The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1896-07-31
HOMEMADE GUNS.
The Crude Artillery Which
Cubais Patriots Use,
Forts Captured by Logs Wound
With Green Rawhide.

| lutloh against ophlu ia Auua AAfN
brought to tho front many clever de-
vices 10 tho shape Of home made
weapons Almost everything has been
pressed into service which would snf-
flee for d cannon. Cannon 10 Cuba
have been cast from crude bronze; ;
have been extemporized from captured
sugar mill steam pipes, and quite SER
viceabIe ones have even been made
from wooden logs, wound with strips
Of green rawhide.
There grows in the interior Of Cuba
q peculiar tree, with a winding grain.
The wood is remarkably tough, aud to
split it by ordinary means is almost
an impossibility. When wanted for
artillery purposes the tree is felled;
section some five feet in length and
one foot in diameter is selected, and
cut the bark is removed, and all
knots and uneven places on the sur.
face dressed down. The embryo can
non is then placed on rude trusses
aud bore burned in it with white
hot crowbars or round iron pipes
from the sugar mills This burning
out Of the interior serves 10 still
further tougher the wood. While tho
bore is being burned green OK hides
are cut into long strips by commenc-
ing in the center and working toward
the outer edge, as you would peel an
apple.
When all is in readiness, one end of
this raw hide bard, which is about
three inches in width, is spiked to the
wooden cannon, near the breach. A
lever, or bar, is attached to the butt
Two or three stout men grasp the
arms of the bar and slowly turn the
followed log on its supports. The
band of green hide is kept under
strain, and in this way the core of the
cannon is wound with one of the
toughest materials, outside of wire, in
the world.
The first layer of hide is tightly
wound to the muzzle of the growing
gun and back toward the breach;
again to the muzzle and back until
number of successive layers have thus
been wound on and the promising
piece of artillery has gown several
inches in diameter. 1t is then placed
in draught of dry hot air and allowed
to harden. When the hardening and
curing process is complete the per-
severing patriots have really service
able weapon, which will stand a great
Ell strain than manufacturers of
modern artillery would readily be-
lieve. The resistance of this weather
dried rawhide is next tc metal, and
these rudely constructed cannon have
proved more satisfactory than those
made from cast bronze, one of which
at the first fire bursts in hundred
pieces. One of these home made
combination wood and rawhide can
non is said to have withstood one hum
dred and four charges of powder be-
fore becoming useless. The projec-
tiles for it were made of scrap iron,
round stones and fire hardened clay
balls.
When, in the early part of October
last, general Gomez started on his now
famous raid into the western part OF
Cuba, he had under his command but
twenty-five hundred men, and these
had hardly four shot apiece, although
they knew they were going to meet
fifty thousand we'll armed Spanish
troops, intrenched along the first
trocha, which extended fifty miles
across the island near the eastern Dor
der of Santa Clara province.
One of the first places of general
Gomez's attack was the town of Pelayo,
near the centre of the trocha. Shortly
before reaching Pelayo Gomez entered
a sugar mill and took from it piece
of iron steam pipe, about four inches
in diameter, which had q strong screw
cap on one end Near the cap ht
drilled small hole, and had this sub
stituted for cannon, mounted on (
rough wooden carriage The piec,
was charged with gunpowder and tillec
nearly to the muzzle with telegraph
wire, which had been cut into piece
, .1,o,,A 4~-o f,oLoo Iono Tho 49,, l..