Object data
wood, iron, brass, rope and paint
height 34 cm × width 98 cm × depth 31 cm × calibre 44 mm
Rijkswerf Vlissingen
Model of an 80-Pounder Shell Gun on a Pivot on a Ship Deck
Flushing, 1839
Provenance
...; transferred from the Ministerie van Marine (Department of the Navy), The Hague, to the museum, 1883
Object number: NG-MC-1241
Copyright: Public domain
Entry
Model of an 80-pounder shell gun on a pivot and slide, painted black.
The wooden barrel is 55 cm long, has a 44 mm calibre and fittings for sights at the muzzle and the second reinforcement. Above the breech, a vent patch for a lock is indicated – the button is also the breech ring. The upper carriage, narrowing slightly to the front, has two cheeks with three steps, the upper parts with the trunnion boxes are made of solid brass. The cheeks are connected by an inclined transom, a second transom in the middle and the axletrees. The stool bed lies on the hind axletree and the middle transom. The axletrees do not have trucks but slide on tracks; directly in front of the cheeks two trucks are positioned, which only support the carriage when it is jacked up with a handspike on the two small trucks aft. The hind axletrees have braces fastened around the rim of the slide’s ledges, at the same time securing the upper carriage to the slide, which, when screwed tight, serves as a friction brake. The slide consists of outer ledges on which the upper carriage moves, and a middle ledge with a hole for the pintle of the upper carriage and tracks for the trucks of the jack. The ledges are connected by three cross-beams, all with trucks underneath. The slide is extended with removable pieces.
On 17 April 1837, the Navy dockyard in Flushing received an order for a model that was almost identical, except for the indication of the placement of the gun on the ship deck (NG-MC-804).1 It is probable that both models were made at the same time. This particular model was transferred from Flushing to the Navy Model Room in The Hague in 1868.2
The extension was designed for Suriname’s gun, allowing it to be retracted against the foremast, and the ship’s two 30-pounder guns that were positioned near the paddle wheels so it could be moved forward. Tests proved the pintle to be superfluous, which is why it was left out on the gun carriage of Etna.
Scale (derived) 1:5.
Literature
L.K. Turk, Gegevens en tekeningen van geschut en munitie, verstrekt op verschillende schepen en sloepen van de Koninklijke Marine, s.l. (c. 1848), manuscript in NSM, inv. no. A.0356(0006), p. 75; J.M. Obreen et al., handwritten inventory list for items 944 to 1431, 1884, manuscript in HNA 476 RMA, inv. no. 1089, no. 1241
Citation
J. van der Vliet, 2016, 'Rijkswerf Vlissingen, Model of an 80-Pounder Shell Gun on a Pivot on a Ship Deck, Flushing, 1839', in J. van der Vliet and A. Lemmers (eds.), Navy Models in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.245052
(accessed 15 November 2024 13:25:14).