18thmississippi
Corporal
- Joined
- Mar 22, 2013
- Location
- confederacy
glad to know that the U.S. took pride in naming a fort after him.And hood graciously assisted the Union on that occasion as well Sorry couldn't resist.
glad to know that the U.S. took pride in naming a fort after him.And hood graciously assisted the Union on that occasion as well Sorry couldn't resist.
the only men ive ever heard of using the Henry rifle was one of Sherman's brigades, and even if that it was probably a company of men. But sooner there after they got them they were throwing them away and picking back up the single shot muskets since there was no abundant amount of ammo and on top of that the Henry wasn't even military issued it was a experiment to see how well if performed in the field.
not sure exactly where but was told that there were only a few that had them but i have read letters of union privates throwing the rifle down due to not having the ammo to fire the thingWould love to know where you heard that.... cause there were whole regiments armed with em... 64th (who were the skirmishers for Mower when he advanced and causes Johnston to high tail it or be captured at Bentonville) and 66th Illinois (who used them to great affect to retake Degrass' Battery at Atlanta) 7th Illinois (fired over 31,000 rounds and beat off the attack on Allatoona), 2nd D.C. Cavalry, 10th Kentucky Cavalry, just to name a few...
Enjoy: http://www.rarewinchesters.com/articles/art_hen_02.shtml
I know right. The more I read about Franklin and afterward, the more I dislike J.B. Hood. I can only imagine what his subordinate commanders thought of him....glad to know that the U.S. took pride in naming a fort after him.
Ummmm, no. See the 7th IL VI. They gave good service w/ their Henry's at Atlanta & Allatoona Pass in particular add the 64th IL & other units to the mix... something like 10k Henry Rifles were used by US troops. Republican Blues gave you good info.the only men ive ever heard of using the Henry rifle was one of Sherman's brigades, and even if that it was probably a company of men. But sooner there after they got them they were throwing them away and picking back up the single shot muskets since there was no abundant amount of ammo and on top of that the Henry wasn't even military issued it was a experiment to see how well if performed in the field.
not sure exactly where but was told that there were only a few that had them but i have read letters of union privates throwing the rifle down due to not having the ammo to fire the thing
I'd be a lot more impressed if they were originals...
At the Stones River Battlefield NP, this is the first year we are firing the Spencer rifle to show the history of the rifle issued to Wilder at Murfreesboro.National Park Service: Manual of Instruction for the safe use of Reproduction Repeating Rifles in interpretive Demonstrations. http://www.nps.gov/stri/upload/19th-Century-Repeaters-Manual.pdf
There isn't a good excuse for the Union failure to more promptly use both (1) breech loading single-shot carbines, and (2) repeating rifles and carbines. It was probably the biggest blunder on the Union side during the entire War.
MIT Engineer and Pulitzer Prize winning historian Robert Bruce concludes the Federals would have won the War by Gettysburg at the latest if they had adopted single shot carbines and repeaters at a realistic pace.*
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*Bruce, Robert V. *Lincoln and the Tools of War*, (Urbana and Chicago, University of Illinois Press, 1987)
It's the "What if" vs what was.I think there actually is a very good excuse for both of those. Experience. The ordnance department had previous experience with breech loaders, and it was mostly bad. The development of the self-contained cartridge turned a failure into a success, but there is no reason why anyone in the ordnance department should have been able to predict this. The beginning of the war is no time to rearm with an unproven weapon. I think the ordnance department did an admirable job of issuing the Spencer as widely as possible once it had been proven in combat. They even had the Burnside factory convert over to Spencer production. Look at all the problems they had with contractors producing the much simpler Model 1861 rifle-musket; to say that they should have been producing repeating rifles at a faster pace is unrealistic in my opinion.
the only men ive ever heard of using the Henry rifle was one of Sherman's brigades, and even if that it was probably a company of men. But sooner there after they got them they were throwing them away and picking back up the single shot muskets since there was no abundant amount of ammo and on top of that the Henry wasn't even military issued it was a experiment to see how well if performed in the field.
At the Stones River Battlefield NP, this is the first year we are firing the Spencer rifle to show the history of the rifle issued to Wilder at Murfreesboro.