gurdymonkey | Dear Mythbusters

Our leather cannon is STILL prettier, and functional too:

Love and kisses,
The Free Artillerie Company of the Earl of Montrose.

You know the lady who brought the Civil War Parrot Rifle for the Mythbusters episode on leather cannon to use for benchmark measurements? Jane's one of ours too. In fact, she put the show in touch with our captain and gunsmith, Dale Shinn, (center, wearing the blue sash). Their reaction, when he explained how to actually build a functional 17th c. leather cannon was, 'Um, wow, that's really involved."
I'm not surprised their breech plug failed. Their version of the Swedish cannon was something of a rush job. Dale's guns are not.

From the Free Artillery Company's web page:
The presence of sympathetic foreign mercenaries in the service of Gustavus Adolphus is well documented. The military genius of this great General whose practices altered and reshaped military tactics for centuries is also well known. One such innovation that caused great alarm throughout the countries of Europe at its debut was his new secret weapon-the leather cannon. The evolution of this weapon of mass destruction finds it’s early beginnings at Zurich where the Kings’ Austrian born Colonel Melchior Warmprandt went to learn of the new invention. He brought the idea back to Sweden and developed it into the efficient anti-personnel weapon it became during that European struggle. Scottish mercenaries were prominent in Gustavus’ service and one prominent Captain of Infantry; Robert Scott was among those who submitted a prototype weapon along with Ludvig Ripp, a Captain of Artillerie in 1628 at the trials held at the naval station of Skeppsholmen. One contemporary report in English credited Scott with the invention of the marvelous leather Cannon! Facts reveal a different story, but Scott did bring his own version of this weapon to Scotland to be constructed and used in number with good effect during the English Civil Wars.

This lightweight 3-pound cannon (Regimentstück) was a brilliant tactical success. Taken apart and carted in wagons it was carried to and assembled or rolled out to the front line to first receive the Cavalry Charge. Using the first self contained linen cartridge ever designed, 18 .80 caliber balls were hurled with deadly effect at trooper then infantry alike. So devastating was the use of this secret weapon that some exaggerated claims (up to 18 shots a minute!) of its rapid fire heralded its announcement in the foreign press. Its self-contained linen cartridge made at a munitions factory was a singular innovation since these cartridges freed the crew from the complicated loading process with powder and shot.

Our leather cannon is constructed like the original, with a copper core, sleeved in a steel tube held in place by a steel cage, wrapped with rope, plastered and covered with linen and the leather casing shrunk on the tube and over a wooden cannon muzzle and breech ring. The only departures are the steel tube sealed with its threaded breech plug rather than the cast amalgam used a to seal the breech of the wrought iron original. The simpler design adopted suffered serious design flaws that plagued it throughout the War. The Ripp design overcomes these and likewise offers greater strength solving in large degree the age-old failure of iron tubes subjected to the wet swab that eventually cracked the casing, by using a cooper core and the cage that helped dissipate heat. No doubt its added weight and expense though made it prohibitive to adopt on large scale. Our carriage design is taken from an original leather cannon."

We and our dead sexy leather cannon will be at the Scottish Games in Woodland, CA the weekend of April 24-25.