I have to rethink the spare cylinder idea

Jedidiah said:

There was a reason Josey Wales carried 12 pistols!!!! LOL,LOL

Click to expand...

I love that documentary.

Dark Angel said:

You'd probably be devastated then watching the History Channel when they show reenactments of historical events. Once saw a cap lock rifle in an event that happened before the era of cap locks. Saw a match lock being used in a modern-day event. One saw an episode about the OK Corral shoot out. The Earp Bros. were using C&B revolvers. Saw an M1 Garrand being used in Viet-Nam. You get the idea. Think sometimes to those doing these reenactments a gun is a gun regardless of period correctness.

Click to expand...

To be fair, plenty of M1's were used in Viet Nam by ARVN troops and CIDG irregulars.

Also, it's not outsidethe realm of possibility for a C&B cartridge conversion to have been used at the OK corral.

I often think that the improper era weapon and the handling thereof is the least considered aspect of movies.

Why they are called movies it aint real.

AlexB said:

Why they are called movies it aint real.

Click to expand...

Well, i guess it is just semantics, but being unreal is not actually why they are called movies even though they are in fact unreal. I think the term movie came about when the industry first made pictures that moved. Uh oh, I'm getting way off topic and far away from muzzleloaders.

buttap said:

Get on a horse and try to do that and get back to reality..the cylinder swap deal is all hollyweard vs then swap? hello extra guns.

Click to expand...

No horse to practice on sadly. Maybe I should bust out the unicycle.


Did a little looking for videos of cylinder swaps. Turns out my swap speed is even slower than I thought. Makes sense, I haven't practiced for it.





Now, you're not gonna do that on a horse, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if an experienced horseman could come close to something like my time. Not saying it actually happened, but claiming it's unrealistic or extremely difficult is a bit of stretch.

Dark Angel said:

You'd probably be devastated then watching the History Channel when they show reenactments of historical events. Once saw a cap lock rifle in an event that happened before the era of cap locks. Saw a match lock being used in a modern-day event. One saw an episode about the OK Corral shoot out. The Earp Bros. were using C&B revolvers. Saw an M1 Garrand being used in Viet-Nam. You get the idea. Think sometimes to those doing these reenactments a gun is a gun regardless of period correctness.

Click to expand...

Evidence of how we all have made the grave mistake of believing that the "media" knows what it is talking about.

fireman1 said:

To be fair, plenty of M1's were used in Viet Nam by ARVN troops and CIDG irregulars.

Also, it's not outsidethe realm of possibility for a C&B cartridge conversion to have been used at the OK corral.

Click to expand...

Saw M1-M2 carbines. In fact, I carried and M2. Full size Garands, NOPE! Was all over that country, trucking supplies and such, for a while working a TMP. In fact, in one Montagnard village, saw a match lock rifle. As for C&B at the OK Corral, C&B would have probably still been around, but in this clip. the caps were clearly visible on the nipples. Even by that time, rim-fire cartridges were becoming a rarity with just a few 'old' .44 Henery's around.

Dark Angel said:

Saw M1-M2 carbines. In fact, I carried and M2. Full size Garands, NOPE! Was all over that country, trucking supplies and such, for a while working a TMP. In fact, in one Montagnard village, saw a match lock rifle. As for C&B at the OK Corral, C&B would have probably still been around, but in this clip. the caps were clearly visible on the nipples. Even by that time, rim-fire cartridges were becoming a rarity with just a few 'old' .44 Henery's around.

Click to expand...

Dark Angel said:

Saw M1-M2 carbines. In fact, I carried and M2. Full size Garands, NOPE! Was all over that country, trucking supplies and such, for a while working a TMP. In fact, in one Montagnard village, saw a match lock rifle. As for C&B at the OK Corral, C&B would have probably still been around, but in this clip. the caps were clearly visible on the nipples. Even by that time, rim-fire cartridges were becoming a rarity with just a few 'old' .44 Henery's around.

Click to expand...

Understood about the caps. I agree that would have been long gone.

Dark Angel said:

Saw M1-M2 carbines. In fact, I carried and M2. Full size Garands, NOPE! Was all over that country, trucking supplies and such, for a while working a TMP. In fact, in one Montagnard village, saw a match lock rifle. As for C&B at the OK Corral, C&B would have probably still been around, but in this clip. the caps were clearly visible on the nipples. Even by that time, rim-fire cartridges were becoming a rarity with just a few 'old' .44 Henery's around.

Click to expand...

I think the Rimfire lasted a lot longer than some people think. I spent time around an old cabin foundation The cabin was built around 1890 and there were quite a few .44 Henry and .56 spencer casings scattered around the area. The Henry’s all had the two opposing firing pin indents of the model 1866 Winchester not the single one of a revolver. I believe they made ammo for both up until WW I but I don’t have documentation.

Sylvester Pattie said:

I think the Rimfire lasted a lot longer than some people think. I spent time around an old cabin foundation The cabin was built around 1890 and there were quite a few .44 Henry and .56 spencer casings scattered around the area. The Henry’s all had the two opposing firing pin indents of the model 1866 Winchester not the single one of a revolver. I believe they made ammo for both up until WW I but I don’t have documentation.

Click to expand...

The 1866 Winchester was made until 1899. Sears catalogs sold Civil War Spencers in the early 1900s. I believe Sears also sold Civil war military muskets in the early 1900s, IIRC as cut down to carbine size and/or smoothbored, as well as 50-70 trapdoors (1866 to 1870s models) The book COTW mentions 44 rimfire ammo was made until 1934.

Surplus guns of all types were sold for quite a long time after newer commercial models were common. They were generally very affordable. Old gun catalogs of the 1870s bought and sold used percussion revolvers. Ill see if I can find the specific reference. They also sold new percussion sporting rifles and shotguns at least into the 1870s.

Active Duty SeaBee, mid 1990s. Our armory still had full auto M16A2E3, M79s in addition to our M203s, M60s, M14s, 1911s keeping our Beretta 9s company, 2 “outlawed” M1897 12g trench guns and 870s shared a rack…
Specialty units are still issued “obsolete” weapons.
From 1865 war ending until at least the Spanish-American War, obsolete guns were reissued. Many, such as the Trapdoor, were still being produced. My Trapdoor serialed to 1896.
The 2 guns that get the most use at my farm were made before WW1, and are as accurate as the day they were made. Cumbersome to reload, but…

Ed C. said:

Thanks for posting this. Gives us some good historical insight. The Patersons were much earlier, 1837-1842 and aside for use by the Texas Rangers were not very popular. They were sold with the extra cylinder being part of the package so past that point I doubt those cylinders were ever marketed.

Click to expand...

The poor metallurgy of the early Colt Dragoons and Patersons allowed burst cylinders occasionally. For this reason Colt often shipped those guns with a spare cylinder just in case.

I have done it on horseback at a canter but I have been riding a long time.........oh so did they.

If in Indian territory or a mining situation I would have been as well armed as pssible and still be able to function.
Getting caught alive was not the way to go.

AlexB said:

I have done it on horseback at a canter but I have been riding a long time.........oh so did they.

If in Indian territory or a mining situation I would have been as well armed as pssible and still be able to function.
Getting caught alive was not the way to go.

Click to expand...

It may be one thing to do for practice but under actual combat conditions on horseback? I have questions… I’ve seen Marines and soldiers fumble reloads with unmentionable combat weapons, can’t manage simple stoppages, etc. It’s not hard to see how swapping cylinders at a canter while dodging bullets or arrows could go south rapidly. I’m sure it happened but doubt it was common. How many civil war era rifles have been found with multiple loads stuffed down the bore but never fired?

Bad Karma said:

It may be one thing to do for practice but under actual combat conditions on horseback? I have questions… I’ve seen Marines and soldiers fumble reloads with unmentionable combat weapons, can’t manage simple stoppages, etc. It’s not hard to see how swapping cylinders at a canter while dodging bullets or arrows could go south rapidly. I’m sure it happened but doubt it was common. How many civil war era rifles have been found with multiple loads stuffed down the bore but never fired?

Click to expand...

Those peoples scalps would be on display in a dance ceremony........ being ill prepared doesn't change the reality at hand for the better.

AlexB said:

Those peoples scalps would be on display in a dance ceremony........ being ill prepared doesn't change the reality at hand for the better.

Click to expand...

VC didn’t typically take scalps, but sure, some good lads, as well prepared as the Corps could make them, died because they couldn’t manage to perform simple tasks like magazine swaps or clearing drills under extreme duress. I can’t find any fault here. Not everyone can be John Rambo.

AlexB said:

I have done it on horseback at a canter but I have been riding a long time.........oh so did they.

If in Indian territory or a mining situation I would have been as well armed as pssible and still be able to function.
Getting caught alive was not the way to go.

Click to expand...

This was interesting, loading carbines and percussion revolvers at a trot and gallop on horseback. He indicates it was in period manuals and troopers were expected to be able to do it at all gaits. I saw one of his other vids of accuracy from horseback with pistol and he has similar one for carbines, Sharps percussion I believe and Spencer. They commented about getting caps on the Sharps, but the originals had tape primer feeds which would make them much easier to load on horseback.

Note that period doctrine was first row of Cavalry fired their pistols empty, went off to the left then took rear row to reload, each row following suit.

One thing to keep in mind about things like this, they are starting basically from zero with little practice in this exact skill, so one has to take that into consideration when coming to conclusions about the results. Its similar to discussions about long range pistol shooting, someone tries it with zero relevant experience, cant do it and proclaims anyone that says they can as telling tall tales. Doing any thing enough to be proficient is vastly different than trying it new and making sweeping statements. The only point is doing something more than once or a few times is quite different than concerted effort at doing it.

Good horseman can do All that stuff. Certainly extra pistols and and extra cylinders were not standard issue so only very experienced veteran troops would have had the opportunity to scrounge extra pistols and the chutzpah to ignore rules and be out of uniform by carrying as many loaded pistols as they could get their hands on. The spare cylinder thing must have been exceedingly rare as not documented anywhere. Irregular troops absolutely carried as many loaded pistols as possible.