10 pound Parrott Shell

30 pound Parrott Shell

4.16 Armor Piercing Shell

Examples of Different Parrott Rifle Shells

Examples of Different 3" Ordnance Shells

Example of Solid Shot with a Sabot 

Different types of Ammunition

Solid Shot: was made of cast-iron in either round ball for smoothbores or elongated projectiles called bolts for rifled guns.  Both were well used in counter battery fire or attacking enemy fortifications.  The fire power of the rifle bolt was the technological development that made masonry fortifications obsolete.

Shell: was a hollow iron object filled with black powder.  Round shells and some rifle shells used a time fuse to set off the powder charge.  Rifle shells also used percussion or impact, fuses.

Case Shot: was also called shrapnel or shrapnel shell after the Englishman Henry Shrapnel who invented it   An improvement to a shell, it had a thinner outer wall and had lead balls mixed in with the black powder.  Case was designed to explode in midair and almost always used timed fuses.

Canister: was a tin or iron can filled with iron balls packed in sawdust.  When fired out of a gun it had the same effect as a large shotgun.  Canister was for one thing and that is killing Infantry.

Grape Shot: was similar to canister. It had fewer and larger balls that were held together with iron rings or tied up with fabric and twine. It is often, mistakenly, said that grape was only used by  navel guns.