Rodman Gun - Rifled Rodmans

Rifled Rodmans

During the War, and immediately after, attempts were made to cast rifled Rodman guns. Unsuccessful attempts were made to cast a 12-inch rifle in 1861, an 8-inch rifle in 1862, and another 12-inch rifle in 1868. (Birkhimer 1884, p. 267). However Robert Parker Parrott at the Cold Springs Foundry near the United States Army Military Academy at West Point used the Rodman water core method of casting to produce large bore rifled guns in 200, 300, and 400 pound models. Parrott rifles that had been cast using the Rodman method were inscribed with the initials WC in order to differentiate those guns from ones that had been cast using ordinary methods. Primarily these guns were used on naval vessels especially large monitors. In the 1870s and 1880s efforts focused on converting existing Rodman guns into rifles. 10-inch Rodman smoothbore guns were converted into 8-inch rifles. The first method used was inserting a wrought iron rifle sleeve through the muzzle, a similar steel sleeve was also used later. The last method involved drilling and tapping the breech of the 10-inch Rodman and inserting a rifled steel sleeve and screwing it in tight with a threaded breech plug. These breech inserted guns are easily recognized by the square “cascabel” which was designed to provide purchase for screwing the breech plug and liner securely into the gun.

These conversions were not viewed favorably, were primarily seen as cheap stopgaps until modern breech-loading rifles could be developed and emplaced (Birkhimer 1884, p. 293).