The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.

by Edward W. Byrn

FIG. 278.—AUTOMATIC PISTOLS.

Breech-Loading Guns.—Although the breech-loading principle was well known prior to the Nineteenth Century, it remained for this period to give it effective development. The first United States patent for a breech-loading gun was to Thornton and Hall, May 21, 1811. It was a flint lock, and many of these arms were made at Harper’s Ferry Armory in 1814, and issued to the troops, one being given by order of Congress to each member of Congress to take home with him to show to his constituents. The present style of break-down gun was invented by Pauly, in France, and is to be found in his British patent No. 3,833, of 1814. Lefaucheux, of Paris, however, made this form of gun practical. Minesinger, in United States patent No. 6,139, February 27, 1849, supplied the important improvement of making the front edge of the metallic cartridge shell thinner than elsewhere, so as to expand by the pressure of the exploding charge, and swell to a tight fit of the barrel. The Maynard rifle, first patented May 27, 1851, No. 8,126, was one of the earliest practical forms of breech-loaders.

Magazine Guns.—Walter Hunt’s United States patent No. 6,663, August 21, 1849, was the first on a magazine firearm of modern type. It had a sliding breech block carrying the main spring and firing pin. The Spencer rifle was one of the early ones that came into use. This had a row of cartridges in the stock, and was first patented March 6, 1860, No. 27,393. It was this weapon which in the Civil War gave proof of the deadly efficacy of the breech-loading magazine gun, and its superiority to the old style military arm. Another type of magazine firearm which in the last half century has gained great prominence and popularity is the so-called “Winchester.” This has its cartridges arranged in a tube below and parallel with the barrel, and they are fed in a column to the rear by a helical spring as fast as they are used up at the breech. The pioneer of this type is the arm patented by Smith & Wesson February 14, 1854, No. 10,535, re-issued December 30, 1873, No. 5,710. This was subsequently improved as to the extractor by B. F. Henry in patent No. 30,446, October 16, 1860, re-issued December 7, 1868, No. 3,227, and was manufactured and favorably known for many years as the Henry rifle. This rifle was also used in the Civil War. O. F. Winchester subsequently re-organized it in patent No. 57,808, September 4, 1866, and the arm in late years has taken his name.

The Needle Gun, of Prussia, represents an early form of breech loader, and may be considered the prototype of the modern bolt gun. The needle gun has in the place of the swinging hammer a rectilinearly sliding bolt, carrying in front a needle which pierces the charge and ignites the fulminate by its friction. Its construction permits the fulminate to be placed in advance of the powder, which thus burns from the front, and is entirely consumed in the gun, instead of being partially blown out of the gun, as may occur when ignited in the rear. The needle gun was invented by Dreyse in 1838, was first introduced about 1846, and gave effective service in the Prusso-Austrian war of 1866. The Chassepot, brought out in 1867, United States patent No. 60,832, was a French development of the Prussian needle gun.

About 1879 two forms of magazine guns appeared which have become types for most all subsequent guns of this class. Both of them employed the bolt system as previously embodied in the needle gun, but added to it the magazine principle and changed the method of supplying and feeding the cartridges. One was the invention of James Lee, and the other was the joint invention of Colonel Livermore, of the Corps of Engineers, and Major Russell, of the Ordnance Department, U. S. A. In the Lee, whose name has been much in evidence in late years, there was a relatively small detachable box (see [Fig. 279]) capable of holding five cartridges and designed to be filled and then placed in a slot opening centrally under the gun, below the receiver, and directly in front of the trigger guard. A spring within the magazine fed the cartridges up into alignment with the barrel. Lee’s first patent was No. 221,328, November 4, 1879.

FIG. 279.—LEE’S MAGAZINE RIFLE, PATENTED NOVEMBER 4, 1879.

The Livermore-Russell gun, patented October 28, 1879, No. 221,079, had a magazine opening transversely in the upper edge of the stock behind the bolt, and the cartridges were fed to the barrel beneath the bolt. The important feature of the gun, however, was a cartridge case slotted on its side and detachable from the gun, and each bearing a group of five cartridges, which were to be thus made up in small packets and carried in the belt or cartridge box of the soldier. This idea was subsequently developed by Livermore and Russell in patent No. 230,823, August 3, 1880, and this feature, viewed in the light of the importance subsequently attained by the “clip” in the Mauser and Mannlicher guns, may be fairly considered the pioneer of this idea of grouping cartridges in made-up packets for bolt guns. Its great advantage is the large number of shots that may be fired in a short space of time without an excessive weight in the gun itself.