this post was submitted on 14 Jan 2026
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Man pretending to fire a 'quaker gun', a decoy cannon made out of a log, US Civil War, 1862 (media.piefed.social)
submitted 16 hours ago by PugJesus@piefed.social to c/historyphotos@piefed.social
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[–] calliope@retrolemmy.com 8 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (1 children)

Might be obvious, but “less harmful” is why it’s called a “Quaker” gun!

The name derives from the Religious Society of Friends or "Quakers", who have traditionally held a religious opposition to war and violence in the Peace Testimony.

From Wikipedia, which also has a different photo where they’re even more obviously logs!

[–] Atelopus-zeteki@fedia.io 5 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

I've known plenty of Quakers over the years. Prolly the one I knew earliest was my boss back in High School/ Undergrad. Fine folk as far as I can tell. Anyway, yes, I get the pun, but others might not.

[–] captainlezbian@lemmy.world 3 points 12 hours ago

Weirdly enough they have a terrible track record with the American presidency. The only one was Nixon