[Boogieman]

“I’ve never heard an explanation as to why Custer wasn’t issued repeating rifles.”

I’ve heard that some people in the Army command were resisting switching to more modern rifles, because they thought that soldiers would just waste ammunition firing willy nilly, instead of carefully aiming their shots. I believe it wasn’t until the Spanish-American War that that line of thinking was completely uprooted.

[buffaloguy]

“I’ve never heard an explanation as to why Custer wasn’t issued repeating rifles.”

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Repeaters were expensive and somewhat unreliable. A number of units were issued repeaters and they were given bad reviews by soldiers as well as officers. The subject was dropped and they continued to use the Springfield Trapdoor

One of the problems was the repeaters used much lighter rounds than the 45-70 and were less effective at longer ranges.

The investigation after the battle led the Ordinance Dept to replace all copper jacketed 45-70 with brass jacket. The copper jacket had expanded in the rifle as heat increased to the point that the fired round could not be ejected. Brass expands less.