MEMOIR OF DANIEL TREADWELL. 



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The making of the thirty-two pounders seems to have been attended wit 

 unexpected difficulties, and the appearance of cracks in some of the jrims alarmed 

 Mr. Treadwell. He immediately communicated the fact to those associated with 

 him. and charged himself with the expenses of the work going on at the Mill-dam 

 to the amount of $2,000, if it should not prove successful. He went with Mr. 

 Francis C. Lowell to Washington, and laid the matter before Colonel Taleott, who 

 had been urging the adoption of the guns by the Navy Department. Colonel Taleotl 

 considered the accident as most unpleasant, but believed it could be overcome. 

 The work went on, until the cannon, twenty-two in all, were completed* 



In 1845 M. Buggraff, an agent of the French Government, visited Mr. Treadwell's 

 works at the Mill-dam, investigated his method of manufacture, and made himself 



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acquainted with the results of the proving of the guns at Washington. Alter this 

 visit he received the following letter from Mr. Treadwell, ottering one of the 3l2- 

 pounders to the Kino; of the French. 



To Mr. Buggraff, Agent of French Government 



Camhrhxw, November. l*l.">. 

 Sir, — I have placed in Boston, subject to your order, one cannon, with the request that you 

 will forward it to the proper officer of the government of His Majesty the Kinir <d the French, 

 to whom I wish it to be presented. This gun, the calibre being of the size of an English 82- 

 poundcr, is made of wrought iron after a method invented and reduced to practice by me, and 

 a short account of which is contained in the pamphlet which you will receive with this. I have 

 already furnished to you an account of the proof to which several field trans, made by me. have 

 been subjected by the Ordnance officers of the United States. The gun now forwarded wa 

 manufactured by the same process, but is less perfect than the field gnns, in being made all of 

 iron, instead of having its calibre faced with steel as used in the field guns. The reason of this 

 difference, and the deficiency of hardness which results from it, is noticed in the pamphlet, page 

 IB, and in consequence of it a lodgement may be produced if soft wads are used with high 

 charges and several shot. With the exception of the particular above alluded to, this jruu j 

 I believe, every way perfect; it has been proved with twelve pounds of powder, two shot, and 



* Similar difficulties have since been met with elsewhere. At the Russian government foundry it often 

 happens that cracks are found in the cylinders of which the bodies of the guns are formed, afar being rabmitt 1 to 

 the hammers during the process of welding. "Some of these are inconsiderable, not deep, and ha\ no influence on 

 the quality of the metal, or the resistance of the cannon itself. Sometimes, on the contrary, these fissures are of a 

 sufficiently great extent to cause the rejection of the piece. Minute observations have shown, that of these non- 

 malleable pieces there have been some of which the casting, forging, and reheating have taken place under 

 exactly the same conditions as with other cylinders that have proved of the best quality. Chemical analysis has not 

 been aide to assign an explanation for these fissures; even at the point where they have occurred. . . . Cnfor- 

 tnnately, tins fact, than which there can be none more interesting, awaits, like a great many others respecting the 

 production of cannon steel, a satisfactory explanation, which as yet the engineers and chemists of the works have 

 not been able to furnish." — Notes on the Construction of Ordnance, No. 21, p. 16. "Fabrication of Cannon in 

 Russia, by Lieut. Michel Levitzky, Russian Navy." Washington, May 14, 1883. 



