Arms from the Association

Arms from the Association were from various makers. No special tabulation now exists by which a name could be connected with this order. Records show barrels passing proof at Birmingham as follows:

1856	384,900
1857	490,037
1858	333,478
1859	450,753
1860	486,617
1861	656,605
1862	1,131,306
1863	No record
1864	No record
1865	552,109

The prewar years and 1865 indicate the norm for the Trade was about a half million barrels annually. A large proportion of these were common sporting gun and rifle barrels; presumably, also, pistols. But the rise in 1860-61 was caused by the excitement in Eng- land that they might go to War with France at any minute. A Volunteer Rifle movement swept the United Kingdom and yoemanry regiments were formed overnight. Equipped at private expense, their rifles were finely finished. For this market the Whitworth and Kerr sharpshooter rifles were aimed.

The Volunteer Rifle movement tapered off into the shooting association of Great Britain, but the Confederate and Yankee purchasers came along to fan the flames of Birmingham barrel forges higher. The increase of 500,000 barrels over 1861 for 1862 was entirely of Enfield type barrels, for the warring purchasers. Why no records are found for 1863 and 1864 is not known —they would be of great interest, if they existed. How much more the United States paid for Enfields from Naylor, than if Stanton had let Hartley remain another six months abroad, is a simple problem of arithmetic which others can solve. The record of history shows that Naylor sent in guns regularly, in quantities promised, and of good quality, often better than expected. That a great many of these guns never got to the fighting fronts, and troops maneuvered in the morass of a southern winter carrying smoothbore muskets, is the fault of official Washington and failures of transportation, not of the Ordnance to contract and buy, nor of Naylor or other contractors to deliver.

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CHAPTER 17 The Starr Rises

From the catalog of Wallis and Wallis, British gun auctioneers ( 1962 ) at Lewes in Sussex, we read of the sale of a Starr revolver: Lot 1060 ... A 6 shot .44 Starr SA Army Perc Rev 14", brl 8", No. 51594, the top strap bearing old engraving Col. Colt Address New York, Good Condition but action As Found & frame screw not orig . Eben T. Starr of Yonkers, New York, might not have smiled at this latter day whimsey. Marking his re volver with the name of the man he dared challenge by launching a new revolving pistol business in 1858 was to him not funny. Though the modern gun bug who fraudulently marked this in the hope someone would bite on it as a hitherto unknown Colt double action revolver we trust was unsuccessful in his piracy, per haps the buyer at the Wallis and Wallis auction cherishes his purchase for what it is: one of the best and most modem revolvers of the Civil War era. Though complex inside at first glance, its parts are well thought out and reveal Star...

CHAPTER 6 Rifle Muskets: Civil War Scandals

You place me in a most embarrassing position, Mr. Secretary. How is that, Mr. Wilkeson? the gaunt-faced Penn sylvanian queried, the lines of his expression amplified by the fatigue and, somewhat, disappointment with which he laid down his role as Secretary of War for Mr. Lincoln. Because, Mr. Cameron, the newspaperman re sponded, your contract for rifle muskets with the Eagle Manufacturing Company of Mansfield, Connecticut is for only 25,000 arms, and my friends there, whom I induced to engage in this business in expectation of your issuing a further order, as your assistant Mr. Scott assured me you would, will be sorely embarrassed in their operations on this small amount. Indeed this is bad news to me, Mr. Wilkeson, War Secretary Simon Cameron sympathetically observed, as he stuffed papers from his desk drawer into a large portfolio, scanning them briefly, consigning some to the waste basket. But as you can see, I am leaving office today; I believe Mister Stanton, who repla...

French and Belgian Arms

French and Belgian materiel was considered next best to the Enfields, though the types and calibers were more varied than either Enfield or Austrian Lorenz arms. Basic pattern for the best rifles of both France and Belgium was the “carabine” of Captain Minie. Minie’s designs had exerted profound changes in the world’s small arms armament. That change was ably summed up by lexicographer Thomas Wilhelm after the War when he prepared his military dictionary. Said Wilhelm, “Minie Rifle. A species of fire-arm, invented by Capt. Minie, from whom it receives its name. It is certain in aim, and fatal in its results at 800 yards.” The claim was, if anything, inferior to the real capability of the Minie rifle. France in 1861 possessed a surplus of many arms. During the 1840 ’s the temporary procurement of guns designed by Thouvenin, Pontchara, Minie, and others kept the arsenals busy and the soldiers active testing them. Then came the Crimean War and France’s involvement on the side of Gr...

Civil War Guns

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