Gatling guns in movies

[UncleEd]

Fired a Gatling gun today.

Had 50 horsemen charge at my position.

I killed 37 horses, wounded 12 men and killed 3 men.

Thought that such a weapon only hit the riders.

Did I have a defective Gatling gun?

Or what did I do wrong?

Next test will be 100 riders. Seeking volunteers.

[BigBoy99]

Video game?

[TomkinsSP]

On the bright side, a wooden crate of ammunition, about the size of a crate that holds two .50 caliber ammo cans, will last three days in those "hollywierd" models.

[Chuck24]

Rooster Cogburn!

[Mike, SC Hunter]

The Wild Bunch.

[Texas Star]

I'm not too impressed. At Omdurman, Lt. Churchill claimed three men dead for sure, a couple of wounded, and a "probable" or two. This with a 10-shot 7.63 mm Mauser pistol!

For the exact account, see his book, "My Early Life.", 1930.

[eb07]

Outlaw josey wales

[Muley Gil]

Been hitting the 'shine again???

[Golddollar]

"The Gatling Gun", starring Robert Fuller, John Carradine, Guy Stockwell, Barbara Luna, Pat Buttram, Phil Harris and Patrick Wayne. It's a real movie. I have the DVD.

[jimmyj]

"Only The Valiant" starring Gregory Peck and Ward Bond

[Targets Guy]

"The War Wagon"

[Cardboard_killer]

Originally Posted by Mike, SC Hunter

The Wild Bunch.

Nope. Browning m1917.

[amazingflapjack]

Invented by a Dentist from Washington,D.C. Hey, wasn't Doc Holiday a dentist too? Got'a watch them dentists...

[BLACKHAWKNJ]

Watch "Rough Riders" to see them in real action.

[DWalt]

Originally Posted by amazingflapjack

Invented by a Dentist from Washington,D.C. Hey, wasn't Doc Holiday a dentist too? Got'a watch them dentists...

Gatling wasn't a dentist, but he did have a medical degree (or at least what passed for one at that time). And he was from NC. He never practiced medicine however. He invented agricultural equipment in addition the the Gatling Gun. Late in his life he became interested in heavy artillery. Wahl and Toppel's "The Gatling Gun" (Arco, 1965) is the bible for Gatling Gun history.

[PALADIN85020]

Hand-cranking a multi-barreled revolving contraption is way out of date. Here's how it's done today - thanks to Mike Dillon!

John

[M1A]

Very poor weapon unless you had a line of enemy. Elevation was cranked up or down and it was not easy to spin around as you see in the movies. No good on dispersed multiple targets. Very heavy too.

[DWalt]

Some believe that Custer's failure to take his Gatlings along on his expedition to the LBH was responsible for the massacre. Others don't.

[TAROMAN]

3:10 to Yuma (2007):

[DWalt]

Originally Posted by Cardboard_killer

Nope. Browning m1917.

There are several anachronisms in "The Wild Bunch" and that is one of them. During the time period of the movie, the M1917 HMG did not exist. Nor did the Springfield M1903A3.

[eb07]

Originally Posted by DWalt

Some believe that Custer's failure to take his Gatlings along on his expedition to the LBH was responsible for the massacre. Others don't.

Only because the guns would have slowed his pace and he may have ran into the Gibbon and Terry columns and never reached the Little Bighorn before they tribes began leaving. Otherwise they still would have been lagging way behind while his column moved forward and still have been useless against essentially what was a highly mobile guerrilla force.

[THE PILGRIM]

We did finally get good results from the Gatlings in Cuba.
They were effective against the Spanish who were in fortified fixed positions.
Custers’ Troopers? Gatlings?
Probably not.
They needed repeater rifles.

Gatling

[LVSteve]

Originally Posted by M1A

Very poor weapon unless you had a line of enemy. Elevation was cranked up or down and it was not easy to spin around as you see in the movies. No good on dispersed multiple targets. Very heavy too.

Depends on how many guns you have and how they are deployed. In WWI the Maxims and Vickers machine guns were set up to fire across an advancing line at an angle. This is because nearly all lines present some depth when viewed at an angle. Not all the soldiers will be in an exact line abreast. One of the R Lee Ermey shows demonstrated this very well.

[tlawler]

Predator and Young Guns

[jag312]

Originally Posted by DWalt

Some believe that Custer's failure to take his Gatlings along on his expedition to the LBH was responsible for the massacre. Others don't.

Custer was offered four additional companies from the 2nd Cavalry. He said that he didn't need them. Mistake? It could have meant more men being killed. I'm sure the 2nd Cavalry troopers were happy that they didn't go.

[THE PILGRIM]

Oh no!
This ain’t in no movie!

[Ole Joe Clark]

Originally Posted by PALADIN85020

Hand-cranking a multi-barreled revolving contraption is way out of date. Here's how it's done today - thanks to Mike Dillon!

John

This guy's gun is like the six shooters in the movies, it don't ever run out of ammo.

Have a blessed day,

Leon

[amazingflapjack]

Adrenaline would make it much easier to crank and carry.

[BC38]

Lone Ranger? (the version with Johnny Depp as Tonto)

[walnutred]

Originally Posted by THE PILGRIM

We did finally get good results from the Gatlings in Cuba.
They were effective against the Spanish who were in fortified fixed positions.
Custers’ Troopers? Gatlings?
Probably not.
They needed repeater rifles.

Gatling

Without close air support I don't think Custer ever had a chance.

[Weimar]

Originally Posted by walnutred

Without close air support I don't think Custer ever had a chance.

I personally, having been to the site a couple of times, is that if Custer had not charged the encampment, that he probably would not have got dead.... if he had kept his force in one place and not tried to use minimum and fast cavalry movement as he did in the civil war, it would have helped too

[jag312]

Originally Posted by walnutred

Without close air support I don't think Custer ever had a chance.

Custer made one mistake. He turned down the offer of four additional companies from the 2nd Cavalry. Custer did have to leave some of his men behind because their horses were worn out and there were no replacement horses. No Commanding Officer ever complained about having too many men. However, the battle was screwed up by Reno. Custer had planned for a simultaneous three-prong attack on the village. Reno from the South, Benteen from the Southwest, and Custer from the North. Reno, who had been drinking, started the attack before Custer was in position and Benteen hadn't arrived from the pack train.



The Sioux and Cheyenne were well known for their ability to attack, They were also well known for being unable to establish a defensive plan from an attack from different directions. They would retreat, leaving the women, children, and old men behind until they could organize an attack.


Let's play "what if". What do you think had been the outcome if Custer had the additional men and if Reno hadn't started the attack when he did and screwed up Custer's plan of attack?

[LoboGunLeather]

The Gatling gun was officially classified by the US Army as an artillery piece. Typically mounted on a caisson (carriage-like device equipped with elevation and traversing mechanisms) towed by mules or horses, moved into position, then used at massed targets engaged at relatively long ranges.

Reports I have read indicate that Custer's 7th Cavalry Regiment was equipped with two Gatling guns, which Custer decided to leave behind so as to not impede speed of movement. Custer would appear to have been an old school cavalry officer-- find and fix your enemy, close with the enemy and engage with swift mounted charges for close combat, with the preferred weapons being the saber and the revolver. Once the 7th found itself fixed and surrounded, effectively denied maneuver or retreat, the battle became completely defensive against a vastly superior hostile force. Under such circumstances any chance for survival exists only by prompt arrival of an overwhelming rescue force, something that simply could not be provided in that incident.

Another interesting tidbit is that Dr. Gatling pursued his rapid-firing gun invention with a firm belief that it would quickly bring an end to warfare because of its overwhelming firepower. Nobel (inventor of dynamite, founder of the Nobel prizes) held similar beliefs/hopes for his developments. More than a few people involved in the Manhattan Project (producing the first nuclear weapons) also believed that the existence of such weapons would ensure lasting peace.

Man plans, God laughs.

[dscampbell]

The effective use of a Gatling gun was realized when an electric motor replaced the hand crank. I give you the mini gun on a warthog aircraft.


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[jlrhiner]

Wasn't there also a problem with the ammo Custers men were issued for their trapdoor carbines? Something about the cases being too soft and ripping off the rims leaving the rifle jammed until the spent case could be pried out.

[UncleEd]

Originally Posted by jlrhiner

Wasn't there also a problem with the ammo Custers men were issued for their trapdoor carbines? Something about the cases being too soft and ripping off the rims leaving the rifle jammed until the spent case could be pried out.

Copper cases vs. the preferred brass cases.

[S42N8]

Originally Posted by dscampbell

The effective use of a Gatling gun was realized when an electric motor replaced the hand crank. I give you the mini gun on a warthog aircraft.


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I'm pretty sure the GAU-8/A is not a minigun, in any sense of the term.

[Nevada Ed]

Custer needed something a LOT, LOT higher than just air support !!

[Steve912]

Custer was long due for being caught short.

[Marshwheeling]

Started to watch a Netflix movie called Hickok last night. I had high hopes for it, being a western and all. The opening scenes featured some flavor of Gatling gun, being used by Confederates in some unnamed battle. That’s all i know. The gun did not figure in the rest of the movie, which in any case turned out to be so lame we didn’t finish it.

[JohnRippert]

The Last Samurai

[Dave.357]

I have fired reproductions made by Mike Sutchca from Ohio.
He is no longer building guns but he built several for Hollywood

[DWalt]

Originally Posted by dscampbell

The effective use of a Gatling gun was realized when an electric motor replaced the hand crank. I give you the mini gun on a warthog aircraft.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Gatling himself developed several electrically powered versions back around the turn of the century.
And they worked. But at that time they would have needed very long extension cords to be of any combat use. There wasn't much interest in perfecting electrically-powered Gatlings until the advent of jet aircraft. Much of the development of early electrically powered Gatlings for aircraft use was done back in the early 1950s at the Armour Research Foundation in Chicago. And some such guns were used as far back as the early days of U. S. involvement in Vietnam. Remember "Puff the Magic Dragon"?

[LoboGunLeather]

Originally Posted by DWalt

Gatling himself developed several electrically powered versions back around the turn of the century.
And they worked. But at that time they would have needed very long extension cords to be of any combat use. There wasn't much interest in perfecting electrically-powered Gatlings until the advent of jet aircraft. Much of the development of early electrically powered Gatlings for aircraft use was done back in the early 1950s at the Armour Research Foundation in Chicago. And some such guns were used as far back as the early days of U. S. involvement in Vietnam. Remember "Puff the Magic Dragon"?

"Puff the Magic Dragon" was a highly developed piece of equipment before my arrival in Vietnam (1969). Essentially a C130 cargo plane (turbo-prop, four engines) modified for the air support role, featuring 7.62mm mini-guns, also known as the Vulcan Cannon (several configurations existed, including at least one with a 105mm howitzer). The mini-guns had a cyclic rate of 6000 RPM, but were commonly "tuned down" to about 2000 RPM (approx. 333 RPM per barrel of the 6-barreled gun, so heat build-up and barrel burn-out were serious concerns in use). Usually deployed in a circular or oval orbit over a target area, allowing the side of the aircraft armed with guns to engage ground targets. When firing the sound (from the ground anyway) was a high-pitched buzzing sound, not unlike a heavy-duty zipper being pulled, and the tracer elements in the projectiles looked very much like a red laser beam descending from the sky to the ground. Very impressive armament.

Mini-guns (7.62mm) were also deployed on Army attack helicopters (AH-1 Cobra and UH-1 Huey gunships), and I saw a couple of fixed installations with mini-guns mounted in towers for perimeter or area defense.

Some USAF attack aircraft were equipped with the 20mm Vulcan Cannons, basically a larger caliber model of similar design. 20mm ammunition included armor-piercing and high-explosive versions, allowing use against armored vehicles and fortified positions, or against troop concentrations.

Later developments included the A10, a turbo-fan armored attack plane essentially built around the 30mm version of the modern Gatling gun design. A very effective tank killer weapon, usually firing depleted uranium projectiles for extreme armor-piercing capability. The USAF has announced the A10 to be discontinued, but after several years the "Warthogs" continue to serve.

All of those systems started with development work revolving around a vintage US Army Gatling Gun, .45-70 caliber, modified with electrical drive and improved ammo feeding mechanisms. The company names sticking in my mind from that development period are General Electric and Vulcan Systems.

The only original Gatling Gun that I have ever personally examined was a 7X57mm Mauser example, made by Colt, reportedly for a Latin American military where the 7mm Mauser was the standard service cartridge. It was in the usual caisson-mounted configuration, but was equipped with armor plate protection panels for the gunner and loader. I'm sure several other versions exist (or existed).

[Golddollar]

On Top Shot on the History Channel, one of the events was using Gatling guns to sever upright telegraph poles. That looked like a lot of fun. I would hate to have to pay for shells though.