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- Unveiling the Power of a Napoleonic Cannon: Witness the Devastating Damage
Unveiling the Power of a Napoleonic Cannon: Witness the Devastating Damage
Experience the thrill of HistoryHit's experiment with an 18th-century replica naval cannon capable of firing cannonballs. Watch as we test its accuracy and power on a target 600 meters away, and be amazed by the devastation it can unleash.
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Video Transcript
Whoa! That is literally shocking. Welcome to the HistoryHit YouTube channel. Today we
are carrying out a fascinating experiment. We are using this, one of the few 18th century
replica naval cannons in the world capable of firing cannonballs. We've got a target
600 metres away made of thick oak planks. We're going to see if we can hit it and what
damage we can do. Then we're going to bring that target closer and compare accuracy and
punch. Let's get on with it. Before we start loading the cannon it's important I familiarize
myself with the equipment and that we warm up the bore to ensure optimal performance and accuracy.
Time to fire a blank.
roughly about here holding the lint stock you want the match to be vertical
like that give it a bit of a blow yeah blow on your coal lovely and then just
drop that straight into the power and soon as it takes lift the lint stock up
out of the way. Alright get your protection everyone. Fire as she bears.
Firing!
Clear fire!
Woah!
You can feel, it's the sound, but the shockwave really hits you as well.
And look at the grass in front, wow!
The f**k of war.
That was intense!
Imagine that in an enclosed gun deck as well, with the beams low over your head.
would be amplified wouldn't it? It really would. Wow and there's a hundred of those weapons on HMS
Victory.
Yes, 104 guns altogether.
Not all firing at once.
No, but still.
One of the smaller ones is still quite enough.
Oh my goodness.
That is literally shocking.
With my ears still ringing and dreading to think what it must have been like for a gunner
below decks during the Battle of Trafalgar, it was time to fire a real cannonball.
Our initial target 600 metres away.
Right, just put in the finishing touches now.
cannon is ready to go, they're doing the final bit of aiming, target 600 metres
away, are we going to hit that enemy ship?
We didn't know it at the time, but after reviewing our footage we saw the ball fell way short of our 600 meter target
But not to worry
We had a telehandler
Well, the bad news is that we did not hit the target at 600 meters
We went up there and look at it
We thought there might be a mark on it
But no and we can find a cannonball either which means that some future archaeologists have a very complicated
Scene to kind of reconstruct one these days, but the good news is that we brought the target to 60 meters 70 meters
I'm going to try and hit it at that range and that does reflect
what British naval commanders sought to do during the great wars against France 200 years
ago. They always believed the closer the better you can finish the enemy off at point blank
range. So let's see if it works.
It's a good seal.
3, 2, 1, give fire!
Right, it looks good. I can see a nice little round hole up here quite high up.
Remember you're not trying to sink an enemy vessel in Nelson's Navy.
