Single-shot firearms are firearms that hold only a single round of ammunition, and must be reloaded manually after every shot. The history of firearms began with single-shot designs, then multi-barreled designs appeared, and eventually many centuries passed before multi-shot repeater designs became commonplace.
The term Springfield rifle may refer to any one of several types of small arms produced by the Springfield Armory in Springfield, Massachusetts, for the United States armed forces.
A firing pin or striker is a part of the firing mechanism of a firearm that impacts the primer in the base of a cartridge and causes it to fire. In firearms terminology, a striker is a particular type of firing pin where a compressed spring acts directly on the firing pin to provide the impact force rather than it being struck by a hammer.
The Springfield Model 1863 was a .58 caliber rifled musket manufactured by the Springfield Armory and independent contractors between 1863 and 1865.
The .45-70 rifle cartridge, also known as .45-70 Government, was developed at the U.S. Army's Springfield Armory for use in the Springfield Model 1873, which is known to collectors as the "Trapdoor Springfield." The new cartridge was a replacement for the stop-gap .50-70 Government cartridge, which had been adopted in 1866, one year after the end of the American Civil War.
The Springfield Model 1873 was the first standard-issue breech-loading rifle adopted by the United States Army. The gun, in both full-length and carbine versions, was widely used in subsequent battles against Native Americans.
The British .577 Snider–Enfield was a breech-loading rifle. The American Jacob Snider invented this firearm action, and the Snider–Enfield was one of the most widely used of the Snider varieties. The British Army adopted it in 1866 as a conversion system for its ubiquitous Pattern 1853 Enfield muzzle-loading rifles, and used it until 1874 when the Martini–Henry rifle began to supersede it. The British Indian Army used the Snider–Enfield until the end of the nineteenth century.
The Springfield Model 1865 was an early breech-loading rifle manufactured by U.S. Armory in Springfield, Massachusetts. It was a modification of the Springfield Model 1861. It was later replaced with the Springfield Model 1866.
The Springfield Model 1866 was the second iteration of the Allin-designed trapdoor breech-loading mechanism. Originally developed as a means of converting rifle muskets to breechloaders, the Allin modification ultimately became the basis for the definitive Springfield Model 1873, the first breech-loading rifle adopted by the United States War Department for manufacture and widespread issue to U.S. troops.
The Springfield Model 1870 was one of the rifles which used the trapdoor breechblock design developed by Erskine S. Allin. The Model 1870 was a minor improvement to the Springfield Model 1868, and retained most of the Model 1868 rifle features.
The Springfield Model 1868 was one of the rifles which used the trapdoor breechblock design developed by Erskine S. Allin.
James Paris Lee was a British Canadian and later American inventor and arms designer, best known for inventing the action and magazine used in the Lee–Metford and Lee–Enfield series of rifles.
The Minié rifle was an important infantry rifle of the mid-19th century. A version was adopted in 1849 following the invention of the Minié ball in 1847 by the French Army captain Claude-Étienne Minié of the Chasseurs d'Orléans and Henri-Gustave Delvigne. The bullet was designed to allow rapid muzzle loading of rifles, and was an innovation that brought about the widespread use of the rifle as the main battlefield weapon for individual soldiers. The French adopted it following difficulties encountered by the French army in Northern Africa, where their muskets were outranged by long-barreled weapons which were handcrafted by their Algerian opponents. The Minié rifle belonged to the category of rifled muskets.
The .50-70 Government is a black powder cartridge adopted in 1866 for the Springfield Model 1866 Trapdoor rifle.
During the American Civil War, an assortment of small arms found their way onto the battlefield. Though the muzzle-loading percussion cap rifle was the most numerous weapon, being standard issue for the Union and Confederate armies, many other firearms, ranging from the single-shot breech-loading Sharps and Burnside rifles to the Spencer and the Henry rifles, two of the world's first repeating rifles, were issued by the hundreds of thousands, mostly by the Union. The Civil War brought many advances in firearms technology, most notably the widespread use of rifled barrels.
The Springfield Model 1870 rolling-block U.S. Navy rifle was a shipboard small arm for use by the United States Navy, employing the Remington Arms Company rolling-block design, and manufactured under a royalty agreement with Remington.
The Winchester Hotchkiss was a bolt-action repeating rifle patented by Benjamin B. Hotchkiss in 1876 and produced by the Winchester Repeating Arms Company and Springfield Armory from 1878. The Hotchkiss, like most early bolt-actions, had a single rear locking lug integral with the bolt handle, but was unique in feeding multiple rounds from a tubular buttstock magazine similar to the Spencer rifle. The .45-70 Hotchkiss was acquired in limited numbers by the US Navy as the M1879, and by the US Army and several state militias as the M1883, making it the first center-fire bolt-action repeater to be adopted by any major military.
The Springfield Model 1875 was a variant of the Springfield Model 1873 rifle.
The term Joslyn Rifle refers to a series of rifles produced in the mid-19th century. The term is often used to refer specifically to the Joslyn Model 1861/1862, which was the first mass-produced breech-loading rifle produced at the Springfield Armory.
In firearms, a trapdoor is a form of breech-loading mechanism for rifles in which a hinged breechblock rotates up and forward, resembling the movement of a trapdoor. The Springfield models 1865 and 1873 were best known for first employing this type of action.
