Historic .44 Henry Cartridge targets made in 1866

[w44wcf]

Pards,
Here's some neat historic information on the long range accuracy of the .44 Henry cartridge
at 300, 600, 800 and 1000 paces!  A man sized target would definitely be in trouble at 600 paces.
At 1000 paces there is still a 25% chance of being hit.

The large squares = 6"  Small squares = 1.2"  Pretty darn good shootin'!













Impressive!

w44wcf

[Montana Slim]

For fun, I've estimated those distances to be:

300  paces = 250 yds
600  paces = 500 yds
800  paces = 665 yds
1000 paces = 830 yds

Regards,
Slim

[cactus joe]

so how is a pace measured, is it one foot in front of another, or is it a stride (which would be close to 3feet per stride). If thats the case wouldn't 300 paces be nearer to 275-300yds? anyway better than i can do, i was at the range today just shooting at 50yds, i couldn't get to the 100yd marker too much snow, my 50yd shooting wasn't even close to being in those guys league. I can see i wouldn't have lasted too long on the fronter with my shooting ability.

[Montana Slim]

A methodical stride would be the closest definition. My estimate is based on approximately 30" per pace. This is (was) a fairly common, but "loose" definition and has been (& still) used by the military, railroad & construction industry "hold-outs".

I learned this distance estimating technique back when I was an enginering student & worked as a highway construction inspector during the summer. Lets just say that was a several years ago.... Pacing was taught to me by an senior inspector, and was valuable for rough measurement of distance. Personally, I use this frequently today when setting targets. I'm about 6'3", & my "calibrated" pace works out to 3 steps = 10 ft., count 3 times = 10 yds.

Probably waay more info than you were looking for

Slim

[Henry4440]

Wow, up to 800 paces it is very impressive!!
And that with the .44 Henry and not the 44-40.
Can't wait to shoot my Henry at Ulfborg.

[cactus joe]

thanks montana thats what i was looking for. I was thinking maybe the 300 pace distance if it was stepped off toe to toe about 1 foot per step would have maybe made the distance 100yds which is the normal starting distance for a shoot. But i think your accessment is correct. My 50yd shoot yesterday was about equal to their 1000 pace shooting. only 5 of my 50 shots hit in the center ring the rest were just scattered all around the target.I'm really impressed by their shooting to have groups put up like those  at those distances is remarkable!

[w44wcf]

Slim,
Thank you for the conversion.  It is too bad that they did not specify the distances in meters or yards, but there is a Height Of Trajectory Chart which shows 30.15 feet high @100 paces to reach 1,000 paces.  Personally, in my normal walking pace, it takes 110 paces to reach the 100 yard target frame. So, at least in my case, 1,000 paces would = approximately 900 yards.

Joe,
Please look at the size of the target frame at 1,000 paces - 8 feet high  x 10 feet high. I don't think your 50 yard target and group is anywhere near that big..........

w44wcf

[cactus joe]

w44, Yea i was around 6 to 7inches of center, but at 800 to 900 yds i probably have a hard time hitting the side of a barn, so hitting a 8x10foot target is pretty impressive.

[Henry4440]

Paces:
Column1     Column2     Conversion Factor

Pace     Centimeters   76.2
Paces       Feet            2.5
Paces            Hands     7.5
Paces            Inches      30

That's what i found.

[cactus joe]

thanks lonsome, thats in line with montana slims explanation. cj

[Driftwood Johnson]

Yeah, but how many firkins are there in a barrel?

[yeti76620]

Yeah, but how many firkins are there in a barrel?

British Ale Volumes for $1000.00..Alex

What is a Fourth of a barrel?  

[sail32]

A barrel from the United Kingdom is 36 UK Gallons, therefore a 1/4 barrel is 8 UK gallons.
Or if you prefer, 8 UK gallons is equal to 9.6075988 US gallons.

[MMA10mm]

In Boy Scouts (please don't ask how long ago that was) we used paces to measure distances.  We learned to always start walking on the left foot, and count a pace every time our right foot hit the ground.  It was emphasized to use a normal stride, rather than the exagerrated one like you see ocassionally on TV.  Because the boys were different ages, we actually laid out a 50' tape measure so they could figure out their pace at that time no matter how tall or short they were.  Last time I measured mine, I was about 16, and was 5'10".  My pace was 5' exactly, so the way most are talking about it here (as a single step), 30" would be exactly what mine was (on average). 

It's interesting how closely accurate the old-timey measurement systems are...

[Coffinmaker]

Yea, ......... Right, ............ What's a Cubit???

Heard that somewhere ............

Coffinmaker

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

Jes' Googlit!   (I cheat;- I have this on my "favorites".)

http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/index.html