The Employment of Artillery in the Indian Wars, 1860-1890

[Cannoneer]

An article about how artillery was used in the wars against the the Amerinds in the latter half of the 19th century.

Artillery in the Indian Wars

[KABAR2]

Some interesting information, good find!

[cannonmn]

Thanks for posting. The author did a good job from an academic standpoint, but made a few errors of fact only by virtue of not being personally familiar with antique artillery.  He mentions 10-inch Parrotts being used where he meant, I'm sure, 10-pounders.

The photo on lower left of page 14 is captioned to the effect that the field artillery piece shown is a 12-pounder Napoleon, when in fact of course it is a 6-pounder gun, M1841.  Then he mentions a "Rodman rifle" (which is another name for the 3" ordnance rifle) as if that was something different from a 3-inch ordnance rifle.  I guess the lesson is if you are a scholar, have someone with "shop" knowledge help with proofreading.

[GGaskill]

I guess the lesson is if you are a scholar, have someone with "shop" knowledge help with proofreading.

While I agree with you 100%, those academic PhD's would never submit their masterpieces for review by a commoner.

[subdjoe]

I thought the 3 Inch Ordance Rifle was the Griffen Gun.  Weren't Rodmans all smoothbore? And cast using Rodmans process, not made of wrought iron?

[cannonmn]

I thought the 3 Inch Ordance Rifle was the Griffen Gun.  Weren't Rodmans all smoothbore? And cast using Rodmans process, not made of wrought iron?

"Rodman rifle" is a nickname I've seen applied, here and there, to the 3" ordnance rifle, not to imply there's any great logical or historical basis for that usage, which there isn't. 

I recall critiquing, long after the fact, an article by the late Fairfax Downey, a former artillery officer (WWI).  His article appeared in MILITARY COLLECTOR AND HISTORIAN, aka JOURNAL OF THE COMPANY OF MILITARY HISTORIANS.  One of the points I "jumped on" was his assertion that Thomas J. Rodman was responsible for the development of the "3-inch Rodman Rifle" made of wrought iron and incredibly durable.  The article also included a nice large photo of a US bronze 12-pounder field howitzer, mis-captioned "Naploeon 12-Pounder."  Downey had written many books and articles about historic artillery and artillerymen, but at the time (ca. 1960's) there were few if any accurate, illustrated reference books on artillery, since Ripley and Olmstead hadn't published theirs yet.  So technical errors of that kind weren't obvious to too many people.

[subdjoe]

Ah!  A somewhat sacastic term-of-art.  Got it. 

[GGaskill]

As I recall, Rodman was a junior (if not the junior) member of the commission that examined the Griffen/Phoenix proposal.  It was the contention of the author of the article that Rodman had little to do with the design that emerged beyond acting as secretary, but when you compare the Rodman smoothbores with the 3" wrought iron rifle, it is hard to say that the flowing curves aren't indicative of Rodman's input.  It would have been much simpler to have used straight lines for most of the profile and that would have made construction much simpler, but they didn't.

So while I have to give Griffen the nod for the overall design using the wrought iron, it seems beyond belief to exclude Rodman from the design of the profile, documentation, or its absence, notwithstanding.

[Cannoneer]

I thought the 3 Inch Ordance Rifle was the Griffen Gun.  Weren't Rodmans all smoothbore? And cast using Rodmans process, not made of wrought iron?

Here are two Artilleryman Magazine articles about John Griffen's "3-inch Wrought Iron Gun," and why it shouldn't be called a "Rodman."
While I don't think it should be considered "wrong" to call the "3-inch Ordnance Rifle" by Griffen's name, because he is certainly the person that should be credited with its conception, I think it would be a lot less confusing if we didn't call it that. Most of the well regarded writers on CW artillery use the designation "Griffen Gun" to describe John Griffen's first experimental wrought iron cannon design, which was a smoothbore, and had a slightly different profile with sharper angles than the latter rifled cannons with their graceful rounded surfaces that most of us refer to as the 3-inch Ordnance Rifle, or the 3-inch Wrought Iron Gun, as it was originally called.
While its certainly a possibility that Thomas Jackson Rodman is responsible for some of the design features of the Ordnance Rifle; I'm in agreement with the Artilleryman article in that there is no definite proof of his influence over the final design of the rifle. In "The Big Guns" by Olmstead, Stark, and Tucker, it is stated that cannon designers of this period had knowledge of the effects caused by sharp angles (stress risers) in the bore, and even on the outer surface of the barrel, so its plausible that others on the Ordnance Board that reviewed Griffen's gun, may have played a part in the guns smooth appearance.       
 
Inventor of Wrought Iron Gun

Don't Call It A Rodman

[GGaskill]

That second article ("Don't Call It a Rodman") is the one I was recalling; it appears that Rodman was not the Secretary.  In any event, taking the following quote,

"The 1861 Ordnance Board, which made the final design for the 3-inch rifle, was comprised of 
Capt. Alexander B. Dyer, president; Capt. Theodore T.S. Laidley, recorder; and Capt. Thomas J. 
Rodman, member.

Dyer was the man who tested both the 1856 Phoenix-produced Griffen gun and the first 1861 
model. Laidley was the officer sent to Phoenixville, Pa., to inspect and test the first 
production guns of the final design.

All three men were present for all the meetings at which the Ordnance Rifle specifications were 
drawn and the final drawing produced. Both Dyer and Laidley signed the minutes of the meeting, 
as officers of the board."

the credit has to go to one or more of these three men as no one else was present. 

The statement, "Rodman's fame came primarily from his patents for an internal cooling process for cast iron guns," is somewhat misleading as another reason for Rodman's "fame" was that he had invented a pressure measuring device, and using it, had measured chamber and bore pressures along the length of the bore.  And from this information, he developed the distinctive curvature of his barrels.  Since what we are discussing here is the shape of the Wrought Iron Gun, not its method of manufacture (which clearly is Griffen's invention), it seems absurd to think that Rodman had little or nothing to do with it. 

Now it may be that since the streamlined design of Rodman's coast artillery pieces had been introduced several years before, it was now considered common knowledge, and therefore not something special that any of the board members thought worth taking special credit for.  Although not mentioned in the article (except to say that Rodman's name was not on the drawings), it appears that none of the Ordnance Board members' names were on the final drawings of the Wrought Iron Gun.  So the lack of Rodman's name shouldn't be given any special value.

As concerns the later correspondence, et cetera, being directed to Dyer and Laidley, this would seem natural if they had been assigned responsibility for the testing and production of the Griffen gun and later the Wrought Iron Gun.  Also Rodman presumably had some responsibility for the ongoing production of the seacoast pieces of his design.

So from the data presented in the article and from the profiles of the Rodman seacost guns and the wrought iron gun, and the presence of Rodman on the Ordnance Board that created the design for the wrought iron gun, I think one has to conclude that Rodman had something to do with the profile of the wrought iron gun either directly or indirectly, and that neither of his fellow officers on the Ordnance Board felt that they were more responsible for its design than Rodman.