The Photographic History of The Civil War: in ten volumes, Thousands of Scenes Photographed 1861-65, with Text by many Special Authorities, Volume 5: Forts and Artillery.
Francis Trevelyan Miller, Ed.

[154] advantage. A 12-inch rifle was also under test, and had been fired, by the time the war closed, three hundred and ninety times, with a charge of powder weighing fifty-five pounds, and throwing a 600-pound projectile. This was almost conclusive in favor of the gun. Some of the large Parrott rifles used in the siege of Charleston showed remarkable endurance--one of them, a 4.2-inch 30-pounder having fired four thousand six hundred and six rounds before bursting.

After the great pressure of war was over, the department undertook the duties of cleaning, repairing, preserving, and storing the tremendous quantities of war materiel that had accumulated. Fire-proof warehouses were constructed at Watervliet, Frankfort, and Allegheny arsenals, three great magazines were constructed at St. Louis Arsenal, and one each at Washington and Benicia arsenals. The Harper's Ferry Armory had suffered so much in the stress of war that it was in bad repair, and was abandoned. At the Springfield Armory, the work was confined to cleaning, repairing, and storing the small arms used during the conflict, and to making preparations for the conversion of the old Springfield muskets, the best in the world of their kind, into rifled breech-loaders, the new type which the experience of war had brought into being.

France had sent an army into Mexico. The United States declared this a violation of the Monroe Doctrine, and the issue was doubtful. The Ordnance Department expected further trouble, but was fully prepared for it. The able officers of the department and the devoted personnel under their direction had made an institution unsurpassed in history. Be it for peace or war, no concern was felt for the outcome, for arms, equipments, and miscellaneous stores for nearly two million men were ready for issue, or already in the hands of troops. This was the net result of the great labors of the men of the department. But France realized the power of the United States, withdrew her forces from the support of Maximilian, and the crisis was past.