M1903 Gatling Gun

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	Weapon: M1903 Gatling Gun Type: Hand-Cranked Machine Gun Country of Origin: United States Year Adopted: 1903 Overall Length (mm): 1100.0 Overall Length (in): 43.31 Weight (kg): 77.00 Weight (pounds): 169.76

The M1903 Gatling Gun was a manually operated machine gun, developed by Dr. Richard J. Gatling in the late 19th century. It featured multiple rotating barrels and was capable of firing up to 800 rounds per minute when cranked by hand. The M1903 was one of the last models of Gatling guns to be used by the U.S. military before being replaced by more modern, fully automatic designs.

Adopted by the U.S. Army in 1903, the Gatling Gun saw limited use due to the advent of automatic machine guns like the Maxim. However, it was still deployed in some instances, including the Spanish-American War. The Gatling Gun's reliability and high rate of fire made it a formidable weapon in earlier conflicts, despite being labor-intensive to operate.

Though the M1903 Gatling Gun was eventually rendered obsolete by newer technologies, its place in the history of automatic firearms is undisputed. The Gatling Gun was one of the first weapons to demonstrate the potential of rapid-fire technology, paving the way for modern machine guns.

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