Delvigne, Henri-Gustave

▪ French officer and inventor

born 1799, Hamburg [Germany]

died Oct. 18, 1876, Toulon, France

      French army officer and inventor who designed innovative rifles and helped introduce the cylindrical bullet.

      Delvigne joined the French army as a youth and attained the rank of captain of the royal guard. In 1826 he introduced the Delvigne rifle, the powder chamber of which was narrower than the barrel. When the rifle ball was dropped down the barrel against the chamber, a few blows of the ramrod expanded the ball to fit the rifled grooves snugly. Although this system had several drawbacks, it performed well in Algeria and was used extensively.

      Delvigne began experimenting with elongated bullets (bullet) as early as 1830. He designed a cylindro-conical bullet with a hollow base that would expand to fit the rifling grooves when fired. Although he did little to further develop the bullet, the basic idea was adopted by the French inventor Claude-Étienne Minié in the widely used Minié ball.

      Delvigne designed a chambered breech rifle that was adopted by France in 1842. His experiments and developments were essential to later advances in firearms. He also introduced new grenade designs.

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