"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied"
(Matthew 5: 6)
Foreword
In previous articles on rifles of various systems, each of them was considered separately, and it was only indicated in which other countries these rifles (besides the one where they came from) were also used. However, the amount of information on this topic was so great that until recently it was not possible to start considering this topic in a complex. But gradually the information came together, and the vision of the topic itself "took shape", so now, dear visitors of the TOPWAR website, you will be given the history of bolt-action rifles in all countries of the world. Materials will not duplicate previously published articles, but will only supplement them. Well, and will be used in the work mainly two books. The first: "Bolt Action Military Rifles of the World" (Stuart C. Mowdray and J. Puleo, USA, 2012), the second: "Mauser. Military Rifles of the World”(Robert W. D. Ball USA, 2011). These are very solid publications (408 and 448 pages, respectively), in which all rifles that had a sliding bolt and were in service in the armies of the world of the twentieth century are considered in detail and on a huge amount of factual material. A number of illustrations are taken from the book by Jaroslav Lugs "Hand Firearms" (German), published in the GDR and containing many beautiful graphic schemes. To start, however, seems to be the most reasonable from the "beginning", that is, from the very appearance of the sliding bolt and its use in hand-held firearms. That is, from the story of how the weapon designers came to this design …
Bolt Action Military Rifles of the World (Stuart C. Mowdray and J. Puleo, USA, 2012).
Mauser. Military Rifles of the World”(Robert W. D. Ball USA, 2011).
"The treasury is the head of everything"
Even when the flintlock reigned on the battlefield, and all the guns and pistols were loaded from the muzzle, there were cunning gunsmiths who wanted to facilitate this difficult process, which had to be performed solely while standing at full height, thereby exposing themselves to the bullets of the enemy. Here it should be remembered that the breech-loading was still the wick (!) Arquebus of the English king Henry VIII, which had a replaceable powder chamber. We know, as we know, the breech-loading systems of the Americans Ferguson (1776) and Hall (in service with the American army in 1819-1844), Theis's German gun (1804), but the most interesting version was invented by the Italian Giuseppe Crespi in 1770 …
An original breech-loading rifle belonging to the King of Spain Philip V, by the master A. Tienza, 1715
… And the device of its shutter.
His rifle had an upward-swinging bolt with an oblique cut at the end, which facilitated its docking with the breech of the barrel. To load it, it had to be thrown back, equipped with gunpowder and a bullet, and then lowered and secured with a special wedge for two curly protrusions on the barrel. Then everything happened in the same way as with an ordinary flintlock: the lid of the shelf was thrown back, gunpowder was poured onto the shelf, the shelf closed, then the trigger was pulled back and … after all this it was possible to aim and shoot. The disadvantage of this system was the breakthrough of gases when fired, because the bolt with the breech was not connected in any way and it was simply impossible to ensure their perfect fit to each other.
Breech-loading dragoon carbine M1770 with a flintlock system Giuseppe Crespi, caliber 18, 3 mm. Vienna Military History Museum.
Subsequently, when at the beginning of the 19th century capsule rifles appeared in the infantry's arsenal, many original designs appeared, the creators of which tried to combine loading with a paper cartridge from the breech and a perfect, as it seemed to them, capsule lock. However, you can understand them. The production of primers and paper cartridges was a perfectly fine-tuned production process and it seemed impossible to change it. The rifle is another matter. It was believed that it could be improved, while retaining both the old cartridge and the primer.
Among the first primer shotguns, loaded from the breech, the rifle Zh. A. Robert sample 1831, caliber 18 mm. He copied it from the Swiss gunsmith Samuel Paulie, who worked in France, but if he designed his gun for the world's first unitary cartridge (and he made it back in 1812, showed it to Napoleon and even achieved its adoption), then Robert the charge came from a separate capsule. The shutter was controlled by a long lever that went along the neck of the box to its toe, where it ended in a characteristic loop for the fingers. Robert's system 1832 - 1834 produced in Belgium as an army infantry rifle.
"Pull the ring, the shutter will open!"
In the same 1831, the design of David was proposed, in which the bolt, which swung up and forward, was also controlled by a long lever located along the neck of the box on the right. The capsule sleeve was located on the bolt. The trigger is behind the center of the neck of the stock.
The Starr breakaway carbine, used during the American Civil War, along with the Gilbert Smith carbine, which is very similar to it. When lowering the lever-staple under the barrel, the latter leans down.
The bolt of the Starr carbine.
The original rifle with a folding breech bolt was proposed in 1842 by the Norwegian Larsen. The bolt with a lever on the right rose up, and the capsule sleeve on the bolt was at its bottom and it was possible to put the capsule on it only (!) With the bolt open. The trigger was also at the bottom and had a special safety guard located in front of the trigger guard. There was also a safety catch that locked the trigger, in a word, it was simply impossible for the "uninitiated" to shoot from it.
In the Karl d'Abbeg rifle of 1851, the bolt in the form of a square steel bar with a capsule sleeve was rotated in the horizontal plane by turning the barrel lever to the left. The chamber is loaded from the muzzle with an ordinary paper cartridge. Then the lever is put in place, the bolt is pressed into the barrel, the primer is put on the bushing rod, the hammer is cocked, after which you can shoot.
Taking as a basis the system of Paulie and Robert, the Englishman Westley Richards in 1859 designed his chamber carbine of 11, 43-mm caliber with capsule ignition, which entered service with the British cavalrymen in 1861. His bolt also pivoted upward, but not behind the ring, but behind the "ears" of the lever lying on the neck of the box. A paper cartridge in a thin shell and with a felt wad in the back was inserted into the breech of the barrel, which served as an obturator. When fired, the paper burned out, and the wad remained in the barrel and was pushed forward by the next cartridge.
Westley Richards carbine bolt
The so-called "Zuavskaya rifle" of the "Remington" company in 1863 was designed practically according to the same scheme. A patent for which Roberts also received, but not a European, but a brigadier general of the US Army.
The bolt of the Zuav rifle, Remington, 1863
The Mont-Storm rifle (model 1860) was also equipped with the same folding bolt, only it leaned back to the right. Moreover, the charging chamber was inside the shutter. The cartridge was inserted into it with a bullet backwards, after which the bolt closed and firmly adhered to the barrel. When the trigger smashed the primer, hot gases broke through the shell of the cartridge and ignited the powder. The folding bolt in the Hubbel rifle, which was tested in the same year, worked in a similar way. Only with him, he leaned back to the left.
The bolt of the rifle of the Mont-Storm system. There was only one problem with her. How to remove from its chamber the remains of not burnt, for example, slightly damp, cartridge paper?
On Guyet's rifle, the barrel itself moved forward with a lever located under the stock, and when the lever was put in place, it was locked.
But here we can say and the history of the sliding shutter began. At first, among all the other reclining chambers, he was not particularly visible. However, there were already inventors who applied it in primer rifles, loaded with paper cartridges! For example, it was the original Wilson model 1860 bolt action rifle. Immediately behind the trigger on the slide box was a locking wedge. It had to be removed by the bump, then raise the grooved shutter lever adjacent to the neck of the box and move it back. Now it was possible to insert a paper cartridge, insert it into the breech of the barrel with a bolt, and then, sharply hitting the wedge, lock the "treasury" with it. Then everything is traditional: the trigger is cocked, the primer is put on and the shot follows!
Wilson rifle bolt.
The gunsmith Lindner, who in 1860 created a bolt-action rifle, in 1867 created something completely new - a 13, 9-mm primer rifle with a rifled bolt! The grooves were made in the same way as on the piston bolt of the cannons, that is, with grooves so that when unlocked they would not interfere with pushing it back. The shutter turned out to be very durable, the locking was reliable, but it was not at all easy to make it on the then technology. The handle was located at the back. It had to be turned so that the grooves came out of the grooves, and the bolt had to be pushed back. There was a lid on top of it. She opened the receiver, where the cartridge was stored. Then the bolt was fed forward, followed by a turn of the handle, and the bolt tightly locked the breech of the barrel. Well, then all that remained was to cock the trigger and put on the capsule …
Green rifle sliding bolt.
In 1860, Benjamin's rifle with a sliding bolt-lid appeared.
Benjamin rifle bolt Model 1865.
Approximately the same was the structure of the American Green's bolt-action primer gun. In the back of the bolt there was a handle, which had to be turned to the left before loading, and then the bolt together with the lid had to be fed back. The presence of a cover significantly reduced the effect of gases escaping outward, therefore such a design was considered very rational.
Kalischer-Terry carbine. Pictured with an open shutter.
Closed Kalischer-Terry shutter.
A very interesting example of a weapon was the Kalischer-Terry carbine of the 1861 caliber 13, 72 mm, adopted by the British cavalry. It also had a wedge-locking piston-shaped sliding breechblock. A cartridge made of nitrated paper was burned by fire from a primer and burned out when fired. By the way, the carbine weighed only 3, 2 kg, which was very convenient for the rider.
Kalischer-Terry shutter in operation. On the receiver behind the trigger there was a handle with an internal protrusion and an external round "button". Pulling the "button" and throwing the handle back, you could push the bolt. At the same time, a side window in the receiver was opened at the same time, through which the cartridge was inserted and then pushed into the barrel with the bolt. The handle turned and closed, i.e. fit along the receiver, and its protrusion entered the square hole made on it, which achieved the locking of the bolt. Thanks to such a device, the blowout of gases back was completely excluded, which, of course, was important for the shooter. (In the photo, the locking handle is removed!)
So the first sliding breeches appeared on rifles not for a unitary cartridge or even for the first metal cartridges with rimfire and centerfire primers, but for the most traditional paper cartridge with smoky black powder and a round bullet or Minier's bullet glued into it!
