Spencer vs. Henry?

[Coal Creek Griff]

Agree? Disagree?



CC Griff

[greyhawk]

Agree? Disagree?



CC Griff

I would favour the henry but would be interesting to take this a bit further - the Spencer was made available with loading tubes? yes?  So why not go 14 shots starting with each magazine empty? That would level the field quite a bit I bet. Load and fire fifteen aimed shots per minute is a fair effort with a henry or 66 (talking hit a mans head size target at 25 yards not a two foot square at ten feet)   

[El Supremo]

With all due respect:

Another loving Saturday rant.  Sorry.

Taint only rate of fire......

Maybe "cognitive dissonance" is also involved?

One other aspect is the effectiveness of the round in combat.

Range games can be fun, but there was a very good reason that the War Department standardized on a 50 caliber round in 1864 and it was killing power, especially OF A HORSE, FRONT-ON!
The Department WAS cost conscious, too. From lots of battle experience, smaller bores were considered to be marginal at black powder velocities.

Ask an Old Corp Marine about how puny the 30US Carbine round was in cold weather Korea against quilted uniformed ChiComms. Gimme a Garand with eight rounds instead of the Carbine with 15-30. I have had MY life saved by eight-round clips of black tip vs. three high calacity mag's full of 9MM. 9 poor when bad guy behind van, black tip gooood.

That recently posted (here) UTUBE VID of the fellow shooting plates with his Armisport Spencer RIFLE at 100 yards in WIND speaks volumes.

How about that sort of side by side test?  And, the plates have to fall.

No substitute for cubic inches. A pistol is what you use to get a rifle......
And, more importantly, thank God for the United States Marines.

Very respectfully,
El Supremo/ Kevin Tinny

[Two Flints]

That comparison has been done before . . . but the Spencer WAS the weapon of choice and used effectively during the Civil War . . . which, if I'm not mistaken, ended about 150 years ago   So why do we keep comparing these two very different repeaters

Two Flints

[Will Ketchum]

No substitute for cubic inches. A pistol is what you use to get a rifle......
And, more importantly, thank God for the United States Marines.

Very respectfully,
El Supremo/ Kevin Tinny

[/quote]

Your welcome Kevin 

[Coffinmaker]

I wanna jump in Too 

Let us harken back to those halcyon days of Yesteryear when Men were Men and real Cavalry charged Grapeshot loaded cannons with Sabers Drawn ....    Yep, they did that.  IN that period of time, the Generalissimo of the world (not just ours) were convinced the Repeating Rifle would only be a great waste of ammunition.  The line troops would simply fritter away their ammunition in reckless abandon.  Nobody was considering the number of rounds fired per casualty. 

The accepted method of battle was for two (or more) armies to arrive at the designated place, march onto the field as if on the drill round, align themselves at about 60 paces, calmly load their rifles, present, and on command fire their Muskets at the opposing line.  Or more or less the same thing from behind breastworks.  NO wasted ammunition.  Everything orderly and systematic.  Simple.

Anyone who figures "killing power" was a prime thought amongst the Generalissimo simply doesn't understand, the Spencer was the closest thing they could get to a Single Shot and avoid the wastage of a rapid fire repeating rifle.  The acceptance of large capacity repeating rifles was forced upon the worlds military by the industrial revolution.  Whether they (the Generallissimo) like'd it or not, once one side armed up with repeating rifles and quit standing up like gallery ducks, the single shot was doom'd.  As were rifles as cumbersome to operate as the Spencer.  Then we have all those other arguments that take place as innovation and development takes place.

Rail Guns at 50 Paces anyone??     

[PvtGreg]

I like these guys and their content BUT a couple things.  

1) The Spencer has an extractor (as we know), not an ejector like the Henry (again like we all know).
2) The Henry is a faster rifle no argument, but I dare you to disassemble a Henry in the field and NOT loose a teeny, tiny screw or two.
3) The Spencer round has much better kinetic energy (again we know this).

I believe that they had already made up their minds that the Spencer sucked, THEN they shot the video.

The way Ian shot looked deliberately clumsy.  At one point he looks like he's waving his arms all around instead of just doing cock - tilt -  lever - shoot.

Karl was better in that he attempted to be smoother, but again, cock - tilt - lever - shoot.  If you know the Spencer and have experience with it, its a good performing rifle (again as we all know).

Anyone else notice any of this?

Greg

[Trailrider]

There were some other important factors that favored the Spencer over the Henry: First of all, the Henry was more expensive to manufacture, and, with its open magazine was more susceptible to dirt and to get out of order.  The Spencer was faster to reload...IF the Blakesley reloaders were available. There is no question that the Spencer packed more punch per round. Accuracy was another matter.  The Spencer did have a reputation for excessive drift, but at close range that didn't matter much.   

[Two Flints]

While we're comparing repeaters, maybe a better duo would be the Henry vs the Evans . . . boy, I'd like to see that video if one exists 

Two Flints

[Coffinmaker]

LEAPING back into the Fray ........

Let us consider.  The open bottom of the Henry magazine is always cited as "more susceptible to dirt and to get out of order."  Horn Swagel.  As often as this is brought up ..... NO historical precedent.  Plus the open Henry magazine was super simple to keep clean.  There was no real reason to take a Henry apart to maintain it.  I few drops of oil in the action keep it running indefinitely.  Henry ammunition was copper cased and there was no "Blow-By."  HOWEVER:  There is one glaring failing of BOTH!!

Lever action Rifles are ALL a very real PITA when your on yer belly.  That wasn't really fix'd until the adoption of Bolt Action rifles with vertical stack magazines.  The Henry was by all accounts, the first assault rifle.  Nobody knew what to do with it.  Except the Souix.

PS:  THE modern iteration of the Henry is handicapped by the 44-40.  If you want to run a real informative "race" we run the race against my 45 Henry stuffed full of C45S cases and I get to use "reload tubes" too.  So There!!

PSS:  We can also run the same race with a 44Spl Henry set up to run 44 Russian cases.  Take That!!

[Forty Rod]

With all due respect:

Another loving Saturday rant.  Sorry.

Taint only rate of fire......

Maybe "cognitive dissonance" is also involved?

One other aspect is the effectiveness of the round in combat.

Range games can be fun, but there was a very good reason that the War Department standardized on a 50 caliber round in 1864 and it was killing power. The Department WAS cost conscious, too. From lots of battle experience, smaller bores were considered to be marginal at black powder velocities.

Ask an Old Corp Marine about how puny the 30US Carbine round was in cold weather Korea against quilted uniformed ChiComms. Gimme a Garand with eight rounds instead of the Carbine with 15-30. I have had MY life saved by eight-round clips of black tip vs. three high calacity mag's full of 9MM. 9 poor when behind van, black tip gooood.

That recently posted (here) UTUBE VID of the fellow shooting plates with his Armisport Spencer RIFLE at 100 yards in WIND speaks volumes.

How about that sort of side by side test?  And, the plates have to fall.

No substitute for cubic inches. A pistol is what you use to get a rifle......
And, more importantly, thank God for the United States Marines.

Very respectfully,
El Supremo/ Kevin Tinny

You channeling Il Commandaore Enzo Ferrari?   

[El Supremo]

Hello, Forty Rod:

Not sure about "channelling" bit. I have my share of hours in Red Stallion cars.  Prefer diesel trucks.  Love 6-bys.

No substitute ... inches,  was shared in 1970's by the senior ballistician at Browning, Bob Sears and a couple airplane, P-47, driver friends.  We were silhouette shooting.

Sears added, " The advantage is always with the larger bullet." ....  as it relates to striking momentum.
He added that bullet dwell time on target adds to striking momentum.
Have heard: Locomotives always win against Corvettes.  
Kinetic energy squares velocity and can distort true impact power comparisons.  

I am NOT trying to debate engineering, please.  
Am just sharing that my black powder shooting favors the largest bullet at similar velocities.  

Most respectfully,
El Supremo/Kevin Tinny

[Coffinmaker]

El Supremo - et. - ALL

We will all find I am complete agreement with El Supremo and his championing of the larger bullet.  Bigger is better.  PERIOD.  I learned the hard way, up close and personal, itty bitty high speed bullets were next to useless in the Jungle.  I managed to get rid of a Mattel Toy and scrounge up a well use'd BAR.  Next was a 12Ga.  My favorite in the bushes was the 12Ga.

During a short stint in Law Enforcement, I learned the 9mm is a joke.  Especially FMJ 9mm.  My personal carry was/is a 1911 with cast 240Gr Keith type flat nose bullets.  Believe me, Bigger is better.  

My contention is not the "bullet" of the 44 Henry Flat is superior.  It isn't necessarily.  The key is the overall size of the cartridge and the capacity of the Magazine.  When going in harms way, you absolutely cannot have too much ammunition.  Been there (a lot) done that (a lot).  LAST SENTENCE EDITED OUT BY TWO FLINTS    XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

[Two Flints]

My Spencer IS LOADED and COCKED . . . I'm watching this thread 

[Blair]

Two Flints,

Your watch full eye is just one of the reasons I like this forum.
Thanks!
My best,
Blair

[Coal Creek Griff]

Well, I didn't expect the video to draw this much of a response.  My take is that it is kind of an apples to oranges comparison.  Both the Spencer and the Henry have pros and cons.  In the context of the primary tactics used during the Civil War, I'd have to lean towards the Spencer with some exceptions.  If I was going to employ a rifle in more modern squad tactics, a case could be made for a Henry.  However, in those tactics, there would be several different arms employed for different purposes--not everyone in the squad would be armed with the same rifle.  I suspect that Ian and Karl are planning to describe how lever action rifles could have been used by the military from the time of the Henry at least through the 1876.  During that time, Spencers were dropping out of favor and developments were being made by Winchester.  If they had simply said that they are planning to follow the progression of Winchester rifles, they would have raised less ire.  Instead, they decided to deride the Spencer somewhat unfairly, emphasizing the advantages of the Henry and neglecting those of the Spencer.

I don't hold the above opinions strongly--they're pretty much off the top of my head.  I'd be interested to hear disagreements, although I must say that BOTH my Spencer AND my Henry are loaded and cocked, so be kind.

CC Griff

[PvtGreg]

C C Griff,

Totally agree.  The video should have just said that they're studying the Post CW era and that (historic fact) the Spencer had been eclipsed by then.  I really heated the demo and the flip comments like we were all idiots for liking Spencers.

I think the last 5 min of the vid say how much fun the Spencer was to shoot etc. was a bone thrown to Spencer fans, but it was too late at least for me.

PvtGreg

[treebeard]

I would prefer to have both! Grab the one that the situation calls for.

[matt45]

Love You-tubers who have never been in the service, much less combat. 
... and thank God, as well, for The U.S. Army, with particular mention to the 82nd Airborne.

[Coffinmaker]

Another consideration, often ignored or at least not understood, is "Lead Time."  All to often, between the time the powers that be, finally realize we need something better, put out a requirement, get prototypes, test the prototypes endlessly, and finally award a production contract, the item is frequently obsolete BEFORE it arrives for service or the intended conflict ends before it enters service.

Hindsight is most always 20/20.  And Generals and the Military are always training to fight the last conflict.  Progress is often slow enough to make a snail supersonic.