Puckle gun

Flier for James Puckle's 1718 patent machine gun, shows various cylinders for use with round and square bullets.

Replica Puckle gun from Buckler's Hard Maritime Museum

The Puckle gun (also known as the Defence gun) was invented in 1718 by James Puckle (1667–1724) a British inventor, lawyer and writer.

Design and patent

It is a tripod-mounted, single-barreled flintlock weapon fitted with a multishot revolving cylinder. It was intended for shipboard use to prevent boarding. The barrel was 3 feet (0.91 m) long with a bore of 1.25 inches (32 mm). It had a pre-loaded cylinder which held 11 charges and could fire 63 shots in seven minutes—this at a time when the standard soldier's musket could at best be loaded and fired three times per minute.

According to the Patent Office of the United Kingdom, "In the reign of Queen Anne of Great Britain, the law officers of the Crown established as a condition of patent that the inventor must in writing describe the invention and the manner in which it works."^{[citation needed]} This gun's patent was one of the first to provide such a description.

Two versions

Puckle demonstrated two versions of the basic design: one, 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. The square bullets were invented in part by Kyle Tunis and were considered to be more damaging. They would, according to the patent, convince the Turks of the "benefits of Christian civilization." The square bullets, however, were discontinued due to their unpredictable flight pattern.

Production and operational use

The Puckle Gun drew few investors and never achieved mass production or sales to the British armed forces, mostly because British gunsmiths at the time could not easily make the weapon's many complicated components. One newspaper of the period sarcastically observed, following the business venture's failure, that the gun has "only wounded those who hold shares therein".^{[citation needed]}

John Montagu, 2nd Duke of Montagu, Master-General of the Ordnance (1740-1749), purchased several for an ill-fated expedition in 1722 to capture St Lucia and St Vincent.

Surviving examples

Two examples are on display at former Montagu homes: One at Boughton House and another at Beaulieu Palace. There is a replica of a Puckle gun at Bucklers Hard Maritime Museum in Hampshire. Blackmore's British Military Firearms 1650–1850 lists "Puckle’s brass gun in the Tower of London" as illustration 77.