Author Topic: Why does this French 4-pdr. have hundredweight marks? (Read 2142 times)

cannonmn · « **on:** August 16, 2009, 02:03:33 AM »

Here's what I believe to be a French iron four-pounder gun. The bore is 3.25 inches, and nominal length is 54 inches. It has been in a small private museum in Massachusetts, USA as long as anyone can recall. I think this gun is from the late 18th C. just since the style is similar to other French guns I've seen from that period. The keyhole vent field is very typical of French guns from that era, as are the breechface and cascabel. The only "easily discernable" marks are the CWT marks, namely 8 2 27, which of course means it weighed 979 lbs. at the foundry where it was cast, after all the machining was done.

Questions:

1. Is it a field gun or small naval gun? The carriage is of course incorrect so ignore that.

2. Why does this French 4-pounder have "British or American-like" hundredweight marks? The French didn't use those as their weight system was quite different.

3. What markings if any should be on a French military or naval gun of this size?

4. I'd like to hear opinions from anyone. Maybe if we're real lucky Bob Smith will show up-he's probably seen more French guns than all the rest of us put together.

The slideshow has many additional photos.

Slideshow:
http://s17.photobucket.com/albums/b62/cannonmn/miscforumsetc/forums42/?action=view&current=7c21504f.pbw

KABAR2 · « **Reply #1 on:** August 16, 2009, 02:16:02 AM »

Could this gun found itself in use with an English company? Captured as part of a prize and sold off by the British Goverment?

then refurbished and sold through commercial channels to say the East India Company? it would be interesting to know if

there are more like this out there, unfortunately WWII probably destroyed more muzzle loading artillery than all the wars they

were used in.

One last idea...... could it possibly be Belguim? closely coping the french pattern..... it would not be the first time their work was

confused, Belgium gun making has a history of making guns for the English trade. If this the case it would have the proper weight marks

used in England, I know that during the war of 1812 some Brithish contract muskets came from Belguim, also I have found reference years

back to an earlier connection, when I was in the parts business I had had several Brown Bess locks that differed slightly from the standard pattern

internally correct external marks but a definite difference in the bridal and sear, also small letter marks left by the maker were a different font, my suspicion

is these were Belguim made locks for the British trade contracted by a contractor in England

dan610324 · « **Reply #2 on:** August 16, 2009, 02:33:38 AM »

its the same way as the swedish barrels was marked at the same time ,
but in sweden the markings was for :

skeppspund = 170 kilo
lisspund = 8,5 kilo
skålpund = 0,425 kilo

thelionspaw · « **Reply #3 on:** August 16, 2009, 02:52:00 AM »

It's a contract gun? I have an English Sharpe, London pistol with Belgian proof marks.

rc

KABAR2 · « **Reply #4 on:** August 16, 2009, 03:30:31 AM »

It's just a thought, years ago I thought about researching the links between the Belgium gun trade in the 18th & 19th Centuries and England
but never got anywhere with it. Kept finding small references to it but it's not something I think the British want to acknowledge, after all
their gun trade was the premier during that time............

And Richard yes your pistol would have been a contract piece. Also Belgium companies were known now and then to counterfeit other makers......
many people of the time were not knowledgeable on the proof marks and might assume it was a English made pistol. one more thing Richard,
is it only Belgium proofs? no English proofs? it may not be a contract piece if there are no British proofs, this is one of the areas I wanted to research,
I believe the East India Company would have picked up contracted guns and shipped them to India with out going the added step of bringing them to
England and add the cost of a English proof. so as you can see there are various scenarios at play here.

Spain became king of what we would call Counterfeiters later on, but that is another story.

cannonmn · « **Reply #5 on:** August 16, 2009, 02:11:17 PM »

My answer us I don't know, and I don't know. Threre are faint marks on the basering, parts of letters and numbers, will have to take rubbings, scrape some paint, whatever to bring them out. There's a story here somewhere.

RocklockI · « **Reply #6 on:** August 16, 2009, 02:56:19 PM »

170 tube weight /

8.5 ball weight /

.425 / charge weight

??

no clue really /.

Quote from: dan610324 on August 16, 2009, 02:33:38 AM

its the same way as the swedish barrels was marked at the same time ,
but in sweden the markings was for :

skeppspund = 170 kilo
lisspund = 8,5 kilo
skålpund = 0,425 kilo

cannonmn · « **Reply #7 on:** August 16, 2009, 03:07:11 PM »

Quote

its the same way as the swedish barrels was marked at the same time ,
but in sweden the markings was for :

skeppspund = 170 kilo
lisspund = 8,5 kilo
skålpund = 0,425 kilo

What Dan did was to say the cannons in Sveedun are marked with three numbers also.

But instead of being hundredweight, quartel, and pounds like ours, his are in three different Sveedie units, kinds like tons, pounds and ounces.

Double D · « **Reply #8 on:** August 16, 2009, 03:38:16 PM »

August 2, 27?

February 8, 27?

cannonmn · « **Reply #9 on:** August 16, 2009, 04:02:42 PM »

>8 2 27, which of course means it weighed 979 lbs.

It works like this: First number is called hundredweights, second is called quartals, third is just pounds.

First number x 112

Second number x 28

Third number x 1

____________________

Add up the products.

dan610324 · « **Reply #10 on:** August 16, 2009, 11:42:49 PM »

first is skeppspund = 400 swedish pounds from that time = 170 kilo today
second is lisspund = 20 swedish pounds = 8,5 kilo
third number is pounds = 0,425 kilo (close to your american pound, 0,454 kilo I think it is today)

if I remember correct , then sweden actually used french pounds (but not 100% sure)
many countries in europe used france as a model for almost anything
the french influence was hughe
technical
science
fashion
you name it and it probably had an french influence

carronader · « **Reply #11 on:** August 17, 2009, 10:39:12 AM »

grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr not in my house it wasn't

Cat Whisperer · « **Reply #12 on:** August 17, 2009, 11:31:13 AM »

Quote from: dan610324 on August 16, 2009, 11:42:49 PM

...
you name it and it probably had an french influence

Good observation. One may like it or not, but undeniable.

We in the US picked up their better-than-everyone-else ATTITUDE.

Seriously, we learned artillary from them at the turn of the century; then we likely did much better than they did, but one needs to look only to the French 75 and the 155mm as examples.

Bob Smith · « **Reply #13 on:** August 18, 2009, 09:04:44 AM »

Again, Ruth's territory rather than mine. But yes, British weights, not dates.

Probably small French naval gun, late 18th century. And yes, the marks suggest being captured, probably in Revolutionary/Napoleonic period. However Ruth says the numbers are not quite in the usual Board of Ordnance style, and given at this period the British were moving away from small-calibre long guns, more likely sold into the merchant service. If not broad arrow, that would confirm that thesis.

French 18th century naval guns should have marks- fleur-de-lys, or cap of liberty or RF engraved on the barrel, date or weight engraved on the baseline; weight or maker's marks on the trunnion face.

Bob Smith

cannonmn · « **Reply #14 on:** August 22, 2009, 07:33:15 AM »

I dug out some info I'd gotten at the Natonal Archives and the Library of Congress back about a year ago while researching French swivels.

Here's the direct link to the table if you need larger print:

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b62/cannonmn/miscforumsetc/forums42/IMG_8629.jpg

The only purpose of the photo, which is an image of a drawing of a French naval short 6-pounder, is to show the great similarity of lines between it and my 4-pounder. I'm positive based on that kind of comparison that my gun is French.

The table, in the right column, does show French naval iron four-pounders. The only one that's close is what they call the short (court) 4-pounder Model 1779. They list the weight for it as 950 French pounds, so with the generally-accepted conversion factor of 1.08 English pounds to one French pound of that period, my gun should weigh 1026 lbs. if it were a French short 4-pounder. It only weighs 979 pounds, which is about 5 % low. Is that within acceptable limits or not? Perhaps for 18th C. it would be OK, I'm not sure, but it would be unacceptable in the US during the 19th C. Anyway, since founders were paid by weight, it would be unlikely they'd cast very many underweight guns before they beefed up their pattern.

dan610324 · « **Reply #15 on:** August 22, 2009, 08:52:42 AM »

I dont think 5% is impossible
first think of a not 100% perfect scale
then a few other % lost by rust during a 200 year time period

its nice and painted for rust protection now , and was so when it was in use.
but there between maybe it was a 100 year period when not anyone did care about if it was rusty or not

so thats a posibility

all expensive collectors items of today have some time had a period when they just had the scrap metal value .
Im just 48 yo , but how many cars dont you think that I regret that I sent to the scrap yard
so what could have happened with that cannon barrel during its 200+ years life

cannonmn · « **Reply #16 on:** August 22, 2009, 10:15:57 AM »

Thanks Dan, yes I'd guess scale error could be maybe one %, but since considerable money could be lost to such an error you would think they would check their weights frequently. The old pictures I see show large beam balances being used in cannon foundries, with big pyramid-type incremental weights to put on the non-payload end.

The weight I'm using for this study is the weight that's marked on the gun, the hundredweight marks adding up to 979 English pounds. I haven't weighed it as I don't have such a scale handy, and I'm only concerned what the gun weighed back whenever they carved those marks in it.

dan610324 · « **Reply #17 on:** August 22, 2009, 10:35:49 AM »

it could also be that they consistently marked them with a 1 - 1,5% higher weight then what the foudry scale showed
that maybe was an accepted error
if so the foundry would earn some extra money on each cannon
no today living person can tell for sure
I guess that any such cheating havent been written down in any documents

who knows ?? Im just brainstorming now

Bob Smith · « **Reply #18 on:** August 24, 2009, 03:52:33 AM »

I asked the Fount of All Knowledge on this and Ruth says this:
I have recently being doing work on French guns and I have been surprised how there was much less control over the individual foundries - bronze and iron- than I would expect for British examples of the same period. There are a couple of things on the weight- one is that the gun might have been bored up to a 6 pounder, which would make is a little less than its original weight. There is a considerable variation for British iron guns, sometimes as much as 10%, but as you say these tend to be on the heavier side rather than the light side.
Bob Smith

cannonmn · « **Reply #19 on:** August 24, 2009, 04:15:58 AM »

Quote

one is that the gun might have been bored up to a 6 pounder,

Thanks to the Smiths for checking this out. The French gun still has its 3.25-inch bore. I'm glad to know British guns varied as much as 10%, so now I'm thinking a 5% variation from specification for a French gun wouldn't be outlandish.

cannonmn · « **Reply #20 on:** November 04, 2009, 04:23:24 PM »

Conclusion of study of unknown 4-pounder cannon

(found some surprising information, checkitout)

http://gs19.inmotionhosting.com/~milita8/cmh/member/member.cgi/read/7958