The Gatling gun had several gun barrels, each with its own bolt and firing pin. Multiple barrels were necessary because a single barrel would have been destroyed by the heat from so many gunpowder explosions in such a short period of time. The barrels were rotated around a central arbor by a hand crank. The first Gatling had six barrels, although many later models had ten barrels, and the principle allowed for any number of barrels. At the end of the crank handle was a small pinion gear, which engaged a larger ring gear that was attached to the central arbor.

When a barrel was at the top of the circle of rotation, the bolt was open, and a cartridge was dropped in from a hopper. As that barrel rotated, its bolt was closed, and the firing pin was cocked. At the bottom, the spring-loaded firing pin was released, and the cartridge was fired. When the barrel rotated again, the bolt would be opened, and the empty cartridge case extracted. A simple fixed cam controlled the loading and firing. The cam follower would open and close the bolt.

The original 1862 design used percussion cartridges, in the .58-caliber musket. In 1865, Richard Gatling switched to metallic cartridges, which were vastly easier to load. (The 1862 design had a more complicated loading and unloading mechanism than the one described above.) While the 1862 model could fire 200 rounds per minute, the 1865 model could achieve 600 rounds per minute. (A round is one cartridge.)

In 1871, Gatling made the gun much more effective with a refinement that allowed the gun's aiming point to be moved laterally, thus vastly widening the gun's field of fire. He also changed the crank so that the gun would automatically have some slight oscillatory lateral motion. The two changes made the Gatling effective at spray fire. A "Camel gun," mounted on a special saddle, was introduced in 1874.

Richard Gatling developed more than thirty versions of the gun, and it was produced in many different calibers. Today, the terms "machine gun" and "automatic" are often used as synonyms, but the Gatling illustrates the difference. The Gatling was the first successful machine gun, but because it was powered by the arm of the gunner, it was not an automatic.

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