Gardner Gun

The Gardner gun was an early machine gun. It had one or two barrels, was fed from a vertical magazine or hopper and was operated by a crank.
The Gardner machine gun was invented in 1874 by William Gardner, formerly a Captain in the Union army during the American Civil War. After producing a prototype he went to the Pratt and Whitney company, who after a year of development produced a military version of the weapon.
A demonstration to officers at the United States Navy yard in 1875 was successful, however they showed no interest in the weapon.
On 15 January and 17 March 1880 more tests were conducted at Sandy Hook Proving ground in front of an Army review board. The weapon performed well, and they recommended that the Army buy a limited number for field evaluation, noting the low cost of the weapon. However the U.S. Army again declined to purchase.
At this point, the British Royal Navy, which had successfully deployed the Gatling gun became interested in the weapon, and Gardner was invited to England to exhibit his weapon. The British Admiralty were so impressed by the demonstrations that they adopted the weapon and purchased the rights to produce the weapon in England. Gardner would remain in England to supervise the construction of the weapons.
The British Army then took an interest in machine guns and after a series of trials selected the Gardner gun. The Army adopted the weapon, although its introduction was delayed because of opposition from the Royal Artillery.
(Wikipedia)
A Gardner gun is on show in The Pancho Villa Museum, Chihuahua, Mexico. It is not clear how the gun came to be in the hands of Pancho Villa's forces.

More WW1 etc photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7700258@N05/

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Gardner
• Gun
• Machine
• Royal
• Navy
• Pancho
• Villa

[Stalin111]

wow thanks for uploading. Thats one cool gun.

[philthydirtyanimal]

Thanks for commenting! Yes, it is an interesting gun, I'm surprised it isn't famous.

[WernerWarhead14]

Great video. :)

[philthydirtyanimal]

Thanks!

[SteveSpicerPortsmuth]

It may look like a Stg44 but internally they are completely different. Just because a car looks similar to another car doesn't mean it's mechanically the same,hence not a copy. The M60 is heavily based on the german MG42 for instance. The british Vickers machine gun was just and "improved" Maxim. The Springfield1903 was so similar to the german Mauser they were sued and forced to pay.

Anyway most historians now believe Tesla invented the radio before Marconi.

[dgard20]

Hey I'm a Gardner and I had no idea

[hamsterlover1888]

"Realiable" "Easy to clear if it jams"?

Tell that to the British in the Sudan (1884-5) were thee things jammed repeatedly.

That being said, cool gun and great to see someone replicating these.

[redreaper2020]

belt feed it, and gear that crank with maybe a 1:3 ratio...it'd be still useable.

And the fact that a maxim and a gardner worked at the same time says something AMAZING.

[Stalin111]

@philthydirtyanimal i just saw it again: Gardner guns at Sedan? I knew they had some bogger volley-guns there, which was used like a giant shotgun and from artillery-ranges - it simply was shot to pieces by normal artillery and coverred a relatively small area from afar. Wikipedia mentions others: the Gast-Gun, Nordenfeldt, and of course the gatling. The Video sure is right, the gardner-gun sure is the most simple and practical of them, the bira for instance wheighs about 1000 pounds.

[Tyriama]

We once made a replica in my sheet metal classes. It was very fun, and I'm amazed this gun did not become more popular, it was very fun to use

[USMCM249gunner]

yeah I understand the last part.

all these inventors are like celebrated icons and heroes....most people think they started the whole idea by themselves. when in reality they just improved an already existing idea. overshadowing the achievements of the latter guy

[USMCM249gunner]

yeah like kalashnikov never admits seeing a Stg44

[MasterAceman123456]

Theres a company building Gardners soon for $29,950

[a0e0roberts]

Hmmm. So, technically, this is not a fully automatic machine gun. I could build one, heh heh.

As long as I could convince the jury....