Barber - The Crack Shot : or Young Riflemans Complete Guide: Being a Treatise on the Use of the Rifle

To GENIO C. SCOTT, who, as an ardent Sportsman and accomplished Writer, has done much towards fostering a love for Field-Sports in this country, this humble attempt to instruct and assist the aspiring youth to become a Crack Shot is INSCRIBED, as a slight token of the appreciation entertained for his kindness, and the estimation he is held in as a Gentleman and a Sportsman by the Author .

First Published in 1873
First Skyhorse Publishing edition 2015

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Owen Corrigan
Cover photo credit: Thinkstock

Print ISBN: 978-1-63220-270-3
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-63220-784-5

Printed in the United States of America.

I HAVE been induced to prepare the following pages from a conviction that a work of this kind was needed. No work has been published since the recent great improvements in breech-loading arms; and moreover, though the books of Cleveland, Chapman, Wilcox, and others are standard works, containing a vast deal of useful and valuable information, yet it has been felt that they are too purely scientific to meet the desired end. At the suggestion of a sporting friend of credit and renown, I undertook the preparation of a work designed to aid and instruct the young idea how to shoot. I have acquitted myself to the best of my humble ability, and trust that it may prove useful and interesting to those for whose use it was specially preparedthe young riflemen of America. I do not claim any great originality, nor do I profess to have propounded any peculiar theories; my object being to compile, in brief and readable style, the views and opinions of those who, from time to time, have written upon this subject. I must acknowledge my indebtedness to the authors above mentioned; to Col. Boucher, Capt. Hans Busk, whose works should have a more extended circulation on this side of the Atlantic; the Text-Book for Schools of Musketry, and that prince of sportsmen and writers, the accomplished and lamented Frank Forrester, besides others of less note, whom I believe have received due credit for anything I may have quoted.

To the friends who have kindly assisted me, by advice or counsel, I beg to acknowledge my sincerest thanks, more especially to Genio C. Scott, Esq., who by his friendly interest has encouraged me in prosecuting my work.

I also desire to acknowledge the assistance rendered me by practical rifle-makers and others connected directly or indirectly with the trade, who have extended me every courtesy.

I am also requested by the publishers to express their acknowledgments to Messrs. Brown, Coombs & Co., of the American Artisan, New York, for favors received. These gentlemen (who have devoted a good deal of space in their valuable journal to the subject of fire-arms) very kindly permitted them to take casts from a number of their drawings and engravings, thereby greatly facilitating the publication of the work.

E DWARD C, B ARBER .

Frank Forrester on shooting. Effect of his writings. Efforts made from the earliest ages to obtain a destructive weapon. The crossbow or arc-a-buse. Introduction of gunpowder. Rude attempts at firearms. Muskets first supplied to the British troops in 1596. Their unpopularity. What I propose to do, and how.

General principles. The line of fire or projection. The trajectory. The line of metal or aim. Inertia. Velocity. Friction. Gravity. Resistance. Various ideas as to the motion of projectiles. Robins first demonstrated the truth in 1742. Windage. Rotation. Object of rifling. Bullets. Centre of gravity. Captain Tamissiers experiments. Sir William Armstrongs views. Major Owens. Effect of the atmosphere. Better results obtained from elongated than from spherical shot.

The old musket. Great windage. Loss of power in consequence. Difficulty of casting a perfectly solid bullet. How this has been obviated. Rifling first devised by Zoller. Robinss researches; his conviction of the great importance of rifling. Rotation obtained by rifling. Early attempts. The spiral devised by Koster. Different systems of rifling. The grooved cylinder. The elliptical or oval bore. The polygonal system. Efforts to decrease windage. Whitworths experiments. Trial of the rifle invented by him. Report of the board. Great cost of his experiments. Varieties of grooving. The twist in grooving. The uniform, gaining, and decreasing. Strong advocacy of each. Varieties found in artillery museum at Paris. Earliest rifle known. Bakers rifle. The Brunswick rifle and belted bullet. The system Delvigne. System Thouvenin. The Mini bullet. Gen. Jacobs opinion of it. His proposed bullet.

Wessons improved American rifle, highly approved of by Chapman. The target rifle. My idea of what a rifle should be. Gordon Cummings rifle. Variations in bullets. Good shooting by Sheppard. Advocacy of off-hand shooting. Seth Green. Pattern of fancy shooting by Billinghurst. Telescopes. Good rifle-makers among the Canadians.

The muzzle-loader fast being superseded by the breech-loader. Lesson learned from the needle-gun. Early invention of breech-loaders. Robins. Colts revolver. Hans Busks opinion of that rifle. Description of it. Sharps rifle. Wonderful results achieved by it. The Maynard Rifle. Stablers high opinion of it. Favorite sporting gun. Merrills rifle. Burnside rifle. The Spencer repeater. Manner of operating it. How it has stood the test of rough usage in warfare. High opinion entertained of it by our generals. Report of Board of Ordnance pronouncing it the best magazine arm. The Ballard. Its simplicity. How to work it. High testimonial from New Mexico. The Peabody rifle. Its strength and simplicity. Recommendation of it as a national arm by the Springfield Board of Officers. Adoption of it by the Canadian Government. Favorable report by Danish Government Commissioners. Colonel Berdans breech-loader. The Remington. Rapidity of fire. Objections to it. How these have been overcome. Its adoption by Austria, Denmark, &c., &c. Wessons breech-loader; its popularity, performances, &c. Cochrans breech-loader. Poultney breech-loader. The National breech-loader. The Laidley carbine. The Henry repeater; delicacy of its mechanism; unsatisfactory performance at Washington; Clevelands opinion of it; my own experience. Winchester repeater. Balls repeater. The Empire Congress. The Hubbell. The Meigs. Report of New York State Board of Officers.