Part 24

After a severe competition it appeared that the best weapon would be produced by combining Henry’s system of rifling with Martini’s mechanism for breech-loading. The parts constituting the lock and the mechanism for working the breech, shown in Fig. 86, are contained in a metal case, to which is attached the woodwork of the stock, now constructed in two parts. To this case is attached the butt of the rifle by a strong metal bolt 6 in. in length, A, which is inserted through a hole in the heel-plate. The part that closes the breech—termed the “block”—is marked B. It turns loosely on a pin, C, passing through its rear end and fixed into the case at a level somewhat higher than the axis of the barrel. The end of the block is rounded off so as to form with the rear end of the case, D, which is hollowed out to receive it in a perfect knuckle joint. Let it be observed that this rounded surface, which is the width of the block, receives the whole force of the recoil, no strain being put on the pin, C, on which the block turns. In the experiments a leaden pin was substituted, and the action of the mechanism was not in the least impaired. This arrangement serves greatly to diminish the wear and the possibility of damage from the recoil. As the pin on which the block turns is slightly above the axis at the barrel, it follows that the block, when not supported, immediately drops down below the barrel. Behind the trigger-guard is a lever, E, working on a pin, F, fitted into the lower part of the case. To this lever is attached a much shorter piece called the “tumbler,” which projects into the case, G. It is this tumbler which acts as a support for the block, and raises it into its firing position or lowers it according as the lever, E, is drawn toward a firer or pushed forward. How this is accomplished will be readily understood by observing the form of the notch, H, in which the upper end of the tumbler moves. It will be noticed that the piece being in the position for firing, if the lever be pushed back, G slides away from the shallower part of the notch into the deeper, and the block accordingly falls into the position shown in the figure; and if again the lever is drawn backward, G acting on H will raise the block to its former position. The block or breech-piece is hollowed out on its upper surface, I, so as to permit the cartridge to be readily inserted into the exploding chamber, J. The centre of the block is bored out, and contains within the vital mechanism for exploding the cartridge, namely, a spiral spring, of which the little marks at K are the coils in section. These coils pass round apiece of metal called the “striker,” which is armed with a point, capable of passing through a hole in the front face of the block exactly behind the percussion-cap of the cartridge when the block is in the firing position. When the lever handle is moved _forward_, it causes the tumbler, which works on the same pin, to revolve, and one of its arms draws back the striker, compressing the spring in so doing, so that as the block drops down the point of the striker is drawn inwards. In this position the piece receives the cartridge into the chamber. The lever, E, being now drawn backward, the piece is forced into the notch, H, and the block is kept firmly in its place; besides this, there is a further compression of the spring by the tumbler, and in this position the spring is retained by the rest-piece, L, which is pushed into a bend in the tumbler. By pulling the trigger this piece is released, so that the tumbler can revolve freely, and relieve the pent-up spring, whose elasticity impels the striker forward, so that this enters the carriage directly. A very important and ingenious part of this arrangement is the contrivance for extracting the case of the exploded cartridge. The extractor turns on the pin, M, and has two arms pointing upwards, N, which are pressed by the rim of the cartridge pushed home into two grooves cut in the sides of the barrel. It has another arm, O, bent only slightly upwards and pointing towards the centre of the case, and forming an angle of about 80° with the above-mentioned upright arm; when, by pushing forward the lever, its short arm drops into the recess, the block, no longer supported, falls, and hits the point of the bent arm of extractor, so causing the two upright arms to extract the cartridge-case a little way.

The barrel is of steel; the calibre is 0·451 in. It is rifled on Mr. Henry’s patent system. The section of the bore may be generally described as a heptagon with re-entering angles at the junctions of the planes, so that there are fourteen points of contact for the bullet, viz., one in the middle of each plane, and one at each of the re-entering angles. The twist of rifling is one turn in 22 in. The charge consists of 85 grains of powder, and a bullet weighing 480 grains, of a form designed by Mr. Henry. The cartridge is of the same general construction as the “Boxer” cartridge, used in the Snider rifle, but it is bottle-shaped, the diameter being enlarged from a short distance in rear of the bullet, in order to admit of its being made shorter, and consequently stronger, than would be otherwise possible. A wad of bees’-wax is placed between the bullet and powder, by which the barrel is lubricated at each discharge. The sword-bayonet to be used with this rifle is of a pattern proposed by Lord Elcho. It is a short sword, broad towards the point, and furnished on a portion of the back with a double row of teeth, so as to form a stout saw. It is so balanced as to form a powerful chopping implement, so that, in addition to its primary use as a bayonet, it will be useful for cutting and sawing brushwood, small trees, &c.

The following are the principal particulars of weight, dimensions, &c., of the Martini-Henry rifle:

│Without bayonet 4 ft. 1 in. Length of rifle │With bayonet fixed 5 ft. 8 in. │Of barrel 2 ft. 9·22 in.

Calibre │ 0·451 in.

Rifling │Grooves 7 │Twist 1 turn in 22 in.

Weight │Without bayonet 8 lbs. 7 oz. │With bayonet 10 lbs. 4 oz.

Bayonet │Length 2 ft. 1½ in. │Weight without scabbard 1 lb. 8 oz.

Charge of powder │ 85 grains. Weight of bullet │ 480 grains.

The rifle is sighted to 1,400 yards.

As an evidence of the accuracy of fire in this rifle, it may be stated that of twenty shots fired at 1,200 yards, the mean absolute deflection of the hits from the centre of the group was 2·28 ft. The highest point in the trajectory at 500 yards is rather over 8 ft. so that the bullet would not pass over a cavalry soldier’s head within that distance. The trajectory of the Snider at the same range rises to nearly 12 ft. The bullet will pass through from thirteen to seventeen ½ in. elm planks placed 1 in. apart at 20 yards distance; the number pierced by the Snider under similar circumstances being from seven to nine. As regards rapidity of fire, twenty rounds have been fired in 53 seconds; and one arm which had been exposed to rain and water artificially applied for seven days and nights, and had during that time fired 400 rounds, was then fired, without cleaning, twenty rounds in 1 minute 3 seconds.

Rifles of the Martini-Henry and Chassepot type were soon superseded, for as early as 1876 Switzerland had armed her troops with a magazine rifle of a smaller calibre than any then in use, and this weapon was found so effective that in a few years after every European nation had followed suit, as also had the United States and Japan, each country adopting some particular pattern of a weapon with certain modifications. Of these the Mannlicher and the Mauser are much used. A magazine rifle is one that can be fired several times successively without reloading. Like revolvers, the magazine arms repeat their fire, but instead of having several distinct firing chambers, they have but one, from which the empty cartridge cases are automatically extracted by the breech mechanism, for the magazine rifle is necessarily a breech-loader. The magazine rifle carries a supply of cartridges, which one after another are brought into the firing chamber by the simple action of the breech mechanism, so that the soldier is enabled to discharge several rounds in any position without reloading. The several varieties of the magazine rifle may be classed according to the position of the magazine. This may be: First, in the stock; second, under the barrel; third, in a box under the breech; or fourth, in a box above the breech. In the first and second variety the cartridges are in line in a tube, out of which they are moved on by a spiral spring, and this was the earlier form of the weapon. The box above or below the breech is the later development, and has the advantage of holding the cartridges lying side by side, and thus in a position in which they are not so liable to injure each other as in the tubular arrangements. Then, again, the movement of the cartridge in the breechbox in arriving at the firing chamber is much less than in the linear magazines, and the centre of gravity of the whole changes but little when the supply is exhausted. With any of the varieties of magazine a suitable modification of the mechanism may be adopted, so that the weapon can at will be used as a single firing rifle, but changeable in an instant to the magazine form. Again, the box magazine may be made as a fixture on the rifle, or it may be detachable. Commissions of military authorities had for several years been deliberating upon the best models for their respective nations, while Professor Hebler was working out his researches as to the best calibre for military rifles. Hebler published a work showing the great advantages of a bore one-third less in diameter than that commonly in use, which was about 0·45 inch, as in our Martini-Henry. The small-calibre rifle shoots straighter and hits harder than the large bore one, and the recoil is less, and so is the weight of the weapon. Lead is found to be too soft a material for the bullet of the small-bore rifles, as it does not keep in the rifling, which has a sharper turn than that in the older weapon; hence the bullets are now cased in steel or nickel. These bullets have remarkable power of penetration. Some will go through a steel plate 1¼ inch thick, making a clean hole in it, and the Lebel bullet penetrates 15 inches of solid oak, at a distance of 220 yards. Such a missile would, therefore, be capable of going completely through the bodies of several men or horses.

The Germans, about 1888, adopted a magazine rifle known as the Mauser. It had a fixed tubular magazine for eight rounds below the barrel, and a breech mechanism of the Remington-Keene type. The French followed suit with their famous Lebel gun, the construction of which was long kept secret. It also has a fixed under barrel tubular magazine, and the cartridges used with it contain smokeless powder. It is said that a new gun of practically the same pattern has been adopted by Russia, but with a detachable magazine to contain five rounds. The Russian gun will also use smokeless powder. In England, a small-bore rifle of 0·303 inches calibre is now issued to all troops. It has an under breechbox magazine, modified from the Lee rifle. The box is detachable, so that the weapon could normally be used as a single loader, and the magazine attached only when required. But the British authorities have decided that the magazine box is to be attached to the weapon by a chain. The first issue of this pattern of rifle to British soldiers took place early in 1890. The Austrians are adopting the Mannlicher pattern, in which the magazine idea is embodied in a complete and practical form. This rifle has a fixed box magazine below the breech. From this box, in which the cartridges—five in number—lie side by side, they are fed up by springs as they are disposed of by the movement of the breech mechanism. The magazine is recharged by placing in it a tin case containing five cartridges, and the case drops out when all the cartridges have been fired. In this form there is of course no necessity for providing any mechanism for holding the magazine in reserve while the rifle is used as a single loader. As to calibre, the Austrian authorities follow other countries in adopting a small bore, namely, 0·315 inch. Italy has converted her single-fire Vetterli rifle into a magazine arm, with a box something like the Mannlicher, and Belgium has adopted a gun of the same type. The rate of fire from charged magazines of such guns as the “Lee,” “Mannlicher” and “Vetterli,” worked with the right hand without bringing the piece down from the shoulder is, for all of them, about one shot per second; but the time that is required to recharge the magazines varies much according to the contrivance used. The number of rounds the magazine of a rifle is capable of containing when fully charged is from 5 to 12, or more, according to the difference of system. It is considered that in the detachable Lee or the quick recharging Mannlicher five rounds are ample for use at a critical moment.

The calibre of the military rifle has been decreased with almost every new pattern adopted. Thus, while the _old_ “Brown Bess” had a calibre of 0·75 inch, in the last issue of it the bore was reduced to 0·693 inch; the Enfield (1852) had a bore of 0·577 inch; the Martini-Henry, 0·451 inch, which, in a newer pattern adopted in 1887, was reduced to 0·400 inch; and, finally, in the Lee-Metford, the calibre is only 0·303 inch. A similar consecutive reduction of bores has taken place in the rifles adopted by other countries, and one of the latest type, issued for the use of the United States Navy, has a bore of only 0·236 inch, and it is even expected that a still smaller one will become general. The advantage of the narrow and lighter projectile is that while it has a higher initial velocity with a given charge, its flight is less checked by the resistance of the atmosphere, the section it presents being so much less. Thus the bullet of 0·236 inch diameter has a section little more than one-fourth that of the 0·45 inch bullet. The difference is well shown in the comparative heights of the _trajectory_ (or path of the bullet) of the Martini-Henry 0·450 inch bullet, and that of the 0·303 inch Lee-Metford (the latter with _cordite_ ammunition); for at a range of 1,000 yards the former reaches to 48 feet above the line of sight, while the latter rises to only 25 feet.

Some form of repeating or magazine rifle has now been adopted by all the most important nations of the world. The number of shots contained in the magazines varies from 5 to 12. In the British detachable box magazine there are ten charges. The calibres of the barrels range in the infantry patterns of different nations from 0·256 inch to 0·315 inch; the explosive used in every case is some kind of smokeless powder, and this, in the cartridge for the Lee-Metford, is _cordite_. The bullets are not made simply of lead, but of lead coated with a harder metal or alloy such as steel, cupro-nickel, nickel steel, or they consist entirely of some of these alloys.

Although the magazine rifle is now the regulation weapon of the infantry of all great armies, it is not improbable that at no distant future it maybe superseded by one in which, as in certain machine guns, the force of the recoil will be used for actuating the breech and lock movements. Many patents have already been taken out for rifles on this principle, and several patterns have actually been constructed, in which a merely momentary contact of the breech-piece with the end of the barrel is sufficient; the recoil of the barrel with the reaction of a spring performs all the requisite movements with such rapidity that an amazing speed of firing has been obtained. It is said that such an automatic gun can send forth bullets at a perfectly amazing rate. Of course the mechanism of such a gun is somewhat intricate, and it is impossible to explain its construction and action without a great number of diagrams and much description.

_RIFLED CANNON._

Having briefly sketched in the foregoing section the development of the military rifle from such weapons as our own “Brown Bess,” down to the repeating or magazine rifle, we now purpose to adopt a similar course with regard to ordnance, giving also some particulars of the methods of manufacture, etc., and following in general the order of history.

Naturally there is nothing that accelerates progress in warlike inventions so much as the exigences of war itself. This is well exemplified in circumstances attending the Crimean War, which was waged in 1854 by England and France in alliance against Russia. The desire of having ships that could run the gauntlet of the heavy guns mounted on Russian forts led to the construction of _La Gloire_ and other armour-plated vessels, as we have already seen, and a suggestion of the French Emperor, as to improving metal for guns, made to Mr. Bessemer, led incidentally but ultimately to the great revolution in the manufacture of steel, although it is true that Krupp of Essen had begun to produce small cast-steel ordnance as early as 1847. But what determined the necessity for rifled ordnance was more particularly the greater comparative effects obtained by the muzzle-loading rifles over the field artillery then in use in the several engagements that took place in the Crimea, especially in the battle of Inkerman (1854). The rifles so much surpassed in accuracy at long ranges the smooth-bore field-pieces firing spherical projectiles, that field artillery was on the point of losing its relative importance, and even in the matter of range the latter lost so much by windage that the men serving the artillery could sometimes be leisurely picked off by the rifle sharp-shooters. Inventors were soon at work on devising methods of increasing the accuracy of ordnance fire with both light and heavy pieces, and before the end of the war some cast-iron guns rifled on Lancaster’s plan had been mounted on forts and in ships, without proving very successful except in regard to increase of range when elongated pointed projectiles were used with them.

Now let us see of what kind was the ordnance used for some years after the middle of the century, in order that we may be the better able to appreciate the progress that has since been made. Ordnance is, as already noticed, of several species, as guns mounted on fortresses, naval guns, siege guns, field-guns, etc., and the size of the pieces under each of those heads is distinguished sometimes in one, sometimes in another of three different ways. We may name it by the weight of the gun itself in tons or hundredweights, as “a 35–ton gun,” etc.; or by the weight of its projectile, as “a 68–pounder,” etc.; or by its calibre, that is the diameter of its bore, as “a 4–inch gun,” etc. We may take the naval guns with which Nelson won his battles (Trafalgar, 1807) as representative of all except field ordnance up to about 1856. They were all made of cast iron, threw spherical projectiles, and were very rudely mounted. The gun most commonly mounted on board our ships of war was the 32–pounder, weighing 32 cwt., shown with its carriage in Fig. 90. The carriage was of wood, and consisted of two side pieces joined back and front by two transverse pieces and carried by four low wooden wheels. The trunnions of the gun fitted into bearings at the top of the side-pieces, and were secured by iron plates that passed over them in a semi-cylindrical form and were bolted down to the wood. The position of the trunnions on the gun was always such that the breech end of the gun preponderated, being supported on an adjustable wooden wedge; and when the muzzle of the gun had to be lowered, this was done by raising the breech end with handspikes and pushing in the wedge so far as to prevent the breech from dropping down again. There was a vent or narrow passage to contain a train of powder from the touch-hole at the upper part of the breech to the rear of the charge. When the gun was fired, with its muzzle protruding a little way out of the port-hole, the recoil would trundle it inwards about its own length, when its course would be stayed by a thick rope attached to the sides of the vessel; and by other tackle it would be kept in position until loaded, when it would be allowed to roll back, or would be drawn by ropes and pulleys out to the port-hole, and by the same means such lateral inclination as might be required could be given. This last adjustment was called _training_ the gun. A 32–pounder required the services altogether of a dozen or fourteen men, but these by virtue of constant drill would learn to handle the clumsy machine with a certain amount of expedition. If we except a notch on the highest point of the muzzle, the pieces were devoid of anything of the nature of sights, though sometimes marks were made on the adjustable wedge under the breech to correspond with certain elevations. Nor were sights required; for the mode of fighting then was to get quite close to the adversary’s ship and pour in a _broadside_ by firing simultaneously all guns on the enemy’s side when they had been _trained_ (by rough methods), so as to concentrate their effect as much as possible on one point of the antagonist. Nelson’s famous ship the _Victory_ carried a few larger guns than the 32–pounders, namely, two 68–pounders, called _carronades_ (from having first been cast at Carron in Scotland), and some 42–pounders. The 32– and 42–pounders numbered together thirty, and there were also as many 24–pounders, with forty 12–pounders. These were all simply cast of the required dimensions, and were not made with the one single improvement which after two centuries’ use of cast-iron guns had been introduced into France about fifty years before, namely, the _boring_ of the chase out of a solid casting.