Abstract:
Dr. Richard Gordon Gatling of Maney's Neck in Hertford County was born September 12, 1818. In 1835, he invented a screw propeller for warships, but another inventor, John Ericsson, beat him to the U.S. Patent Office by a few days. Gatling was world-famous for his agricultural inventions by the middle of the 19th-century. After the outbreak of the Civil War, he began work on a weapon that would bring him lasting fame -- the Gatling Gun.