“When did you first begin to invent?”
“Almost before I learned to walk. When I went to work, I began to study out ways of improving tools and appliances.”
FROM GAS MACHINES TO INCANDESCENT LAMPS.
“What were your first practical inventions?”
“In 1862–63 I was at work at Fitchburg, Massachusetts, making gas machines. I made various improvements at that time, which afterward came into general use. From Fitchburg I went to Boston, where I entered the service of Oliver P. Drake, who was not only a gas-machine maker, but also a philosophical-instrument maker. I first worked as a draughtsman, and then became his foreman. I learned from Mr. Drake many things that were useful to me in after life. From Boston I came to New York, where I obtained a situation as draughtsman at the Novelty Iron Works, East Twelfth street. At that time they were building the Pacific Mail steamers. Shortly after this, I thought of a new system of making gas from gasoline. All the machines that had existed would maintain only one hundred lights or less, and the density and illuminating power of the gas varied so much as to make the lights very unsatisfactory. I decided to make a machine that would make the gas, from first to last, of an equal density. I made this machine and patented it. It was intended for large consumers, and several were purchased by A. T. Stewart & Company. One of them was in the Park Avenue Hotel, and, for a time, another was used in the Post Office in New York City. I also made a very large machine, the biggest ever made, for the Grand Union and several other hotels at Saratoga which belonged to A. T. Stewart. From gas machines I turned my attention to small steam motors, and had a place in Centre street, which is still in existence, my successors being Messrs. Welch and Lawson, 205 Centre street. I soon began to experiment with electricity, and was the first man to file at the Patent Office an invention for building up and preserving the carbons of incandescent lamps, by the action of hydro-carbon vapors. I lost this patent, however, by a system of fraud, which I will not describe to-day. I was the first man to make an electrical regulator, and exhibited it at the Paris Exposition in 1881, and was made a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honor. I secured many patents on electrical inventions from 1880 to 1885. I next experimented with automatic firearms.”
THE GENESIS OF THE AUTOMATIC GUN.
“How did you come to invent the automatic gun?”
“Many years ago, while firing at a target with a military musket, I was much surprised at the force of the recoil. It appeared to me that this waste of energy might be profitably employed in loading and firing the weapon, but it was not until I went to Europe and found myself in Paris with insufficient work to keep me fully employed, that I tried to make an automatic gun. I first made a drawing, which I afterward took to London; and, having obtained and equipped a small factory there, I commenced experiments with the view of evolving a gun which would load and fire itself. There were no data to refer to. No one had ever before spent a single cent in experimenting with automatic guns. I first thought of employing the recoil to working existing forms of mechanism, but found that impracticable. I then designed and constructed a totally new machine and a totally new system of feeding.
“In the spring of 1884, I constructed the first apparatus ever made in which the recoil of one cartridge would load another cartridge into the barrel and fire it. This is now in the South Kensington Museum, in London, labeled: ‘This apparatus loads and fires itself, by force of its own recoil, and is the first machine ever made in which energy from the burning powder is employed for loading and firing the arm.’
“When I made my first gun and found that it would really load and fire itself, I knew it would have a great future. A few friends came in to see it. They told others, and very soon a great number of people came to see the new wonder. In fact, everybody, from the Prince of Wales down, came to see the gun and fire it. No less than two hundred thousand rounds of ammunition were used in explaining the gun and showing it to visitors. At first, no one would believe that an automatic gun had really been made. No one was prepared to believe, without seeing it. In fact, I may say that they were unable to understand that the gun actually loaded and fired itself. It was considered a nine days’ wonder. The English Government was the first to give an order. It asked for a gun which would not weigh over one hundred pounds, and would fire four hundred rounds per minute. I made one that weighed forty pounds and fired two thousand rounds in three minutes, with one pull of the trigger. This is a result that no one else has ever attained. I showed my gun to Lord Wolseley at Hythe, where I fired at a target. That leader and Colonel Tongue were standing by the gun while I was firing it. I heard the latter say that it was the best firing that had ever been seen; that the accuracy was much better than had ever been known before; and that the rapidity of fire was without parallel. Everyone seemed astonished, and it was then that Lord Wolseley approached me and said: ‘Mr. Maxim, I have seen your gun. It is simply wonderful. It is the most remarkable invention I ever saw in my life, and I congratulate you heartily upon your success; but,’ he continued, ‘it is of no good, as you will observe that the cloud of smoke is very large indeed. Unless you can get smokeless powder, I am afraid your gun will be of little use.’ It was then that I began to think in earnest about smokeless powder, one of the directors having said that I was just the man to invent it. When I told him that I was not a chemist at all, as compared with Professors Fred. Adel and Dewar, his reply was: ‘You know all the chemistry that is necessary in the matter, and, moreover, you have an imagination, and the others have not. If you take the matter up, I am sure you will go ahead of them.’ ”
AUTOMATIC GUNS MADE SMOKELESS POWDER INDISPENSABLE.
“Such was really the case, because I find that my application for a patent for a smokeless powder, consisting of nitro-glycerine and gun cotton, was filed at the patent office about fourteen days ahead of any other, and Sir Richard Webster, in speaking for the government in the celebrated case of Nobel against the Government on smokeless powder, said: ‘H. S. Maxim is the first man to make a smokeless powder with nitro-glycerine and gun cotton. This powder was taken out to the States as much as eight or nine years ago, shown at Springfield, and put into competition with all other forms; and, according to the printed reports of the time, it was said to be superior to all others at all points, and I may say that the powder has not been improved on to any extent, as all the leading powders of to-day are practically the same as that invented by him at that time.’
“I was the first man to show a thoroughly good smokeless powder in the United States. Having succeeded in England, I took my guns abroad. Switzerland was the first country where I had a competitive trial with other makers. I was asked to fire at a dummy battery of artillery, at thirteen hundred yards, for one minute; but, as a matter of fact, I was only engaged half a minute in actual firing, when it was telephoned that I had technically killed three-fourths of the men and horses. I thought, perhaps, that I ought to have killed the whole of them, but the general said with great enthusiasm: ‘No gun ever made has ever done anything like that. It is the most marvelous thing that has ever been done. It is simply amazing. A little gun weighing only fifty pounds puts a battery of artillery out of action in half a minute, at thirteen hundred yards.’
“I next took the gun to Italy, where I won another victory, and then returned to England. I received very large orders from all these countries, and the gun is now in use, I may say, nearly all over the world. These guns are being made not only by our own company, which has many factories in England, but by the British Government, by Ludwig Loewe, of Berlin; by Krupp, by Armstrong and by the United States Government at Washington. The company with which I am connected is a very large one, and we make about sixty varieties of rapid-firing and automatic guns. We are also makers of very large guns,