MULE GUN

ca. 1880




This 1-pdr (37mm) rifled muzzle-loading gun was intended to be fired off the back of a mule. Unfortunately, the reaction of the mule to having a small cannon fired off its back was not fully considered. According to tradition, when the piece was tested the mule broke loose, began to whirl around, scattering the alarmed witnesses, then the mule stepped on the lanyard and fired the piece itself. The force of the recoil was said to have knocked the mule “ass over teakettle” into a nearby river.

This is a rather sophisticated piece. It has a rudimentary recoil/recuperator system, a traversing quadrant at the breech end of the carriage, possibly marked in degrees; and the ability to elevate. There seems to be no facility for holding elevation or traverse, other than by hand. Firing is by lanyard and friction primer.

I don’t believe that this is something cobbled together at a post blacksmith shop, but that it is arsenal made. There are a number of fanciful stories about it, but these are all anecdotal and cannot readily be proved, or, for that matter, disproved. I believe that it was designed to be carried on a mule, but that it was fired from the ground. The large staples on each side of the saddle bars possibly mounted spades or skids of some sort. The earliest photographs of the Field Artillery Museum at Fort Sill in the 1930’s show this gun.