A volley gun is a gun with several barrels for firing a number of shots simultaneously. Some volley guns could also fire their barrels in sequence. They differ from traditional machine guns in that they lack automatic loading and automatic fire and are limited by the number of barrels bundled together.

In practice the large ones were not particularly more useful then a cannon firing canister shot or grapeshot. Since they were still mounted on a carriage, they were still as hard to aim and move around as a cannon, and the many barrels took as long or longer to reload. They also tended to be relatively expensive since they were more complex then a cannon, due to all the barrels and ignition fuses, and each barrel had to be individually maintained and cleaned.

19th century volley guns

Two notable artillery-sized volley guns were developed in the mid-19th century, although neither was particularly successful in practice. General Origen Vandenburgh of the New York State Militia designed a weapon in 1860 that had eighty-five parallel .50 calibre rifle barrels. After failing to sell the gun to the United Kingdom , he reportedly sold a small quantity to the Confederate States of America - though there is no record that they were used. Also developed in the 1860s, the French mitrailleuse is an example of a multi-barreled gun volley gun that could fire all of its barrels simultaneously or sequentially over a short period of time.

A few hand-held volley guns were also developed during the 18th and 19th centuries. One of the most distinctive was the "duck's-foot" volley gun, a pistol with four parallel .45 calibre barrels arranged in a splayed pattern, so that the firer could spray a sizeable area with a single shot. The British Royal Navy used Nock's volley gun around the time of the Napoleonic Wars. This was a seven-barreled rifle capable of firing seven .50 calibre rifle balls at the same time, intended for use in repelling boarders. However, its immense recoil made it an extremely physically demanding weapon to use.

Modern connection

More recently, a number of designs of electronically-fired explosive-propulsion projectile weapons and non-explosive projectile weapons have been developed which have some similarities to 18th century volley guns, particularly in that they use many barrels which can be fired all at once or in sequence. However, they are not as yet in general use. The Australian company Metal Storm is one of the leading developers of such weapons, designing a 36-barrel volley gun capable of a theoretical firing rate of more than a million rounds per minute. The principal use for such systems would be in defensive applications, such as ship-based anti-missile defence systems (for which Gatling guns are currently used).

External links

• Strange Guns: Vandenburgh's volley gun