In 1779, James Wilson submitted a design for a seven-barrel volley gun to the Board of Ordnance. Although he had intended the gun as an army weapon, the Board decided that it was impractical for land service, but would be useful for the Royal Navy’s warships.An initial batch, made by the London gunsmith Henry Nock, was tested at Woolwich before undergoing sea trials on HMS Phoenix off Portsmouth. They were simple 12mm (0.46in) calibre muzzle-loading flintlock weapons with six barrels mounted around a seventh central barrel. The barrel assembly was screwed to an iron plate set into the walnut stock and (in theory) all barrels were fired simultaneously.
A few early examples were rifled, but loading was slow enough without the extra time involved in forcing rounds down rifled barrels, and the vast majority of volley guns produced were completed as smoothbores. It was quickly realised that rifling was largely a wasted effort as the weapon’s fierce recoil made it inherently inaccurate.
The Admiralty ordered a total of 500 at £13 each (roughly £1,200 today) from Henry Nock’s London workshops, which were issued on a scale of 20 for each first-rate ship of the line. Second and third rates received 16 and 12 respectively, whilst each frigate got 10.
Victorian vents and Roman roads