Civil War Inventions Essay Research Paper Civil

Civil War Inventions Essay, Research Paper

Civil war inventions

New inventions during the Civil war lead to the development of new weaponry.

Some of the new inventions include the Gatling gun, new bullets, Breech loading

cannon, ironclad ships, Dahlgren gun, and trench warfare.

The Gatling gun invented by Dr. Richard Gatling was a multi-barreled cannon

which allowed troops to shoot multiple rounds rapidly without reloading and

served as the predecessor to the machine gun.

Prior to the war, it was discovered that by giving the bullet spin as it left

the barrel–rifling the bullet-the range of the musket could increase. The new

"rifles" had two problems–the spirals in the barrel would become

clogged with powder and needed to be cleaned after every shot, and the size of

the bullet used prevented rapid reloading

. New bullets were developed to prevent the clogging of the rifle’s barrel

and to increase reloading time during the Civil War. This allowed for troops to

fire several rounds without needing to clean the barrel.

Weapons like the breech loading cannon sped up the reloading process allowing

troops to fire more rounds per minute. Prior to this technology, troops used

musket loading guns and had to run to the front of the gun to reload thus

wasting time and risking their lives.

In 1861, the U.S. Navy began production of a new type of ironclad, the "Pook

Turtle." The flat bottomed warships with two and one half inch armor and

armed with ten eight inch shell guns were virtually invulnerable.

The Dahlgren gun was a new advance with a large caliber and larger bullets.

It was tested on the faumous ship the merrimac.

A new type of defence strategy used in the civil war is trench warfare. This

can be acredited to the new technology with accurate weapons.

These types of technological advances lead to expansions for weapons

manufacturers and inventors, changes in fighting strategy, and increased death

rates. Also the new Technology is why the American civil war is called the first

modern war