Who Actually Invented the First Machine Gun?

I never shall forget the way That Blood upon this awful day Preserved us all from death. He stood upon a little mound, Cast his lethargic eyes around, And said beneath his breath : “Whatever happens we have got The Maxim Gun, and they have not.”This passage, from Hillaire Belloc’s 1898 poem The Modern Traveller, infamously captures the awesome destruction wrought by one of modern warfare’s key innovations: the machine gun. Puttingthe firepower of dozens of soldiers into the hands of just one, this weapon allowed the western colonial powers to conquer half the known world, ground the First World War into a bloody stalemate, helped the Nazis blitzkrieg their way across Europe, and remains a vital part of every army’s arsenal to this day. Yet despite its outsized impact on combat, the modern machine gun is less than a century and a half old. Why did it take so long for this weapon to be developed, and who was responsible for the vitalbreakthrough? Well, lock and load as we delve into the fascinating history of the machine gun. Author: Gilles Messier Host: Daven Hiskey Producer: Caden Nielsen