Rental comparison

joerookery

joerookery

Well-known member
Could one of you who are more knowledgeable about guns than I am, please compare and contrast the sharps repeating rifle used in the American Civil War in 1864 to the carbine used by the German cavalry in 1914. I used to have a reference called guns of the world. It went away. Help me Mr. Wizard!
 
Joe,
The Sharps was not a repeater, but a single shot breechloader. Perhaps you are thinking of the Spencer, which was a repeater with the magazine being a tube loaded through the buttstock. I've fired the Sharps but not the Spencer. Both the Sharps and Spencer are essentially lever actions.
I own and have fired the German carbine used in 1914, the Kar.98a Mauser carbine, a box magazine fed turn bolt design. As you can imagine, the Mauser is a far more powerful and efficient weapon.

Steve
 
Steve you are right! What I am looking for is speed of fire – rate- and magazine capacity. how much was the improvement from the best Civil War rifle to the World War I cavalry carbine? Could it possibly have been worse??
 
The Spencer had a 7 round tube that loaded through the butt, and used a rim fire cartridge. The cartridge was 52 cal. and used 45 grain of black powder. Effective range was about 500 yards and had a rate of fire around 15 rounds per minute.Rate of fire is sometimes misleading, this would be if the weapon was clean, they would foul quickly (due to the powder), also the round may cut paper at 500 yard, but did not have much penetration power. The muzzle velocity was under 1000 ft/sec.
 
My first rifle was a Kar 98 a, It was a bring back from my great uncle, and I still have it. The 98 cartridge was 7.92mm and used modern (smokeless) powder (cleaner burning and less fouling). Rate of fire about 15 rounds per minute and had a 5 round internal box magazine, was loaded by means of a 5 round stripper clip. Muzzle velocity was over 2000 ft/sec. effective rate 500 to 800 yards - max range about 4,000 yards. On the Spencer the effective range was basically its max range for beyond 500 yds the bullet had no punch.
 
Thank you! With this and some information I got by PM, I think I have all that I need. I this is doing into some reasoning about the disagreement between Sheridan and Meade over the use of cavalry and how that related to German World War I thinking. The Germans did not take a lot of stock in the American Civil War. Often it was dismissed as having been conducted by amateurs and not by a professional army – seriously.
 
I believe v. Zepplin made the comment that the armies in the ACW weren't more than armed mobs. Sheridan wanted to reorganize the brigades in the Army of the Potomac to be 5 regiments, 1 armed with Spencers (used as skirmishers), 3 with rifle muskets (line), and 1 with 69 cal. smooth bores (reserve - pug any break throughs in the line).
 
Joe, to a lesser extent the Henry rifle was also used by Union troops. It was a sixteen shot repeater. Google it and read the Wikipedia story.
 
Hi Joe, glad to hear from you. The last few years have been quite a ride....retirement,moving and downsizing. Things have finally settled down. I see that you too have been on the move. Bill
 
The Federal Government only armed one regiment with Henry's. There were a couple of states that purchased them and some regiments where the men themselves purchased the rifles. I've fired both the Henry and the Spencer. In my opinion the Spencer make for a better military arm (more soldier proof).
 
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