Repeating Firearms Predate the Second
Amendment
This is a copy of a recent e-mail on whether the Founders
of our country could have envisioned the types of modern firearms of today. It
dispels the myth that the Founders had "no idea" that such weaponry
could be created in the future.
Both the ideas and the technology already existed!
Many times I have heard the following:
"The founding fathers, when writing the
Second Amendment, could never have foreseen the machine gun"
I wonder if Jefferson had this British design in his
Patent collection?
Also available here:
The Puckle gun was a British flintlock machinegun
invented by James Puckle in 1718. It took a nine-round revolving block, was
mounted on a tripod and was designed to be portable and especially to prevent
an enemy boarding a ship. An unusual feature was that it fired square bullets.
This article is also available by clicking on this
sentence.
James Puckle (c. 1667-1724) was a notary-public and also
an author, his best-known work - reprinted as recently as 1900 - being The
Club, a moral dialogue between a father and son. His 'portable gun or machine
called a defence' - designed to fire round bullets against Christians and
square ones against Turks - is one of his only two known ventures in the field
of military technology (the other being a sword concerning which no details
are recorded). In 1717 it was rejected for government use after trials at
Woolwhich, but, despite this, he obtained a patent on 15 May 1718, and then
made strenuous efforts to market the gun, raising a company for this purpose
in 1721. In March, 1722 the Daily Courant carried an advertisement for
'Several sizes in Brass and Iron of Mr. Puckle's Machine or Gun, called a
Defence....at the Workshop thereof, in White-Cross-Alley, Middle Moorfields'.
At the end of the same month the London Journal reported that at a
demonstration of one of the guns 'one Man discharged it 63 times in seven
Minutes, though all the while Raining; and that it throws off either one large
or sixteen Musquet Balls at every discharge with very great Force'
1 November
James Puckle of London, England, demonstrated his new
invention, the "Puckle Gun," a tripod-mounted, single-barreled
flintlock gun fitted with a multishot revolving cylinder. This weapon fired
nine shots per minute at a time when the standard soldier's musket could be
loaded and fired but three times per minute. Puckle demonstrated two versions
of the basic design. One weapon, intended for use against Christian enemies,
fired conventional round bullets, while the second variant, designed to be
used against the Muslim Turks, fired square bullets, which were believed to
cause more severe and painful wounds than spherical projectiles. The "Puckle
Gun" failed to attract investors and never achieved mass production or
sales to the British armed forces. One newspaper of the period observed
following the business venture's failure that "those are only wounded who
hold shares therein." (1718)
This Third link appears to not work. But it is
"cached" at Google. If a better link is found, please let me know.
[His invention, and other machine guns, are discussed in:
David B. Kopel, Clayton E. Cramer, and Scott G. Hattrup, A Tale of Three
Cities: The Right to Bear Arms in State Supreme Courts, Temple Law Review 68
(1995): 1177. http://www.2ndlawlib.org/journals/kch-3cit.html
Since this posting, I have been reminded of the
multi-barreled pistols called "duck foots" and "mutiny
guns," as well as the old Battery Guns. Anyone with images or good
on-line articles are welcome to send them in. Thanks.
