Harpers Ferry Minie Rifle?

jackpine

Cadet
Joined
Feb 28, 2010
Location
Minnesota
In reading about the 1st Minnesota Infantry there were a few mentions of an "old harpers ferry minie rifle"
being the issue arm in 1861/62 any idea what that would be?
 
Could be a model 1816 Harpers Ferry smoothbore conversion musket .69 cal. or a model 1842 Harpers Ferry smoothbore musket .69 cal.
Both model were reworked for use in the ACW. Some were rifled some wern't
 
Those particular arms were rifled M1842's as the 1st MN had a good number of them, IIRC around 80 as well as large numbers of smoothbore M1842's all the way through as far as Gettysburg.

As a note the term Harpers Ferry Rifle is often linked to the M1841 series of arms as well as the M1855 rifle. The only rifles made by Harpers Ferry were the M1841, Rifled M1842's (some have argued that work was done @ Springfield) and rifled models of the Hall. Generally the term Harpers Ferry or Springfield was used in conjunction w/ the markings on the lockplate.
 
The Model 1816 musket was originally produced at the Harpers Ferry and Springfield Arsenals between 1816 and 1844. Around 675,000 were made, more than any other flintlock in U.S. history.

I typed 1861 instead of 1816 in my first post.(fixed) I have an original model 1816 harpers ferry , converted and rifled. Dated 1836 and a model 1842 Harpers Ferry smoothbore dated 1852. both .69 cal.
 
M1841 would be appropriate for the 4th or 5th MN in particular. M1855 rifle musket, M1855 rifle, M1842 Rifled Musket or M1842 would be appropriate for the 1st MN. P53 for the 2nd or 3rd MN VI. M1861 would be fine for any of the above mentioned.
 
I would intrepret the description "old HF minie rifle" as meaning a US 1841 (Mississippi) bored out to .58 at
Harpers Ferry--many were during the mid to late 1850s--after US Ordnance adopted .58 as std size. The
US 1855 two band rifles were also called "HF rifles," but I don't think they would have been referred to as
"old" during the US Civil War. The US 1855 was considered modern, and the evolution of the US models
continued with the US 1861, which was considered "state of the art."

Some US 1842 muskets were rifled at HF, but these were not referred to as "minie rifles." They were large
caliber (.69) behemoths with a 42" barrel. The 42s were mostly called "muskets" or "rifled muskets." Usually
minie refers to the .58 US Ord Dept round, the minie ball. Who knows? If I were a betting man, I'd say they
were US 1841s...a weapon that was far from obsolete during the US Civil War, twenty years after it was first
introduced.
 
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