Why no inventor built a simple automatic weapon during the War Between the States?

[Bob Wright]

I haven't seen mention of one important aspect: ammunition supply.

Supply was not what it is today, wagon trains of ammunition were slow, and getting it through channels even slower. One of the major objections as repeating weapons came into vogue was the "waste of ammunition" by the individual soldier.

Railroads were still fairly new, and the iron rails short-lived with accidents frequent, with de-railings and track damage. Then, at some point, the ammunition had to be transferred from train to wagon. Roads were poor, often unpassable in rainy weather.

Simply put, rapid firing weapons could eat up ammunition faster than the supply chain could deliver.

Bob Wright

 

[Mike Irwin]

Oddly enough the Union did an amazing job of supplying troops with the proper ammunition during the war. At some points there were almost 200 different types of ammo going to Union troops.

Primary supply was by rail, and the Union quartermaster corps worked very efficiently with the military railroads authority to ensure proper supply.

As for the guns, the Ager at least used a system similar to what Gary described, metal shells. They were filled with standard. 58 cal paper cartridges with standard percussion caps.

The Agers were used at a number of battles and did fairly well but with the overheating issues and also the jamming I described. At no point though were they a game changer.

 

[Mike Irwin]

Oh and I seriously doubt that ammo supply would have been an issue for a few dozen rapid fire guns given that the qm corps had few problems supplying upwards 1 million men in the field armed with rifled muskets.

 

[Bob Wright]

Oh and I seriously doubt that ammo supply would have been an issue for a few dozen rapid fire guns given that the qm corps had few problems supplying upwards 1 million men in the field armed with rifled muskets.

Perhaps so, but line officers always resisted the consideration of rapid firing rifles for general issue, always citing the "waste of ammunition." Generally it would seem that the Army just didn't want one, at least at the expense of long range power. I forget the exact specification, but the rifle had to be capable of "putting down a man and horse" at something like 900 yards. This is partially why the Springfield .45-70 was adopted over the Spencer.

Bob Wright

 

[Mike Irwin]

"but line officers always resisted the consideration of rapid firing rifles for general issue, always citing the "waste of ammunition."

Yet another wonderous example of how the Civil War was in many ways the first 20th century war, but was still fought with 18th century tactics.

The so-called "men will waste ammunition" argument was more a means of enforcing control over the men in the unit, who (the theory goes) couldn't be trusted to do anything unless they were directed to do it by an officer.

And, line officers RARELY were the ones complaining about potential ammunition wasteage. Those concerns were most often broached by those who never took part in a pitched battle, and for whom "war" was, often, an abstract concept, or even a fiduciary one.

Nothing like an upper level general trying to bring a war in under budget by controlling how many shots his men fire in a 24-hour period.

That kind of foolishness lasted in the US army right up through the adoption of the 1903 Springfield.

In fact, I think ammunition wastage concerns were raised when the Garand was adopted, and in some cases troops undergoing basic training during WW II were told to conserve their fire, where as once they got into combat they were told by combat veterans to blast the **** out of anything that might be remotely hostile because ammo is cheap and easy to get, but trained soldiers are not easy to get.

 

[Ideal Tool]

If we take a look twenty years or so forward..when the very first Maxium machine guns were being used by the British army in the mid to late 1880's.
They had to forgo their coiled brass ctg's. for solid head ones due to the harsh extraction in the M.G...but even more troublesome were the frequent accounts of these guns jamming from fouling. I would love to see that smoke screen laid down by a beltfull of .577/.450's though!

 

[Buzzcook]

The South had access to a concept that would have ended the war pretty quickly. It's called human rights.

Black powder doesn't lend itself to automatic fire. The South didn't have access to copper and few iron deposits.

BTW everything necessary for photography was available many years before it was actually developed. The same can be said of lots of technology.

 

[Scorch]

Neat ideas from alternativists. A few points to consider:
* The American Civil War/War of Secession/War between the States was fought primarily with muzzle-loading black powder weapons, swords, and bayonets. We always start wars with the last war's technology.
* As pointed out in other posts, the South/Confederate States had a shortage of brass already, adding cartridge cases to that shortage would have buried their industry.
* The detachable magazine was not invented until the turn of the Century.
* Black powder does not lend itself terribly well to self-loading weapons, let alone blowback weapons. A weapon that could load and fire 5-10 shots before jamming would have been worse than useless.
* It took a genius like John M Browning to observe the effects of fugitive gases and apply a mechanism to capture and use them to cycle a firearm action. The first practical use of self-loading was in the 1880s, although the Gatling was available at the time of the War.
* Like any other technology, changes come fast and furious during wartime, and the Civil War saw the progression from pecussion muzzleloaders to cartridge repeaters in a very short period of time.
* There was so little time to develop and apply the new/developing technology, and we see samples of lever action rifles appearing very early in the war, but acceptance, manufacturing capacity, and cost considerations kept them from becoming major players.

 

[rodent.22]

Good points, really starting to be repeated. Ammo saving was being stressed when I went thru basic 42 years ago, nothing really changes in the military. Different look and powder.

 

[Mike Irwin]

"The detachable magazine was not invented until the turn of the Century."

That comment got me interested, because I had never before considered the history of the detachable magazine.

From what I can tell, it appears that the first successful, commercially produced detachable magazine was used in the Boarchardt Model 1893 pistol.

As for the first detachable bolt rifle magazine, that looks to be James Perris Lee's 10-shot magazine on the Lee-Metford in the 1880s.

Interesting...

 

[Jim Watson]

I have read that Mr Browning designed the A5 shotgun to be able to handle black powder shells as were still common in 1905. Anybody ever tried it in the modern era?

 

[SIGSHR]

IIRC during the Indian Wars the soft copper cartridge cases used in the 45-70 were the source of a lot of problems, the extractor would cut through the rim leaving the body of the case stuck in the chamber. The troops were not issued a broken case extractor, it was said a cavalry trooper then could cuss for 20 minutes straight without repeating himself. The cartridge case was simply too new an idea-First Generation, to use current terminology-to be completely relied on.
IMHO TOO many things would have to been invented at the same time by ONE
person-invented AND perfected AND the manufacturing procedures and tools designed and manufactured-for a practical semi-or fully automatic weapon to have been adopted then, and as others have noted black powder is NOt a suitable propellant for such use.

 

[4V50 Gary]

What? Gatling's detachable stick magazine doesn't count?

 

[Mike Irwin]

"What? Gatling's detachable stick magazine doesn't count?"

In the context of what I'm thinking of, no.

Those magazines were gravity powered.

I should have been more specific regarding an internal spring integral with a follower.

 

[Mike Irwin]

Here are two of those early soft-copper cases.

The one on the left is a .45 Schofield for the Smith & Wesson Schofield revolver. The one on the right is a .45-70.

Both appear to be rimfires, but they have the Benet inside-the-case center fire primer, which is identifiable by the crimp just up from the case head.

The Benet primer, developed at Frankford Arsenal in Philadelphia, allowed a centerfire round in a case that was made of copper, which was simply too soft to support a Boxer or Berdan style primer.

I figure both rounds were loaded sometime prior to 1885 or so, when drawn brass cases finally came into service.

 

[SIGSHR]

IIRC in the first model Gatling guns the magazine was really just a hopper, loose cartridges were simply dropped in. And strictly speaking the Gatling Gun was not a machine gun as we think of it since the power of each round was not used to operate the action.

 

[Bob Wright]

The one on the left is a .45 Schofield for the Smith & Wesson Schofield revolver. The one on the right is a .45-70.

Both appear to be rimfires, but they have the Benet inside-the-case center fire primer, which is identifiable by the crimp just up from the case head.

The Benet primer, developed at Frankford Arsenal in Philadelphia, allowed a centerfire round in a case that was made of copper, which was simply too soft to support a Boxer or Berdan style primer.

I figure both rounds were loaded sometime prior to 1885 or so, when drawn brass cases finally came into service.

Mike,

As amatter of information, here are a couple of .45 S&W rounds in my collection:

Both rounds have the Boxer primer, the December, 1889 is the earliest boxer primed Frankford Arsenal I have.

Bob Wright


Whoops!

 

[Scorch]

As for the first detachable bolt rifle magazine, that looks to be James Perris Lee's 10-shot magazine on the Lee-Metford in the 1880s.

And that one cannot be detached and carried around loaded. The Mondragon rifle was what I was thinking of.

I have read that Mr Browning designed the A5 shotgun to be able to handle black powder shells as were still common in 1905. Anybody ever tried it in the modern era?

BP was common in shotshells well into the 1920s. When the Auto-5 was designed and patented, it was designed for BP shotshells. Smokeless powder shells caused a few issues with the repeater, requiring the later addition of the famous friction ring/cone.

 

[Mike Irwin]

Bob,

The boxer-primed copper cartridges were a pretty dismal failure. Apparently the copper wouldn't hold the primer adequately and they were prone to popping out.

Interestingly enough, though, the Benet priming system apparently wasn't an unqualified success, either, as the internal cup had a tendency to slip out of place, which would allow the round to go dead.

Scorch, the Lee-Metford Mark II, which introduced the 10-round magazine, did have a detachable magazine. I'm not 100% sure, but the Mark I* may also have had a detachable magazine.

As for the Mondragon, it was designed in the early 1880s and patented in the late 1880s, but it wasn't manufactured in anything other than one-off machine room pieces until 1901. It was also a semi-automatic.

 

[Molasses]

Quote:
As for the first detachable bolt rifle magazine, that looks to be James Perris Lee's 10-shot magazine on the Lee-Metford in the 1880s.

And that one cannot be detached and carried around loaded. The Mondragon rifle was what I was thinking of.

I'm thinking maybe what became the Remington Lee was first. Started out as the Sharps Lee, but they went out of business before the first production run of them was finished.
FWIW, the earliest patent date on the side of the magazine is May 28, 1872. Haven't done any research on the patent so I've no idea what feature of it is covered by that one. The relevant detachable box magazine patent was issued November 4, 1879

Edited to add: My example of this rifle was sporterized by some dummy that wanted to make it look modern. My previous interest in the book used as a backdrop in the photos was as a source of photos showing carbine models in an attempt to salvage something that looked remotely "right" out of the gun. Turns out there's a whole mess of info on the development of the detachable magazine in there. Who'da guessed. Took years of effort and more than one person to get one that worked. Definitely did not spring full-grown from the mind of James Paris Lee.