...Posted on 02/12/2013 1:23:10 PM PST by virgil283
"Behold the Girandoni rifle, a 20 round high capacity tubular magazine which fired at roughly the same velocity as a modern .45 ACP. It can punch straight through a 2x4 at 100 yards.
Invented by Tyrollean Bartholomaus Girandoni around 1779, this revolutionary rifle is four feet long and weighs a manly 10 pounds. It's semi-automatic rate of fire and, for the period, its immense firepower reserve made it a fearsome thing to contemplate in battle."
...
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Even with lever actions the indians rarely won a battle so I don’t think they played a key role in Custer’s defeat.
The Ordnance Dept felt that their springfields had been jammed by the use of copper cartridges. They immediately replaced all copper cartridges with brass and did not have any further problems with the .45-70 cartridges jamming in the breech due to extremely high rates of fire and the resulting heat.
Absolutely. Remember, one of the enumerated powers of Congress was, and is, under Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution:
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, byk securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;
The only resonable interpretation of this clause is they anticipated many unknowable and wonderful discoveries would be made in the future, wanted to encourge them, and understood the inaventions and disoveries that impacted the First and Second Amendments would also be protected by those amendments and the patent clause. Otherwise they would have written exceptions into the First and Second Amendments for discoveries and inventions made after the effective date of those amendments.
Beyond doubt, they were the most brilliant and inspired political thinkers ever to walk the earth, and God graced us with them.
The air rifle was mentioned many times, but was never given a name.
The rate of fire even with a bow was faster than the 7th Cav could manage with their Springfields. I would think the Henrys were chambered for .44-40 or some similar caliber, which admittedly limited their range and punch but which didn’t seem to slow them down much. In a battle like the Little Bighorn, where Custer was so vastly outnumbered, I would assert that rate of fire outweighs range, accuracy, or stopping power.
The Gatling guns Custer had declined could have turned the battle into Crazy Horse’s Last Stand.
Actually, the bullet didn't drop any faster, it just didn't travel as far before it dropped. (lower muzzle velocity)
I remember reading that. The ejector would tear the base off leaving the rest of the cartridge in the chamber; there was even a special tool for removing it.
I still think lever action rifles (and that Gatling gun he left behind...) would have made difference for Custer.
I read a summary of the report and one thing struck me as well as them. Many tips of Army issue knive were broken off and laying on the ground after the battle. The procedure to remove a stuck case was to pry it out with your knife with the possibility that you would have to cut into the case and really lever that sucker out with as much power as you could muster.
One of the indian leaders said later that they found no jammed guns on the field after the battle which has generally been interpreted as a refutation of the copper case problem, but I think both are right:
The cases did jam but were removed with the knives as they had been taught. It might have taken several seconds early in the fight when the gun was getting hot but may have taken 10 to 20 seconds as the rifles continued to heat. Having shot .45-70 for a long time it is my contention that the sticking rounds reduced their fire rate to as little as 1/4 of normal (possibility much less as the Trapdoor is quickly loaded, perhaps two to three seconds per round) and the result was lethal. The copper cases cooled off as the indians checked for survivors and the stuck cases remaining in the rifles were easiy removed or perhaps fell out as the breech was opened.
The other thing that struck me about Little Big Horn was that Custer had enough soldiers to handle the attack as our cavalry and infantry always fought superior numbers of indians. The battle of the Canadian River, for instance, involved 54 troopers against an estimated 900 indians and we won the fight even though they had the repeaters.
Quite frankly a frontal attack on Custer’s troopers firing .45-70s would be a suicide mission so something had to have happened to give the indians the confidence to attack and overrun Custer’s position and I think it was a reduced rate of fire due to stuck cases.
The .44-40 was a large pistol round that was useful at fairly short range for deer hunting but was not anywhere near the .45-70 as a battle round and the .35 was even less useful (lots of .35 caliber rifles were given to indians and it is probable that most of the repeaters were .35, not .44-40). Stricly short range stuff. The foot lbs at the muzzle in a rifle were about 700: Strong pistol performance but a fraction of the performance from a .45-70.
The Spencer was .52 caliber with a 48 grain load of bp in a copper cartridge. Not a strong caliber but useful for the cavalry in close fighting as the effective range was only about 500 yards.
IIRC the Spencer was one of the rifles tested and it did not make it through the tests and was eliminated early in the trials. The Army was very concerned about long distance performance and the .45-70 won out over the .50-80 because of the ability of the .45-70 to go farther accurately.
In 1882 the Springfiels had their sights extended to 1500 yards. It was used for area effect rather than aimed shots.
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