M1857 12-pounder Napoleon

In the period before the Civil War, a U.S. Army light artillery battery was organized with four M1841 6-pounder field guns and two M1841 12-pounder howitzers.[1] The field gun fired solid iron cannon balls in a flat trajectory to smash its targets[2] while the howitzer was designed to lob hollow shells into massed formations or fortifications.[3] Napoleon III realized that mixing field guns and howitzers within an artillery battery caused the logistical problem of having to carry two types of ammunition. He understood that batteries might become more effective if a single gun could fire both the round shot of the field gun and the common shell and spherical case shot of the howitzer. (Both field guns and howitzers were already capable of firing canister shot.) The French gun designers' solution to the problem was the invention of the canon obusier de 12 or 12-pounder gun-howitzer. By 1856, this new weapon had been adopted by France, Austria, Prussia, Saxony, and Russia. An American military commission sent to Europe in 1855–1856 led by Major Alfred Mordecai wrote a report praising the new gun-howitzer[4] and the U.S. Ordnance Department quickly obtained a license to produce the gun.[5]

On 14 December 1856, the Ames Manufacturing Company received an order to produce a copy of the gun-howitzer, and on 25 March 1857 the Ordnance Department accepted delivery of one 1,187 lb (538 kg) piece for a cost of $546.02. The weapon failed its trial, but in 2004 the original gun could be seen at the Petersburg National Battlefield visitor center. On 28 May 1857, the Ordnance Department ordered four guns of a modified version from Ames and these pieces were delivered on 16 September 1857. The four modified guns were 3 in (76 mm) longer than the original gun and 40 lb (18.1 kg) heavier. These four guns became the standard model for all 12-pounder Napoleons subsequently produced for the U.S. Army.[6]

Federal M1857 12-pounder Napoleon

M1857 on display at the National Civil War Naval Museum

The Model 1857 bronze 12-pounder Napoleon gun barrel was 72.15 in (183.3 cm) from the muzzle to the end of the knob and weighed 1,227 lb (556.6 kg). The diameter of the bore (caliber) was 4.62 in (11.7 cm) and the bore length was 63.6 in (161.5 cm). With a 2.5 lb (1.1 kg) gunpowder charge it was capable of firing solid shot 1,680 yd (1,536 m) at 5° elevation and spherical case (shrapnel) shot 1,135 yd (1,038 m) at 3°45' elevation. With a 2.0 lb (0.9 kg) gunpowder charge it was capable of firing common shell 1,300 yd (1,189 m) at 3°45' elevation.[16] The cannon fired a 12.25 lb (5.6 kg) round shot of 4.52 in (11.5 cm) diameter. The spherical case shot weighed 12.1 lb (5.5 kg) and released 78 musket balls when it burst. The canister round weighed 14.8 lb (6.7 kg) and contained 27 iron balls that were 1.49 in (3.8 cm) in diameter or slightly smaller.[17] Canister shot was packed in four tiers within the canister round. When fired, canister was effective up to a distance of 350 yd (320 m).[18]

The first 12-pounder Napoleons produced by Northern gun foundries included a pair of handles attached to the top of the gun barrel. As many as 33 were manufactured before the handles were eliminated in late 1861. Of the 21 surviving Napoleons with handles, 17 were produced by Ames, 3 by Alger, and 1 by Revere. Ames also manufactured 6 bronze rifled Napoleons in 1862; all survived and were located at Gettysburg National Military Park in 2004.[19] The Napoleon was a very dependable weapon. In 1864, U.S. Chief of Ordnance Brigadier General George D. Ramsay wrote, "No instance has occurred during the war ... of the 12-pdr bronze gun (the Napoleon) having worn out or of its bursting."[20] Many Confederate gunners preferred the Napoleons produced in the North because of their higher quality. A British observer, Arthur Lyon Fremantle noted in 1863 that many of the guns belonging to the Army of Northern Virginia were captured pieces of Northern manufacture.[21]

The 12-pounder Napoleon was the most favored field gun of both Union and Confederate armies. It was fairly accurate at all ranges and especially lethal when firing canister at close range.[5] The Napoleon was mounted on a carriage weighing 1,128 lb (511.7 kg).[22] The Napoleon fired the same ammunition and propellent charges as the M1841 12-pounder field gun, but its tube and carriage were 577 lb (261.7 kg) lighter than those of the older artillery piece.[23] A 6-gun Union battery of Napoleons was made up of three 2-gun sections. Each gun was hitched to a limber drawn by six horses and accompanied by a limber and caisson drawn by six horses. There was one ammunition box on each limber and two ammunition boxes on each caisson. Generally, each battery also had six reserve limber and caissons, one traveling forge wagon, and one battery wagon hauling equipment.[1]

The ammunition box for the Napoleon contained 32 rounds.[24] At Gettysburg, the 5th Maine Light Artillery Battery, armed with six 12-pounder Napoleons, carried 288 round shot, 288 spherical case, 96 common shells, and 96 canister rounds in its limbers and caissons.[25] In a single ammunition box there were 12 shot, 12 spherical case, 4 shells, 4 canister rounds, and 48 friction primers.[26] But this allocation of ammunition changed. According to the 1864 U.S. Army Field Artillery Instructions, the ammunition box contained 20 round shot, 8 spherical case, and 4 canister rounds. The 1863 Confederate States Ordnance Manual recommended that the Napoleon's ammunition box carry 12 shot, 12 spherical case, 4 shell, and 4 canister rounds.[27] A 6-gun battery of 12-pounder Napoleons with two caissons per gun required 20 6-horse teams and 10 extra horses.[28][29] Each 6-horse team was controlled by three drivers and each gun crew was made up of nine cannoneers.[1]

12-pounder Napoleon manufactured in 1864 is located in front of the Texas State Capitol in Austin, Texas.

General Barry pointed out that after the First Battle of Bull Run, there were only nine artillery batteries of mixed calibers available, drawn by 400 horses and manned by 650 men. By strenuous efforts, in March 1862 when McClellan's Army of the Potomac took the field, there were 92 batteries containing 520 guns, 12,500 men, and 11,000 horses. Many obsolete guns brought by volunteer artillery units in the Eastern Theater were soon replaced by newer guns.[30] Older guns rejected in the east migrated to the Western Theater and were used to equip the western Union armies. The 1862 inventory by the Ohio Quartermaster General listed only ten 12-pounder Napoleons out of 162 available guns, compared to forty-four 3.8-inch James rifles, thirty-eight rifled 6-pounder guns, and thirty M1841 6-pounder field guns.[31] As late as the Battle of Prairie Grove on 7 December 1862, fought in Arkansas, the Union forces employed 40 guns, but none of them were Napoleons.[32]

At the Battle of Antietam on 16–17 September 1862, out of 301 artillery pieces, the well-equipped Army of the Potomac had one hundred seventeen 12-pounder Napoleons, eighty-one 3-inch Ordnance rifles and fifty-seven 10-pounder Parrott rifles. On the same battlefield, the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia employed only fourteen Napoleons, compared to forty-four M1841 12-pounder howitzers, forty-three 10-pounder Parrott rifles, and forty-one M1841 6-pounder guns.[33] Most Confederate batteries were made up of a mix of guns.[34] Captain M. B. Miller's 3rd Company of the Washington Artillery was exceptional in that it was composed of four 12-pounder Napoleons.[35] Captain Joseph B. Campbell's 4th U.S. Artillery, Battery B, armed with six 12-pounder Napoleons,[36] was deployed in an exposed position near the Bloody Cornfield at dawn and suffered heavy casualties.[37] While in action, infantry volunteers served some of the guns as they fired double canister rounds. Not knowing that he was supposed to remove the second gunpowder charge, one volunteer loaded two full canister charges. The Napoleon recoiled violently with each discharge, but at the end of the action the gun was found to be undamaged.[38]

During the Battle of Fort Sanders on November 29, 1863, the 12-pounder Napoleons used by the Federals fired triple canister.[39] The Union armies in the Western Theater eventually received their share of 12-pounder Napoleons. On 30 June 1863, the Army of the Cumberland reported having 220 artillery pieces, including sixty Napoleons, forty-five 3.8-inch James rifles, thirty-four 3-inch Ordnance rifles, and thirty-two 10-pounder Parrott rifles. On the same date, the Army of the Ohio counted 72 artillery pieces, including eighteen Napoleons, twenty-six 3.8-inch James rifles, and twelve 3-inch Ordnance rifles.[31] In the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Gettysburg, every bronze smoothbore on the field was a Napoleon except two 12-pounder howitzers in the 2nd Connecticut Light Artillery Battery.[40] When William Tecumseh Sherman's western army began the Atlanta campaign in May 1864, it included 110,000 soldiers and 254 artillery pieces, of which every one was a 12-pounder Napoleon, 10- or 20-pounder Parrott rifle, or 3-inch Ordnance rifle.[41]

Footnotes

Citations

• Castel, Albert E. (1992). Decision in the West: The Atlanta Campaign of 1864. Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas. ISBN 0-7006-0562-2.
• Coggins, Jack (2004). Arms and Equipment of the Civil War. New York, N.Y.: Fairfax Press. ISBN 0-517-402351.
• Cole, Phillip M. (2002). Civil War Artillery at Gettysburg. Cambridge, Mass.: Da Capo Press. ISBN 0-306-81145-6.
• Hazlett, James C.; Olmstead, Edwin; Parks, M. Hume (2004). Field Artillery Weapons of the American Civil War. Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0-252-07210-3.
• Hess, Earl J. (2013). The Knoxville Campaign: Burnside and Longstreet in East Tennessee. Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press. ISBN 978-1-57233-995-8.
• Johnson, Curt; Anderson, Richard C. Jr. (1995). Artillery Hell: The Employment of Artillery at Antietam. College Station, Tex.: Texas A&M University Press. ISBN 0-89096-623-0.
• Katcher, Philip (2001). American Civil War Artillery 1861–1865. Osceola, Wisc.: Osprey Publishing. ISBN 1-84176-451-5.
• Ripley, Warren (1970). Artillery and Ammunition of the Civil War. Charleston, S.C.: The Battery Press. OCLC 12668104.
• Shea, William L. (2009). Fields of Blood: The Prairie Grove Campaign. Chapel Hill, N.C.: The University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-0-8078-3315-5.

• Downey, Brian (2019). "The Weapons of Antietam". Antietam on the Web.
• Morgan, James (2002). "Green Ones and Black Ones: The Most Common Field Pieces of the Civil War". civilwarhome.com.