back to
Gen. Washington’s Long Range Sniper rifles,The use of wall guns and rampart guns date back to the 17th century. Such firearms were meant to bridge the gap between the common infantry musket and full sized artillery. They even looked like muskets, but had much longer barrels and fired a much larger projectile, usually 1 to 2 inches in caliber. In China and India they were known as Jingal guns, in Europe they were called wall guns, rampart guns, or amusettes. Typically including a swivel, they could be mounted on boats, walls, and other fortifications. With a range of several hundreds yards, it was not uncommon for amusettes to be used as long range sniper rifles, much like modern .50 caliber snipers rifles today, such as the Barrett. During the American Revolution the Rappahannock Forge in Virginia was contracted by Gen. George Washington to produce amusettes for the Continental Army. It is unknown how many were actually produced but at least four are known to survive today. The gun and swivel itself weighs around 50 pounds, caliber is a massive 1.2 inches, and they fired a quarter pound projectile. When delivered, Gen. Charles Lee ordered testing of the weapons. Despite being smoothbore black powder muzzleloading weapons, tests were able to determine that the Rappahannock Foundry amusettes were capable of consistently hitting a sheet of writing paper at 500 yards. Such ranges were incredible for the times.Unfortunately there are no records of the amusettes being used in combat during the Revolutionary War. The four surviving examples of Rappahannock Forge amusettes are currently part of the US Army historical collection. -- source link
Tumblr Blog : peashooter85.tumblr.com
#guns#firearms#history#revolutionary war#american revolution