Black Powder Firearms in the new series "Hell on Wheels"

[Fairshake]

That is my exact point. Watch it and enjoy the fact that at least a few people are still trying to make a western to watch.
All of us who are true historians like all the posted information given by Mako. My wife gets upset when I say that gun is not the correct gun but we all will critique a movie when it comes to guns. Hell that's the reason we dress up and transform ourselves to a time of long ago.
Things have gotten better, in the fifties when I was growing  up there were many westerns to watch every Saturday. They never stopped to reload any gun that was fired. I have seen John Wayne shoot at least 14 times and never load one round.
I finally stopped getting upset and watched them as a form of entertainment.
I did however enjoy the postings of this thread. There are some very good entries by several members. Mako did a good job.
The biggest problem about Hell On Wheels is the channel that it is on. Way too many commercial breaks. Every 10 minutes they break for 5 it seems like. We are probably watching only 30 or so minutes of the show each week and a true one hour would be nice.

[Mako]

Okay... Did anyone see any reason to have the Black Powder explosion in yesterday's episode other than a gratuitous continuation in the myths about BP in general?  The whole affair including the Swede's buying off Cullen to look the other way while he purloined part of the shipment seemed rather forced.

Several things seemed out of proportion:

• The shipment itself was made to seem rather out of the ordinary instead of a common shipment of a material needed for construction of a railroad. (That's even ignoring the fact they are only a few miles from the start and hardly in hard rock country they would need to blast in.)  
• Cullen's attitude in general and his attitude about Elam and his crew handling blasting seems totally incongruous with what preceded.  Was the blast meant to underline that not only was Elam and the others incapable of using BP to blast, but they were also incapable of unloading it without the "expertise" of a foreman?
• The danger of BP and it's propensity to blow up when simply unloading it from a rail car to wagon is totally out of proportion.  They aren't talking about nitroglycerine here...  
• The fact the Swede would approach Cullen about looking the other way seems very odd.  Of all of the supplies being sent to the crew BP would be low on the list of things that would be easy to sell and sell quickly.  Unless someone had an industrial need for large quantities of BP, that is not a supply item that would be in demand day in and out.

So it begs the question, is there some nefarious reason other than resale that the Swede wants the blasting powder for?  We saw him stop and listen outside Durant's personal rail car door as Durant was dictating a telegraph message about buying shares of a railroad stock.  Is the Swede an agent for a party trying to slow or limit the progress of Durant's rail laying?  The fact they were making such a big deal about making the first 40 miles in the last several episodes seems to be foreshadowing about intrigue and potential sabotage to slow the progress.

Now to the rifles.  It seems everyone and their dog has a '66 Carbine. The guy Cullen surprised at the cutting camp had one, he has one.  I'm sure that even Sgt. Harper who we could only see at a distance was carrying one and shot Cullen's horse with it during the 200 yard exchange of fire.  I though it humorous they had the Sgt. wearing his blues you could see (including his chevrons) at a distance.  They should have had him just wear a big glowing sign that read "BAD GUY, Sgt. Harper."  I guess now he will strip off his uniform unlike everyone else who was in the war already did and blend in.  They made a big deal out of Cullen burning the photo, is that more plot foreshadowing?

They are jerking the character of Cullen around quite a bit.

First they make him look extremely competent and able to track his targets and surprise them as he did in the confessional.  They make him look competent in escaping the rail car, making his case to Durant, getting the rail laying back on track, treating the rescued Liliy on the plain, describing his commando activities to Durant in making his case for employment, taking on the Swede's men, rescuing the Swede's henchman at the BP explosion, administering combat first aid to a wounded man after the explosion, verbally fencing with the preacher when confronted as he stumbled drunk back to his tent and much more.  

Then they make him look like a fool in his methods.  The long range gunfire exchange with Sgt. Harper doesn't fit with his military skills of tactical decision making.  It definitely doesn't fit with his long term strategic planning and methods in carefully hunting down the men responsible for his wife's death.  A man who just let his target slip from his grasp as consumed with revenge as Cullen is supposed to be wouldn't go on a drunken bender and risk everything he had worked for to that point. He wouldn't jeopardize the  position he now has as foreman unless he was planning on leaving immediately to pursue Sgt. Harper.  If he was going to pursue Harper, he would have returned to camp, grabbed a couple of horses, provisioned himself and set off to hunt the man down.

I'm afraid it boils down to clumsy handling of the plot subtleties by the writers.  They are waving plot directions in our faces instead of allowing us to "discover them" for ourselves as the story develops.  The other big one (there are actually many) is Lily holding the maps her husband Robert and not delivering them to Durant.  They delved into the "feud" between Robert Bell and Durant and how Robert had been holding back on delivering maps to Durant.  A great amount of detail went into Lily saving Robert's maps and we would assume she was going to deliver them to Durant.  Now she asks Durant if other surveyors will be brought in to finish Robert's work.  We can only guess if she wants them to, or if she would feel like that was cheating his legacy at this point.  We now have to wonder how long this will be kept from Durant, and will she use the maps as weapons against Durant?  Even though her withholding the maps is rather overt, her intentions are very vague, which is probably the only mystery in the series at this point.

Regards,
Mako

[Tornado]

Maybe the Swede set off the powder on purpose to rid the evendence that he took some?  Also, to get rid of the one eared Yankee? 
I agree with you that they are back and forth with Cullen actions. 
As he was shooting at the Sgt., I kept thinking get off the horse and shoot from prone.

[Sacramento Johnson]

Mako,

I've had problems with the plot writing since the first episode.  For instance, I had problems with the survey camp (in acknowledged hostile Indian country) seemingly lacking any firearms or camp security (like guards).  The surveyor who was killed not only didn't have a gun on, he didn't even run and grab a gun! He ran for a bunch of stupid maps (like that was going to save his and his wife's lives!)  (I think Ebert used to call it 'idiot plot' or something like that.)  I've had to invoke a lot of "willing suspension of disbelief" with this series so far. (I haven't seen the newest episode yet, but the scene where Cullen saves Lilly from the 3 bad guys showed a lack of practical military tactics for a ex-soldier like Cullen; he only has six  36 caliber rounds in his pistol and no fast reload; why wasn't he shooting his way to his '66 Winchester?  In fact, why didn't he have his Winchester at his side at all times?)   I fault the writers for these sorts of things; they don't seem to know much about people or the era.  I realize that life doesn't usually make good third acts (to paraphrase Noel Coward), but at least make the plot devices and turns plausible, if not probable.

[Abilene]

Well plenty of gunplay this week after not much last couple episodes. 

[Marshal Deadwood]

I've loving this series !  Really into it now.

Deadwood

[w44wcf]

Thanks to all, and especially to Mako for the great information about the firearms in this movie.

The '66 in action last night reminded me of this true account of yesteryear......

Capt. Wilson was an unconditional Union man, living in a strong disloyal section of Kentucky. His neighbors had threatened his life. In consequences of this, Capt. Wilson had put his Henry rifle inside a corn crib across from his house.

One day, while at home dining with his family, seven mounted guerrillas entered his home with the intention of killing him. After a parley, Capt. Wilson convinced them to take him outside to be shot. The moment he reached the front door he ran to his cover with bullets flying around him.

He thus retrieved his Henry rifle, turned upon his foes and with 5 consecutive shots, killed 5 of his enemies. The other 2 sprang for their horses. As the 6th man threw his hand over the pommel of his saddle, the 6th shoot took off four of his fingers. The seventh shot killed him. Then Capt. Wilson fired his 8th shot, killing the 7th and last man.

w44wcf

[Steel Horse Bailey]

I'll bet Captain Wilson wasn't bothered much after that!

[Fairshake]

John, Your posting goes with the old saying that truth is stranger than fiction. I would say that the captain was lucky to say the least. Today's punk gang members would have capped him right where he stood and his well laid plan would have failed.
The story is quite interesting as on last nights Hell on Wheels was a similar type plan where the hunters became the hunted and were all killed due to bad marksmanship and nerves that caused them to run and be shot in the process.
As always thank you for that interesting story of a historical happening. Later David aka Fairshake

[Mako]

With my holiday schedule I missed the 7th episode last night, but will be watching it on the DVR.

How many of you noticed the Blunderbuss last week?  It was in the crowd of Irish, but they never went anywhere.



The action is picking up a bit, so far I'm enjoying the series.

Regards,
Mako

[Steel Horse Bailey]

I sure did notice!  Like you, I'm enjoying the series more as it gathers speed, so to speak!  I especially liked last week's race between the horse (and rider, but the horse was doing 99.999% of the work) and the locomotive.

I wonder how many races like that were made "back in the day?"  I'll bet it happened several times.  Different situations, but the race itself for one reason or another.





(I wasn't overly impressed with the music video, 'tho.  Not my style or taste.)

[Fingers McGee]

Last night's episode was probably the best one so far. 

[Beauregard Hooligan]

I've been watching the mutant brass framed '60 Colt Army revolvers, the .44 caliber brass framed rebated cylinder '51 Navies and never laughed once at the '66 Winchester Yellowboys being used in '65, but this is well within the old and common Hollyweird standard. Could anything be worse than John Wayne's The Comancheros? This film takes place in 1843, but has 1873 Colt revolvers, 1873 and 1892 Winchester rifles and 1894 Winchester rifles with the forend removed, and either brass plated or gold painted receivers, to appear to be Henry rifles. Also in that film there was a prison in Yuma, Arizona, when Arizona was still part of Mexico, and a Fort Sill, which would not exist until 1876. I could go on for pages, but it's just Hollyweird.

[Mako]

... the .44 caliber brass framed rebated cylinder '51 Navies...

Which episode were they using .44 caliber '51s, I missed those pistols.  And I usually catch most of the platypus pistols.

~Mako

[Dakota Widowmaker]

I thought the timeline was set in 1866/67 as reconstruction and the railroad west were after April of 1865.

Or am I way off as  well?

[Beauregard Hooligan]

Which episode were they using .44 caliber '51s, I missed those pistols.  And I usually catch most of the platypus pistols.

~Mako

During the ambush fight in episode 7 there was one fellow with a brass framed '51 in .44 caliber. Did anyone else notice that after the shooting lesson, Bohannon capped his brass framed '60, but didn't bother with powder and ball? He has a ball or cap pouch on his gun belt, in the middle of is back, but no powder flask, cartridge box or shells for his Winchester '66.

[Abilene]

... Did anyone else notice that after the shooting lesson, Bohannon capped his brass framed '60, but didn't bother with powder and ball? ...

At first I wondered the same thing but watched again and I think he was just removing the spent caps before re-holstering.

[Abilene]

One thing I've noticed in a couple of different episodes is that Bohannon's yellowboy sure seems to recoil a lot for a .44 rimfire.  But at least they are trying to make it look like recoil versus many movies where none of the guns exhibit any recoil at all.

[Dakota Widowmaker]

Recoil on a carbine should be minimal, but, its TV. No way should "blanks" give a kick like that.

I've dumped some warthog loads down range from my 94 winchester ranger (16.5" barrel) and it certainly wakes me up.

[Riot Earp]

The transcontinental railroad was built from 1863 to 1869, I believe.