About "lever rifles" from the very beginning
The Indians are all as one with "lever rifles." Still from the film: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (2007)
Mauritius saw hard drives only in the price lists.
Light, "applied", elegant bullet guns.
And why only here, in the steppe, such surprises?
Evgeny Permyak "Humpbacked Bear"
Light, "applied", elegant bullet guns.
And why only here, in the steppe, such surprises?
Evgeny Permyak "Humpbacked Bear"
stories about weapons. "Let's talk about leverage ... I wrote little!" - such was the content of not one, but several appeals from VO readers at once. “And what would from the very beginning…” Well, since readers want about "lever", then it will be about them. And from the very beginning.
And their beginning is as follows: in 1826 in Italy, Caesar Rosaglio manufactured and patented a revolver with a lever mechanism for cocking the hammer and simultaneously turning the drum, which made it possible to fire six shots from it in less than six seconds. But no one was impressed.
"Lever carbine" "Sharps" 1874 "Texas Rangers" (2001)
Then, between 1837 and 1841, Samuel Colt equipped his drum rifles with a lever that rotates the drum and cocks a hidden trigger. The rifles had been in combat with the Seminole Indians, but required careful loading, that is, that the shooter smeared "cannon fat" on the drum chambers in front. Otherwise, the drum could break. Well, the shooters on the Indian border often neglected this requirement ...
"Sharps" 1874 chambered for .45-70. Photo imfdb.org
One of the first examples of rifled weapons with a long barrel, which was reloaded by a swinging lever at the bottom, is today considered to be the Christopher Spencer rifle, designed by him in 1860. But, since her store was located in the butt, we will not consider it in this material, but we will postpone it until the story about rifles with a store in the butt - VO readers also asked about them.
First of all, we note that such a drive in the late 50s - early 60s of the XIX century became very popular, as evidenced by the appearance of many similar lever systems ...
Here, for example, he is from the models of the "lever carbine" "Sharps and Hopkins" in 1859. Chambered in .44 caliber. The system is very unusual in that the lever, which was also a trigger guard (a similar device has already been used on Volcanic pistols and shotguns from Smith and Wesson!), did not touch the shutter at all, but moved forward ... the barrel!
In the Bollard rifle of 1861, chambered in .54 caliber, the lever, on the contrary, lowered not only the bolt, but also the trigger along with the trigger. And the extraction of the spent cartridge case was carried out manually - with an extractor with a lever-pusher under the forearm!
Surprisingly, decoy guns also appeared. At first glance, they had a lever on the neck of the box, and even the thought might have arisen for it ... grab it. But in fact, it was not a lever at all, but simply a brass attachment for the convenience of holding this gun by the neck of the butt.
Such a strange design was the carbine of George Morse from Baton Rouge, who in 1856 and 1858 patented the design of a surprisingly modern centerfire cartridge and made a rifle for it, or rather a carbine.
Morse carbine chambered for .58-62. Photo rockislandauction.com
The device of the carbine was also very original. There were two fluted keys on the top of the bolt. They had to be pressed, they pressed in and unlocked the shutter, which then rose behind them. Photo rockislandauction.com
Moreover, the shutter consisted of two parts: the front - which was the emphasis for the cartridge, and the back, in which there was a spring and a striker, which was struck by a manually cocked trigger. Photo rockislandauction.com
After positive tests carried out by the army and fleet, Morse received a contract for the manufacture of the first carbines, and then a license contract for the alteration of existing muskets according to his system. Work began at the Harper's Ferry arsenal, but then the money ran out, and only 60 conversions were made.
And with the outbreak of the Civil War, Morse completely sided with the Confederation, settled in Nashville, and when the northerners captured the city in 1862, he moved to Atlanta and Greenville in South Carolina. It was in Greenville that Morse was finally able to start producing his carbines for the South Carolina State Militia, which received something like 1 of his rifles.
Keane-Walker carbine, 1862. Photo by spocketars.com
And this is how his shutter worked. Photo spocketars.com
Little is known of the Keen-Walker Arms Company, except for a few surviving records of the Confederate armory. From them we can learn that in 1862 their company supplied a total of 282 single-shot .54 carbines to the Danville arsenal in 50, receiving $101 for the first 40 and $XNUMX for the rest. The company also subcontracted Reed & Watson in Danville to remake the Hull rifles.
The Howard brothers' Thunderbolt rifle. Photo rockislandauction.com
Another extremely original single-shot lever-action rifle was developed and patented by the brothers Charles and Sebre Howard in 1862. Patent #36779 was filed on October 28, 1862, after which it was produced by the Whitneyville Armory from 1866 to 1870 in rifle and shotgun versions. At the same time, about 1 copies were produced (according to other estimates, about 700) copies.
The Thunderbolt used "sidefire cartridges" in .44 caliber. The rifle was tested by the US military in 1867, but was not accepted into service.
This is what the Thunderbolt looked like when the shutter was opened on it ... Photo by GunBroker.com
The receiver of the Thunderbolt rifle. Photo forgottenweapons.com
It was arranged in such a way that there were no holes at all on its upper surfaces. The shutter was opened with a lever from below, a spent cartridge case fell out, and a new cartridge was inserted from below!
The receiver looked like a pipe, which was connected to the barrel with a thread. Inside, a bolt with two extractors moved with a lever-bracket. It was also arranged in an interesting way: a tube, there is a spring in it, inside the spring there is a cylinder of the actual shutter with a drummer fixed by a protrusion of a spring-loaded trigger. The photo shows how the shutter protrudes from the rear of the receiver. Photo forgottenweapons.com
Incomplete disassembly of Thunderbolt. As you can see, the device is nowhere simpler. Photo forgottenweapons.com
The Sharps-Borchardt M1878 is a single shot bolt action rifle designed by Hugo Borchardt and manufactured by the Sharps Rifle Manufacturing Company. It was very similar to the old Shaprs rifles, but had a firing mechanism that uses a hammerless firing pin rather than the hammer and firing pin of the old rifle.
Shotless rifle "Sharps-Borchardt" M1878. Photo forgottenweapons.com
This system is based on a patent issued by Hugo Borchardt in 1877. Moreover, this is the last single-shot rifle of Sharps and Borchard, and ... it did not sell very well. From 1877 until the closure of the company in 1881, 22 rifles of all models were made, according to a company report. It is believed that it appeared too late, at the end of the great buffalo slaughter, which required large-caliber cartridges such as .500 and .45. This sample fired cartridges of 50–45 and 70–50 mm caliber, that is, it had extraordinary power.
Comparison rifle cartridges (left to right): .30-06 Springfield, .45-70 Government, .50-90 Sharps
In Europe, lever-action rifles also went, first American, and then their own. So, the rifle of the American Henry Peabody of 1862, which had an 11-mm caliber, was adopted by the Turkish, Romanian (M1868), Canadian (M1866) armies, as well as the armies of Switzerland (1867) and Spain (M1868). In the United States, it was in service with the military formations of the states of Massachusetts and Connecticut.
The British army adopted the Martini-Henry rifle in 1871, however, its lever least of all resembled the famous “Henry bracket” and was not associated with a trigger guard! But in Belgium in 1871 they adopted the Comblant rifle, in which the trigger guard was controlling the shutter.
There were little-known lever-action rifles. For example, the Kuhn rifle from Besançon. Little is known about this man, who worked as an inventor and weapons manufacturer from 1860 to 1875. He received his first weapons patent on August 14, 1860, and in subsequent years his efforts were focused on improving breech-loading weapons and, in particular, rifles.
When the Peabody and Martini rifles appeared in Europe in 1870, Kuhn began developing his own rifle based on them, chambered for the Swiss 10,4 mm Vetterli cartridge. The rifle was made, a certain amount was released, but this is all that is known about it today.
The photo shows the main parts of the Kuhn rifle. It can be seen that all parts are solid. Not too difficult to make, and besides, there are not many of them. It was arranged in such a way that when the lever-bracket moved, the bolt of this rifle fell down. Photo forgottenweapons.com
To be continued ...
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