Brass Butt Plate found in South Africa

[TFoley]

Fascinating thread!! FRom ALL directions! My 'claim to fame' is that I have a surrendered 2nd Boer Mauser carbine that is just three digits away from the example shown by Ian McCollum on his Youtube 'Forgotten Weapons' programme. I've also traced the previous - Boer - owner, too.

 

[OceanLifeZA]

On another note i also found this fairly large calibre slug that looks like it had hit something and glanced off, you can however see a kind of crows foot marking on the inside rim of the slug, this same marking is on one or two buildings close by. These markings were apparently used by the british in years gone by, i cant get much specific info on the marking thou. does anyone out there perhaps have any info on this?

 

[RonRC]

The history of the Voortrekkers is fascinating. It falls into the realm of black powder and muzzleloader interest and also has similarities to the American Old West. The Voortrekkers executed fighting tactics similar to the Western-moving wagon trains of the USA. Here, we circled the wagons. In South Africa, they went into "laager," or circled the wagons and put barriers to block the space between the wagons. The laager was on a very defensible location. It was enough to permit 450 or so Voortrekkers to defeat 15,000-20,000 Zulu (casualties: 3000 Zulu; 3 Voortrekkers wounded. According to some of the histories, the majority of Voortrekkers were armed with a muzzleloader very similar to the "Brown Bess". Some would have had better quality firearms.
I took 15 American university students to the Voortrekker Monument. We saw a letter from the Boer leadership to the British complaining about the banning of slavery in 1834.
The study and discussion of the history of the Boers seems to be suppressed nowadays, to the point that the tour guides for the students objected to my insistence on visiting the Voortrekker Monument. Ignoring history does not make it go away.
Ron

 

[Grenadier1758]

The marking on the slug found by @OceanLifeZA looks like the British Broad Arrow marking designating property of the British Government.

 

[TFoley]

The large 'asterisk' stamp often seen on ex-military arms belonging to the British - the so-called 'Sold out of Service' stamp, is simply two of these stamps facing each other.

 

[Rudyard]

The bullet appears to be a compression made Pritchett pattern 577 maybe 1851 Minie if is over the nominal 577. Should be heaps of them if it was used as a range . Oh I put' weeds' in my later letter the e machine should have printed' woods '
Rudyard

 

[MikeJW]

My Irish GG Father fought in the Boer war on the side of the British. I have his discharge papers and pay records of his service. On another note, his brother lost a leg in the battles and his mates made him a wooden leg from the area wood. Not knowing anything of the wood they used (it contained a sort of wood worm) which got into his leg and he died from the worm infection.

 

[Evelyn BH]

The marking on the slug found by @OceanLifeZA looks like the British Broad Arrow marking designating property of the British Government.
View attachment 64409

The "crows foot" thing is a Broad Arrow designating British government property. Interesting that they would bother to cast it into rifle bullets.
The mark on the wall is a bench mark – the Broad Arrow under a horizontal line. The line indicates a point where an exact height above sea level has been measured while surveying. You should find it marked on maps, with the measured height shown.

 

[toot]

a great subject.

 

[Rudyard]

The compression bullet was machine swaged not cast the paper patched smooth sided Prichett bullet being part of the cartridge .Firstly had an iron base cup, then wood' boxwood' then baked clay the gas driving in the the tapering base to ensure expansion finding 550 dia bullets worked well enough and less loading problem in a fouled barrel. The portion of the paper patched end being lubed with tallow & bees wax or some combination. but NOT the pig or cow fat some claim was the ' Spark in the powder keg 'called the' Indian Mutiny 'of 1857 That had much more to do with the Memsahibs coming out to join what had been a mostly male staff creating an 'Us & them 'situation . That naturally did not sit well with the locals . By' staff' I mean the Military & civil employees of the East India company and other private' Box whallah' merchants and clergy ect .It may have been the' Jewel in the crown' but the death rate was emmence from the climate and the prevailing illnesses . Paradoxicaly Lt James Forsyth spent years alone in the highlands of central India his job being a timber assessor but his passion was rifle shooting and experimentation as to the best rifle for sporting purposes .Then he returns to the UK on furlough only to die of Cholara or some such but not before he wrote the interesting books, ' The sporting rifle & its projectiles' &' The Highlands of Central India ' Ime straying a bit far from Africa but tisn't much further .
Rudyard

 

[ADK Bigfoot]

I have a knobkeri, assagai, and OVS (Orange Free State)-marked Mauser rifle, and some empty cases from my trips to South Africa. Fascinating country with a tortured history. I have been "deep in the bush" from Capetown through the Karoo, Drakensberg Mountains and Natal as well as the Free State, Transvaal and Limpopo Valley. Gorgeous country and fine, warm, friendly people. Went with the USIML Team and have gone back 5 times.

ADK Bigfoot

 

[OceanLifeZA]

Managed to clean the plate up a bit. I only used polishing paste as im worried that anything more abrasive could damage the etching and patina.