Early in the war there were many 6-pounder (2.72 kg) bronze smoothbore guns in service with the field artillery and few rifled pieces available.
The initial type was created by reaming existing 6-pounder (2.72 kg) Model 1841 guns to 3.8 in (97 mm), then rifling them.
"[7] In the early part of the Civil War the Union army lacked heavy rifled siege artillery.
To fill this gap, the army rifled existing heavy smoothbore pieces with the system developed by Charles T. James.
Several 14-pounder James rifles at the Manassas National Battlefield Park in Virginia commemorate the Providence Marine Corps of Artillery, which served in the First Battle of Bull Run as the First Rhode Island Battery with this type of weapon.