Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1898-10-07
FINEST IN THE WORLD
THESE ARE WHAT The UNITED
STATES GUNS WILL BE.

Fifty FiNe-inch Wire Wound Seg
mental Guns Nearing Cnmrle,
tion The New American Gun
Differs In One Essential partisu
lar From All Other wirc Wound
Pieces - Lessons of the War
That viii Bc IIeeLeJ.
This war is bound 10 teach rncl,
sam many lessons, many Of which ar,
already very clear and generally ap.
pretended. Others scarcely less inn
portant have yet tn hc prccciycd by
the majority One oi the most vital
of these lessons is the necessity oI
fostering the ingenuity of inventors
VIII" turn their attention to the i'm.
provemcnt of fighting materials and
mechanism. We have been unac.
countably indifferent To many thing.
for thirty years or more: our treat
ment Of our own citizens who have
devised improvements in shouting mp
paratus has been little less than
criminal
IL - true that "a measure of en-.
enlargement was extended by the GO,
crnmcnt some years ago To- the Ialinsk
pneumatic gun: that few Sims.
Dudley guns for the shooting Of pro
jcctllcs containing high-powcr cx.
plosives 10y the use of powder have
recently been purchased for use in
Cuba, and that bcggarly $4,000 i.
now being expended in the construc-
tion of u solid cast steel piece OF heavy
ordnance according Ia the designs by
the venerable Gatling. Yet on the
whole this government has been by
lar the most niggarlly and unpro-
grcsslvc III such matters Of all the 80.
called civilized governments. declares
the New York Press The Zalinsk
gun has not been improved in the
slightest since the Ncsuyius was built,
the ms'Dudly gun received no en-
conragcmcnt whatever from us until
the poverty stricken Cuban insurgents
had tested il and found it good, and
the work on the single heavy Gatling
gun has now been IN progress for
nearly year, yet the piece is still un-
finished. Hotchkiss and Maxim had
to go aboard with their machine guns
for recognition. and so did Gatling
with his. rs matter of fact, since
France made use of IL under the name
of the mitrailleusc long before We
would have anything to do with IT,
At least four years ago il was known
that better smokeless powder could
he and had been made within twenty
miles OF New York than any producer
abroad, yet our brave boys in Cuba
used the old-fashioned black powder
that betrayed their position and thus
added 100 per cent. 10 the fatalities,
while ignorant, unprogrcssive Spain
had smokclcss powder in abundance.
Our infantry rifle is always behind the
times, because, although we have a
lew krag-Jorgensens, we can by no
possibility furnish more than n small
proportion of our soldiers with them,
and must, perfnrcc. fall back on the
ntiquatcd Springiiclds. Aud what is
more, the foregoing examples indicate
only lew OF our many shortcomings
IN this MISUNDERSTANDING due
PARTLY to the steady increase Of bureau
cratic methods at Washington, partly
TO other causes which need not be
enumerated here, and partly 10 that
general false economy which brought
about the utter lack Of preparation for
anything but piping peace" which
existed when the Maine was blown up.
a policy that should lead to the ex.
penditure OF thousands or even millions
in hunting for new guns, new powder
and the like would be much better and
more economic in the long run, as
Uncle Sam has lately been finding out
ut irightful cost Of blood and
treasure.
1t was eight years ago that John
Hamilton Brown, OF New York, cx-
perimenting at Grecnvillc, n. j.,
brought new system of heavy
ordnance construction To the United
States government. We had then
barely begun making big guns on the
build-up plan now in use at the WASH
ingtnn and Xaterrliet ordnance st.eps,
through England and every other
European power had been making
Use of that construction for period
OF time long enough 10 demonstrate
any imperfect'ons.
These impenections have been dwelt
upon so recently in the public prints
to make detailed recapitulation un-
necessary here, though it may he said
in brief that the efficiency OF the build
up gun is greatly impaired after COM
paratively short service by the ir-
regular expansion and contraction of
the different rings" Of which it is
made. This impairment has never
been considered seriously 10y the Ger
man authorities, who still make use of
the Krupp build'up ordnance; but
England abandoned built-up guns
long ago, and for years has been re-
placing her most expensive pieces con-