“Uncovering the Hidden Genius: The Surprising Origins of the World’s First Machine Gun!”
Thus, the mitrailleuse was conceived not as a rapid-firing rifle, but as a longer-ranged version of canister shot, with the weapons being deployed alongside regular artillery batteries. The mitrailleuse first saw combat during the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-1871, but despite the Napoleon’s high hopes for his Army’s high-tech “secret weapon”, it proved a disappointment. However, this had more to do with French doctrine than the design of the weapon itself, for on those rare instances when it was used at close range, it proved devastatingly effective. As one observer noted at the September 1, 1870 Battle of Sedan:
“On the heights, close to Floeing, there was placed a battery of Mitrailleuses. There is, opposite to that, a round hill with wood on the top; and out of this wood and from behind this hill came the Prussian columns. As they came out they were swept down by these Mitrailleuses, and they did not succeed. They could not make any progress, but were obliged to go back again, and go round on the reverse slope of the hill, checked by the Mitrailleuse.”
But despite the mitrailleuse being the first rapid-fire weapon to see combat in large numbers – indeed, in modern French the term mitrailleuse means “machine gun” – it is more properly classified as a volley gun than a proper machine gun since the ammunition is loaded manually rather than automatically. Much closer to the modern definition was the Gatling gun, patented by American inventor Dr. Richard J. Gatling in 1861. Unlike the mitrailleuse, whose barrels were fixed, the Gatling gun’s ten barrels rotated around a central shaft, driven by a hand crank. As a barrel rotated into the top position, a cartridge dropped from a gravity-fed hopper and was automatically loaded into the chamber. When the barrel reached the bottom position, the cartridge was fired. The empty cartridge was then ejected from the chamber before the barrel reached the top position and the whole cycle began anew. The use of multiple barrels allowed each one to cool off between firings, preventing the weapon from overheating and allowing it to sustain continuous fire at a rate of up to 200 rounds per minute.
