Master of the Situation
The modern sportsman with his automatic rifle is prepared for all emergencies.
In 1863, the Remington breech-loading rifle was perfected, and proved to be so great an improvement over previous inventions in military arms that an order for 10,000 of them was obtained from our government. The Ilion plant being taxed to its utmost capacity, the contract was transferred to the Savage Arms Company, of Middletown, Conn., which completed the job in 1864.
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| Illustrations by courtesy of the Winchester Repeating Arms Co. | |
The tools and fixtures used in making Remington breech-loading rifles for the United States were brought back from Connecticut in 1866, and an inventive genius named John Rider was set to work, with a staff of the best mechanics obtainable, to develop this gun still further. He devised the famous system of a dropping breech block, backed up by the hammer.
Uncle Sam had a great number of muzzle-loading Springfield rifles left from the Civil War. By the Berdan system, these were turned into breech-loaders at the Ilion plant, the breech being cut out of the barrel and a breech-block inserted, swinging upward and forward. Spain had 10,000 muskets to modernize by the same system, and the breech-block attachments were made at Ilion.
The Berdan system, with a slight alteration, was the foundation of the Allen gun, made by the United States government for the army until superseded by the Krag-Jorgensen.