How (Civil War) Soldiers Rated Carbines - Civil War Times Illustrated article

[Two Flints]

Hello SSS, 

This is an interesting article entitled, How Soldiers Rated Carbines, written by Spencer Wilson that appeared in Civil War Times Illustrated magazine in May, 1966.  Two Flints

[St. George]

As with any weapons system too-quickly fielded - complaints arise.

Some may never have been of concern, had there not been a fast-moving, wide-ranging war, and would've served well if not exposed to the wildly unpredictable circumstances of combat against a highly-motivated enemy..

The examples shown here - while fairly accurate in assessment, overall - are also examples of Field Commanders wanting the very best for their troops.

TR did much the same, when he lobbied successfully to equip the Rough Riders with Krag Carbines.

Had the Civil War lasted longer, the Spencer may well have been eclipsed by the Henry - thanks to that weapon's success in the Western Theater.

However - it didn't - and no 'woulda if they coulda' need apply.

In a shooting war - reliability and firepower are both valuable assets - but during the later Indian Wars - the threat wasn't deemed as dangerous as was Confederate Cavalry - and the hide-bound Ordnance Department viewed a repeater as wasteful and prone to parts breakage, whereas the venerable single-shot could suffice.

Then, as now - some funny decisions get made in offices...

Vaya,

Scouts Out!

[Fox Creek Kid]

Had the Civil War lasted longer, the Spencer may well have been eclipsed by the Henry - thanks to that weapon's success in the Western Theater.

St. George, could you please expound on that, please. I am not doubting you, just trying to gain more primary source info on the Henry. I know the "Western Sharpshooters" from IL used the Henry w/ great success. I've read the Wiley Sword book but it only concentrates on wartime usage and nothing after.

[St. George]

Not much to expound upon, really.

The Western Theater was a backwater Area of Operations - battles were nowhere nearly as well-reported - nor did they involve so many men.

Henrys were largely private-purchase and were quite well thought of - as Wiley Sword mentions.

They were an evolving weapons system - with continual improvement that would lead to the rest of the Winchester lever guns within a very short period of time.

The Spencer - while an excellent piece - wasn't growing, since it had secured an Ordnance Department contract and was busy filling orders, and it was as if R&D took a back seat for that firm during that time.

It was a weapon of it's time - but not a weapon for the future - no matter what Spencer may've thought.

As to the continued service of the Henry - certainly some stayed on in the hands of their owners as private-purchase weapons - but once the Civil War had ended, Mustering Out happened rapidly and the Army shrank noticeably, and those who stayed put aside those more avante-garde weapons in favor of issue ones, once more.

War brings on great innovation - but when it calms down - blinders come out pretty swiftly...

I'm currently away from my reference library, but when I get back to it - I'll see what more I can provide for you.

Vaya,

Scouts Out!

[Arizona Trooper]

The original report is fascinating, but it's been a long time since I read it. A lot of the officers that rated oddball arms highly were from western units that had been issued real junk early on. The 1st or 3rd Wisc. Cav. (don't remember which at the moment) rated Merrills first, but they had never encountered any other breechloaders. There was one unit in the survey (I think it was a Pa. Cav. unit) that didn't like their new Spencers. They were excessively heavy, complicated and prone to jam. They wanted their Burnsides back. (No kidding!)

The criticisms are mostly on the mark, but we have to remember that the evaluations were done by a bunch of volunteer officers, most of whom had no experience with guns, and their troops were little better off. Sometimes they panned very good arms because they didn't know how to take care of them. For instance, the Sharps came in for a lot of criticism because the troops didn't know how to keep the breechblocks clean. As a company armorer in a mounted reenactment unit, I would fix several Sharps at every big event. The gas plates were seized and the flash channels were stopped up. Reenactors should theoretically be better off than CW troops about knowing the importance of maintenance, since they deal with mechanical things every day. Most 1860's soldiers had never encountered anything more complicated than a plow. The new guns were really a revolution, and required a revolution among the troops as well.

I personally doubt that the Henry would have eclipsed the Spencer had the war lasted. It's too fragile. The magazine slot fills with crap too easily, the cartridge lifter is prone to get dirt in it and hang up, the toggles work loose and it's very easy to fire out of battery, which can wreck the frame and ruin the shooter's day. The ammo is way too puny as well, but that could have been fixed. It's a great ranch gun, where it can be kept clean and not get beat around. But, on horseback and lying around in camp, it won't hold up nearly as well as a Spencer. Keep in mind that the big frame Winchesters, with essentially the same action, did very poorly in the 1870's repeater trials. The Whitney-Burgess did much better, but still all the lever actions were disqualified.

What killed the Spencer was the fact that it couldn't be adapted to take longer cartridges, and a bad business decision. It's a far stronger, simpler and more reliable design than virtually all the other repeaters that came out around the end of the war. Keep in mind that the Henry also died in the military market after the war, but it was perfect for the civilian market. Spencer could have competed there, if they would have come out with their small frame 44s, but they were looking to foreign military contracts instead, and the big frame Spencer was quite obsolete in that market. It was this business decision that sealed their fate, not any inherent superiority of the Henry design. That superiority didn't really show up until the Winchester '73 and '76 hit the market a few years later.

As for military lever rifles, the next successful one was the Winchester '95, which fixed the problems of Henry's design, and it still didn't do well in tropical conditions. The Span-Am War evaluations of it were uniformly poor. However, the Russians sure liked them, and used them through WW I. 

[Montana Slim]

Chief of the Ordnance Dept, a guy named "Ripley" I believe, was adamantly against repeating rifles of any kind. He fought off the Spencer for some time, but after Abe got involved personally, he reluctantly accepted it....though he still hated the idea of it's ability for the soldier to waste ammo.  The Odnance Corp maintained this attitude for quite some time, designers had to have a "cut-off"feature to sell their weapons to the board, showing the rifle could easily have it's magazine feature disabled, saving it for a true "emergency".

....no, I don't think the Henry would have been adopted...

Notice the similarity to the modern (~1985) transition from full-auto firepower of the M16A1 (and it's shameful waste of ammunition) to the "burst" mode of firing with the M16A2 and it's successors....it's a reapplication of similar logic, just at a different administrative level.

Hotgun

[Dakota Widowmaker]

I think it fair to say that different folks had different levels of influence and interests in the Spencer and Henry.

The Henry was great for folks who didn't need a 300yrd rifle. The Spencer was perfect for folks who needed a short carbine and a big bullet.

Its fair to say that the Henry didn't fair any better than did the Spencer when it came to ammunition selection. There was only 1 bullet produced for the Henry or the 1866. 44rimfire...

As far as the Spencer, there were some innovations along the way, but, too little too late in most  cases. The 56-45 was LONG overdue and the inability to transition to a centerfire early enough or to use brass cased balloon head cartridges also cut down on it.

The only thing that would have "saved" the Spencer would have been marketing... and some form of "buy back" of arms from the gubmint so that those thousands of them didn't end up on the "grey market" (as we in the computer field refer to it today).

Why by a $40 rifle new when a slightly used ( and possibly unused!!!) gubmint surplus rifle/carbine was only $20???

The 1866 Winchester didn't hit full production until 1867. Spencer Repeating Arms Co. was out of biz by 1868.

Spencer was a victim of its own success.

[Sgt Scott]

I wasn't sure where to post this, but it seems to fit in the Civil War responses...
I am reading Custer Victorious by Gregory Urwin. The book summarizes George Custer's rise to glory during the Civil War and does give the Spencer some credit in Custer's victories.

I just got to the encounter with J.E.B Stuart at Yellow Tavern and found an intereting story. I know J.E.B's fatal wound is usually attributted to a dismounted trooper (with a pistol), but this book suggests that there were several troopers shooting at Stuart that day. Generals on both sides became famous targets for the troopers as evidenced by the many horses shot out from under generals such as Forrest and Custer. On this day, several had taken shots at Stuart and Major Kidd had to 'decide' just who shot him. The quote from the book is this:
     'Another 7th Michigan man, Private R. Marshall Bellinger, declared he drew a bead on Stuart from behind a fence some 140 yards away, pulled the trigger on his Spencer, and when the smoke cleared, Old Beauty had fallen forward on his horse and was being led out of sight.'  (footnoted from another book -- Lee, History of the 7th Michigan Cavalry pp 99, 225-7)

I know most historians mention the pistol shot, but this one sounds feasible as well....

Sgt Scott