Blakely's manufacturing innovations allowed larger guns of lighter weight and greater resistance to explosion.
The Blakely rifled artillery gun was designed with a cast-iron core and included wrought-iron or steel banding to reinforce the breech.
This was to be done to prevent the inside breaking before sufficient strain was sent to the outside as would be the case with any thick tubes made in one piece.
[9] Blakely wrote that he had shown that no rifled cannon of considerable size had succeeded when made in one mass.
One of the first guns sold was a 12-pounder Blakely delivered to the Confederates for use against Fort Sumter at the beginning of the American Civil War.
[3][12] It was likely the gun which fired a shot scattering debris from the stone cheek of the casemate embrasure, wounding four Union soldiers.
[26] The Confederates cut away part of the barrel and continued to use the rifle as a mortar until Vicksburg fell to the Union Army under the command of Major General Ulysses S.
[27][fn 6] A gun at West Point which was misidentified as Whistling Dick was returned to the Vicksburg National Battlefield Park when it was identified by historian Ed Bearss as "Widow Blakely.
[30] General Roswell S. Ripley improperly loaded the chamber of one of the guns with powder to reduce the size of cartridge bags.
[34] An 8.12 in (20.6 cm) rifled British 68-pounder cannon of 95 hundredweight was captured by Union Army forces at Fort Morgan, Alabama on August 23, 1864.
[29] Olmstead describes the piece as "Identified As A 'Blakely'", casting doubt as to its identity and noting that it is covered in black enamel, obscuring any markings.
[35] Four Blakely 9 in (23 cm) seacoast rifles and four smoothbores were taken from Liverpool, England in August 1871 by the USS Worcester and off loaded at Boston Navy Yard.
The 9 in (23 cm) rifled cannon number 95 is on private property at Bernhards Bay, New York on Oneida Lake.
[39] A July 3, 1862 letter from Frank M. Coker of the Sumter Flying Artillery to his wife mentions that during the Seven Days Battles he was ordered to carry a large Blakely rifled gun down the line.
[43] John B. Brockenbrough's battery, which was heavily engaged in the battle north and west of the Dunker Church, had four different cannon, including a Blakely rifle.
[46] An example of an 18-pounder, 4-inch caliber based on bore dimension was captured in the Union attack on Confederates salvaging the blockade runner Hebe near Fort Fisher, North Carolina on August 23, 1863 has been placed in the Washington Navy Yard.
[53] Historian Warren Ripley noted that if the shell from Alabama's Blakely rifle which lodged in the Kearsarge's rudder post had exploded, the outcome of the battle might have been different.
Also, the piece was marked as manufactured by Blakely Ordnance Company, a known Confederate supplier not used by the Union army, contrary to representations by the agent, that it would be made by Sheffield.
[39] A survivor was stolen from Rivers Bridge State Historic Site near Barnwell, South Carolina on February 2, 1995.