Siege artillery in the American Civil War were used by the Federal troops as their trenches approached Fort Wagner and field artillery was placed in the trenches to defend against possible Confederate sorties. While Fort Wagner was subject to near constant bombardment from the batteries listed in the table below, as approaches neared the fort's ditch the bombardment increased. Fire from U.S. Navy ships, particularly the USS "New Ironsides", proved very effective. The navy were able to skip the round shells from their XI-inch Dahlgren guns off the water, over the ramparts, and into the fort. Several heavy Parrott rifles that had been directed against Fort Sumter
Siege artillery in the American Civil War siege artillery. The advent of rifled artillery made them obsolete. The Civil War was the first major war to see the use of rifled artillery. Rifling gave the guns greater velocity, range, accuracy, and penetrating power, making smoothbore siege guns obsolete. The ranges of these guns is somewhat problematic. The 6.4 inch (100-pounder) Parrott rifle had a maximum range of . However, the absence of suitable sights . and a good system of directing fire on targets that could not be seen from the gun, limited the effective range of the rifled guns. The bombardment of Fort Pulaski demonstrated that