Wiards of Ohio


At the outbreak of the Civil War, Norman K. Wiard had a reputation as a bit of a quack, his most recent and notable achievement was the development of an “locomotive vehicle for running on ice or water” (Patent #26290A) dubbed by the Chicago Tribune the “ice boat.” The boat had not proven a success, but with hostilities with the Confederacy now a reality, Wiard turned his creative genius to revolutionizing the U.S. Army’s moribund Ordnance Department. “I found on examination of the field artillery used in the United States service that there was no less than nine different calibers of rifle and smoothbore guns adopted and in use, and that nothing like system or uniformity prevailed in the department,” he commented in a pamphlet published in 1863. “I found also that the variety and size of the projectiles were even more numerous than the calibers of the guns,” and that the head of the department, General James W. Ripley, had no desire change things.
 
6-pdr Wiard rifled cannon and limber
          
“Impressed by these facts and knowing the needs of the country, I commenced an investigation shortly after the fall of Fort Sumter which resulted in the design and production of a system of field artillery,” the Janesville, Wisconsin man stated. “I have met with the most determined hostility and opposition both from General Ripley and from General [William F.] Barry, chief of the Army Ordnance, who opposed the introduction of any guns but the Parrott cast-iron guns with their clumsy projectiles which were the pets of General Barry, and the 3”wrought-iron ordnance gun, the only one designed and offered by the Army Ordnance Department.” Wiard found much to criticize in the Army’s selection of shells, lambasting the Dyer projectile (“utterly worthless”) and the Schenkl and Parrott shells (“worthless”) and commented that the “last appearance of the Schenkl projectile was at Fredericksburg” where “over 30,000 of them were on hand and although General Ripley knew them to be literally worthless, as not one in 20 would take rifling, he suffered many thousands to forward to the army which were afterwards fired in Fredericksburg but without any very serious destructive effect.”
 
6-pdr Wiard rifled cannon
          Wiard set to work in his New York shops to develop better cannon for the U.S. Army, and developed both a 6-lb rifled gun and a 12-lb rifled gun. Wiard focused his attention on the design of the carriage as well as the actual gun tube. To minimize recoil, he designed the breech end of the gun with a very bulbous appearance, and thinned out the barrel past the trunnion. His primary innovation with the carriage was to place the axle below the gun carriage which allowed for not only a stronger carriage (and one much less prone to breaking when firing) but also the ability to elevate the gun to 36 degrees, greatly extending its range.  “The breech is rounded and without ridge or ring, thus securing an equal and safe expansion of the metal when heated. The diameter of the breech is ten inches and bore about 48 inches,” reported the Chicago Tribune. The cannon featured “gain twist” rifling with about eight grooves and eight lands and had fixed sights. “The cannon throws both round shot and shell of a conical shape and also for the first time in rifled guns canister shot. The wheels are built up by wedges and screws in such a manner than no shrinkage of the wood can loosen the wheel.”


The first test of Wiard’s new cannon came in July 1861 at West Point, New York where Wiard guns, firing a Hotchkiss shell, “completely riddled” the target place at 1,650 yards distance “every ball striking within an area of six feet of the bullseye. Additional testing in Washington again showed the superiority of Wiard’s design and he was given a contract for production. By late September, Wiard had five shops running all out producing guns for the army. “He has organized five distinct shops and stocked them with all the requisite machinery,” wrote a Wisconsin visitor. “These shops are owned by different parties though superintended by Wiard and employ 480 men. Mr. Wiard commenced with steel ingots and finishes the gun ready for use. Five of the 12-lb guns are completed each day.” O’Donnell’s Foundry in New York cast the pieces.
 
The "worthless" Schenkl shell
Wiard’s first pieces were sent to the Navy which used them to arm various vessels, but he also was sending cannon out West for use by General Fremont’s forces in Missouri, several were also used by Ambrose Burnside’s troops in their North Carolina coastal campaign. By January 1862, former Attorney General Christopher Parsons Wolcott of Ohio had convinced the War Department to provide the state with four batteries of Wiards to arm batteries about to enter the service. The first guns arrived at Camp Dennison in mid-January and were quickly put through their paces. “A muslin target was stretched on the hillside and every preparation made for the experiments. By placing the trail under instead of over the axle, the gun can be depressed or elevated some 36 degrees. Using but an ounce of powder, shells were projected to the prodigious height of one mile and dropped behind the target where they exploded in every instance. So slight was the report that many spectators could not believe there had been an explosion of the charge till they would hear the report of the shell exploding,” it was reported. “The muslin was riddled with grape in a way calculated to make on feel uncomfortable nor was there the least evidence after repeated trial that the rifling of the gun had been in any respect injured. The precision of the piece in firing was further demonstrated by two shells aimed at an elm tree, both of which took effect and exploded in its massive trunk, tearing it into smithereens.”
Christopher P. Wolcott

A delegation of Ohio battery officers proclaimed that “no such effective weapon has hitherto been seen in the West” and urged Governor David Tod to secure more Wiards for Ohio. “We think that these guns answer all the requirements of a field battery and we would therefore respectfully submit that the efficiency of this arm of the service would be greatly increased if the Ohio artillery were supplied with these guns in place of the rifled bronze guns now in use,” they said. Among the signatories of this letter was Captain Jerome B. Burroughs in command of the 14th Ohio Independent Battery; Burroughs became the first battery to receive Wiards, being issued four 6-lb rifles and two 12-lb rifles. The other Ohio batteries that received Wiards included Batteries G and K of the 1st Ohio Light Artillery who received them in late January, the 4th Ohio Independent Battery, and the 12th Ohio Independent Battery which received them in May 1862.

Praise for the Wiards was quick in coming. Battery G and the 14th Ohio Battery both used them with deadly effect at Shiloh in April, Private George Moore of Battery G commented that the 12-lb rifle he fired “did more execution than any other gun on the field.” The 14th Ohio, despite being overrun and all six pieces spiked by the Confederates, loved their Wiards and rebuilt them as soon as recovered on the field the next day.

Wiards went to the eastern theater as well where Captain Aaron C. Johnson of the 12th Ohio Battery praised their toughness and accuracy. “I have fired the Wiard battery nearly 3,000 times,” he wrote Norman Wiard in December 1862. “I moved the Wiard battery from western Virginia in the campaign with General Milroy and also through the entire campaign with General Fremont, also under General Sigel, traveling about 600 miles and have not in all that time had an axle break, nor a wheel give way either in marching or in firing. A more certain and reliable aim can be taken with your sights than with any other that I know of,” Johnson commented. “In fact, most of the artillery officers with whom I am acquainted prefer a battery of Wiard guns to any other and I am sure no artillerist will be satisfied with other guns after using yours.” Johnson’s battery was captured at Second Bull Run and the Ordnance Department issued 3” Ordnance rifles as replacements, a move which caused much dissatisfaction with the men who “are anxious to get back the old battery.” 
Wiard diagram

General Franz Siegel, an trained artillerist from his days in the German army, also had high praise for the Wiards stated that the 12 Wiards in his corps “never failed me; none of the axles or others parts of their carriages ever broke down, and their mobility, accuracy, and range, together with the remarkable facility for adjustment and repair on the field, were subject to general remark among officers and men. In my judgment, the Wiard guns and equipments are superior to any field artillery I have ever seen in service.”

Sources:
Wiard, Norman L. Wiard’s System of Field Artillery as Improved to Meet the Requirements of Modern Service. New York: Holman, 1863
“Government Trial of Hotchkiss Projectiles,” New York Times, July 20, 1861
“The Wiard Cannon,” Chicago Tribune, September 18, 1861, pg. 4
“Wiard’s Manufactory of Steel Guns,” Wisconsin State Journal, October 2, 1861, pg. 2
“Wiard’s Steel Guns,” Cleveland Morning Leader, January 20, 1862, pg. 3
“From Capt. Bartlett’s Battery,” Jeffersonian Democrat, April 25, 1862, pg. 3

Comments

Post a Comment

Most Popular Posts

Arming the Buckeyes: Longarms of the Ohio Infantry Regiments

Image
     A common question that comes up in conversation about Civil War Buckeye regiments is "What were they armed with?" We are fortunate in that the state of Ohio kept good records of how the regiments were armed when they went into service, this being especially true for those regiments which went into service in 1861 and 1862. The state adjutant general's reports for 1861 and 1862 have been heavily drawn upon to construct this article, as well as consultation with Phil Spaugy who has done extensive research on how Ohio's troops were armed during the war.      Buckeyes carried a fairly wide variety of weapons into the field, and the below article breaks this down into weapons of both domestic manufacture and imported arms. The early days of the war found the state of Ohio practically bereft of longarms; as an example, when the 1st and 2nd Ohio Volunteer Militia left the state in late April 1861, they left unarmed, being armed at Lancaster, Pennsylvania on their way to
Read more

Dressing the Rebels: How to Dye Butternut Jeans Cloth

Image
     In the early days of the Civil War,  the Southern states found themselves with an abundance of cotton but a shortage of cloth with which to make army uniforms. The trade in cloth prior to the war had largely been to send raw cotton or wool north to New England (or Great Britain) where it was converted into usable cloth; but now that trade was broken and the Southern states were thrown upon their own resources in their efforts to properly clothe the Confederate army.  This collection of Confederate enlisted men's frock coats and shell jackets gives some indication of the variety of shades of butternut worn during the war. All of them are shades of yellow brown, some heavier on the yellow and some heavier on the brown. The blue used around the collar or as rank insignia indicates that the soldier was in the infantry. Surviving Confederate uniforms are considered rather rare and command quite a healthy price in the collecting market. For an in-depth study of how Confederate jacke
Read more

Bullets for the Union: Manufacturing Small Arms Ammunition During the Civil War

Image
       Civil War bullets are perhaps the most common item collected from the era; the two armies expended bullets by the millions during the four years’ conflict and spent or deformed bullets of all shapes and sizes have made fascinating and affordable collectibles since the guns went silent in 1865.       I recently acquired a display piece featuring 35 different types of small arms ammunition used during the Civil War, including everything from a small .28 caliber ball up to a .69 caliber three-ring Minie and it triggered some questions: how did the Federal army obtain its small arms ammunition during the war? Where did the lead come from to make the bullets, and where and how was the ammunition manufactured? This post seeks to answer those questions. A typical .58 caliber 3-ring Minie bullet   “Whenever the blasts of war blow in the ears of men who trade in the implements of destruction, they are apt to experience more joy than the true warrior, for then comes the harvest of gain.
Read more

The Cannons are Now Silent: The Field of Death of Tupelo

Image
       The smoke of battle had drifted away from the battlefield at Tupelo, Mississippi on the hot afternoon of July 14, 1864, but the carnage of war lay spread across the open fields. “Scattered at intervals over the field of a few yards are dull gray blotches half shaded by grass,” an officer from the 7 th Minnesota Infantry recorded. “These are the Rebel dead. They have fought their last battle and lie generally in attitudes of rest; some of them look as if they had welcomed death. On the faces of two is imprinted a smile. One is a boy of 16 with delicate features, almost girlish in their beauty. His last gaze seems to have been directed toward his hand on the forefinger of which was a ring. A circle of purer white indicates its place; the ring was carried off as a trophy of the field.” The following account of the Battles of Tupelo and Old Town Creek was written by an unknown officer of the 7 th Minnesota Infantry, his account appearing in the August 5 th 1864 edition of the
Read more

The Vaunted Enfield Rifle Musket

Image
     The English-made Model 1853 .577 caliber Enfield Rifle Musket was widely regarded as the best infantry arm in the world at the outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861. Favorable international press describing its efficiency in the Crimean War and in suppressing the Indian rebellion led to the widespread desire of American infantrymen (both Federal and Confederate) to be armed with these accurate and well-made arms. The lock plate of this well-worn P1853 Enfield rifle musket produced in 1862 shows the typical markings of a British-made weapon that made it through the Federal blockade.  ( Army of Tennessee Relics ) Enfield-pattern weapons were imported into the states by the tens and hundreds of thousands during the war years; one estimate stated that the Federal government purchased 500,000 while the Confederates purchased another 400,000. The Confederate government dispatched Captain Caleb Huse to Europe in April 1861 to purchase weapons and Huse focused on securing all the Enfi
Read more

Straw Already Threshed: Sherman on Shiloh

Image
  W illiam Tecumseh Sherman was enjoying retired life in New York City when just before Christmas in 1889 he was presented with an article written by John Cockerill, a former drummer boy in the 24 th Ohio who was visiting his father Colonel Joseph Cockerill of the 70 th Ohio of Sherman’s division when the Battle of Shiloh began. Cockerill’s article, originally published in the New York Journalist and later featured in the January 1893 issue of Blue & Gray Magazine, Sherman later pronounced as “the best war story ever written” and the truest account of Shiloh.           On New Year’s Day 1890, General Sherman composed the following letter to his friend Marshall P. Wilder thanking him for sending along Cockerill’s article and giving his own explanation of Shiloh. “This to me is straw already threshed for we have fought this battle on paper several times, a much more agreeable task than to fight with bullets,” he concluded. “When in England some years ago I was gratified to liste
Read more

Federal Arms in the Stones River Campaign

Image
  T he following list, constructed after many years of research, lists unit by unit which type of weapons were carried by the Army of the Cumberland during the Stones River campaign. A number of sources were consulted including state ordnance reports, Federal quarterly ordnance reports (thank you Research Arsenal ), Ken Baumann’s Arming the Suckers, regimental histories and memoirs, captured ordnance reports, and consultation with knowledgeable experts in the field of firearms. Some of this information has been shared on the blog before in “ Rosy’s Heavy Metal: Artillery of the Army of the Cumberland ” or “ Shoulder Arms: How Sheridan’s and Davis’s Divisions Were Armed at Stones River ” but this is the first time the army as a whole has been presented. The overall conclusion I drew from looking at this data is that the Army of the Cumberland in December 1862 was an organization in the midst of transformation as far as arms. Many of the regiments still retained their original issue
Read more

Escape of Captain Henry H. Alban of the 21st Ohio Infantry

Image
Captain Henry H. Alban was among the dozen officers of the 21 st Ohio Volunteer Infantry who were captured on September 20, 1863 at the Battle of Chickamauga. The regiment had held its position atop Snodgrass Hill against repeated Confederate assaults and now battered and without ammunition, with the darkness of evening enveloping the hill, the remainder of that gallant band found themselves at the mercy of the 54 th Virginia. A total of 12 officers and 121 enlisted men surrendered; the regiment’s colors were taken, and the men marched off the field into captivity. Captain Henry Harvey Alban, Co. F, 21st O.V.I. Captain Alban along with the rest went through a series of Confederate prison camps before arriving at Columbia, South Carolina in October 1864. Determined to make an escape, he watched for his chance and one night made his leap for freedom, successfully eluding the local camp guard and setting out along the railroad to head for the mountains of eastern Tennessee and
Read more

Knapsack Compression: Wilbur Hinman recalls the first step of becoming a veteran

Image
L ooking back on his experiences during the war, Captain Wilbur Hinman of the 65 th Ohio (perhaps best known as the author of Si Klegg and His Pard ) recalled that the first road along which his regiment marched was strewn “with debris. A pair of six-mule wagonloads might have been gathered of notions that had been flung aside by a thousand suffering “tenderfeet.” “The average young patriot started for the war with a wheelbarrow load of clothing, a bed quilt or two, books, photograph albums, toilet articles, and gimcracks of every sort,” he wrote. “Neither he nor the good homefolks had the slightest conception of the capacity of a knapsack, nor did they for a moment imagine that before the close of his first day upon the road every pound he carried would seem a hundred.” To the true mark of a veteran soldier was one who “learned to dispense with every unnecessary ounce of weight, and just in the ratio that he did this he increased his efficiency as a soldier. It was of the highest
Read more

Federal Arms in the Chickamauga Campaign

Image
T he ordnance returns of the Army of the Cumberland at the end of September 1863 show the results of a transformational year in weaponry. Since taking command of the army at the end of October 1862, General William S. Rosecrans had repeatedly pestered the War Department to supply his regiments with better firearms both to improve the command’s efficiency as well as expand its striking power. The results speak for themselves: for the infantrymen at the end of September 1863, 90% of them now carried Class I long arms (36,058 out of 39,959), 8.3% carried Class II arms, and a mere 1.5% carried Class III weapons. Most of the foreign-made weapons (except Enfields) were gone, and by and large the army had settled on a single common .58 caliber ammunition, although a few .54 caliber and .69 caliber weapons remained within the ranks. The English-made Enfield rifle musket was by far the most common arm, carried by 56% of the men while the second-most common arm was the .58 caliber M1861 Spring
Read more