On Thursday 13 March, the Military History class was treated to a presentation on the guns used in various wars.
Our presenter, Adrian Roads, brought along sixteen guns starting with a musket used in the English Civil War (1642-1651) in which the Royalists under King Charles I fought the Parliamentarians led by Oliver Cromwell.
Muskets in the 1700s
Adrian then progressed through history covering breech-loading muskets, with an example of a gun used in the American War of Independence (1775-1783), before showing examples of the new percussion cap guns.
The development of the rifle
The introduction of the rifle, which is a gun with a rifled barrel, was a major leap forward in technology. A rifle, in trained hands, was accurate for over a kilometre whereas the old muskets sprayed the shot around and it was a matter of luck whether they hit the target.
The display ended with the Lee-Enfield Rifle, often referred to as a .303 denoting the calibre of the bullets used. The original rifle was the Lee-Metford using the .303 ammunition. However, this gun was found to be underpowered in the Boer War and a newly designed rifle, the Lee-Enfield resulted. This gun became a staple arm of British and Commonwealth armies, and was used in both World Wars and numerous other wars and skirmishes around the world. In order to gain the benefits of standardisation, even the machine guns on the Spitfires and Hurricanes of the Second World War used the .303 ammunition.
It was certainly a most interesting talk. Adrian Roads also has a collection of swords and handguns and therefore, we hope to have him as a speaker again.
Gilbert Foster
Class Leader