The Devil's paintbrush

Evan Robinson

Mrs. Cowan

English III, slot 3

23 November 2009

The Devil’s Paintbrush

         Could a device produce enough slaughter to be awarded a nickname like The Devil’s Paintbrush? In the matabele war between Britain and Africa, a total of five maxim guns armed by about 50 British soldiers took out 5,000 matabele soldiers. This gun was known as the Maxim gun it was also the first machine gun to automatically reload itself, by the force of its firing of one bullet. A small deflect in the system was that the water cooling jacket had to be constantly refilled. Although slightly less affective then today’s guns the maxim gun was the best of its kind to come out, even though it had to be manned by a team of 8-10 people.The teams usually were a order of about 4 people working together to keep the gun running, while the others were to make sure no enemies were headed in as they were reloading



In 1885 Sir Hiram Maxim released his invention, the Maxim gun, into the world. First used by the British army in the Matabele war. His inspiration was first inspired by a man at an exhibition when told “If you wanted to make a lot of money, invent something that will enable these Europeans to cut each other's throats with greater facility” (unknown).The Maxim gun had the estimated firepower of about 100 rifles and could fire an estimated 500 rounds per minute (Simkin). It was the first gun to actually not overheat. Its abilities, of not overheating, were due to the fact of water jackets that had to be constantly refilled so that the barrel of the gun would not overheat. Many of the guns were manned by a large team of 8-10 people in which a group of riflemen were used in order to protect during reloads. “Maxim used the energy of each bullet's recoil force to eject the spent cartridge and insert the next bullet. The Maxim Machine-Gun would therefore fire until the entire belt of bullets was used up” (Simkin). 



The Maxim gun was used through out many wars but in some eyes was not the best. Many other countries copied the design and made a model more similar to the Maxim gun. One gun of such copies was the maschinegewer which was made in Germany to be another form of the Maxim gun. Although they were the first country to use it the British transferred over to the Vickers gun and the later the Lewis gun. Although everyone served their loyalties to the maxim gun in world war I. The following year the Austrian, German, Italian, Swiss and Russian armies also purchased Maxim's gun. The gun was first used by Britain’s colonial forces in the Matabele war in 1893-94. In one engagement, fifty soldiers fought off 5,000 Matabele warriors with just four Maxim guns (Simkin).



A couple of hits and misses of machine guns were that many overheated way to fast so they had to cool down while the enemy could charge. The Maxim gun while shooting 500 rounds a minute had to have water jackets constantly watched so that it would not overheat although it was enough to fire an entire belt without the gun overheating. A benefit of this was that suppressive fire didn't mean that someone would shoot into a crowd until the gun overheated it meant that suppressive fire could last until an entire belt was out of bullets. Within this guns powers meant that the modern warfare would change from worrying when the gun would overheat to the matter of when you had to reload. Although many were used this gun is also the base for today's automatic machine guns.



A modern way of use for the Maxim gun was to have a group of people together because of reloads, overheating, and the ever so possible bullet jam. Maxim’s design was very awe inspiring but had the slightest flaws that made the gun both great to have and some what a threat to use. The belts of bullets were around 1000 each, but were constantly fed by a person on the side who would have to deal with both the worry of getting shot and having ejected shells hitting him. Also for the overheating a set of water jackets that were placed on the barrel of the Maxim gun had to be refilled so that the barrel would stay cool. The inspiration for his gun was that modern day machine guns were constantly overheating so you could fire and wait but in that waiting time the enemy could make a run for it or lob a grenade over at whoever was firing.