Lead Adventure Forum
Miniatures Adventure => VSF Adventures => Topic started by: Fjodin on April 18, 2010, 12:32:18 AM
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In second half of 19 century Europe adopts rifles and breech loading guns. So my question is: what about thousands of muskets and canons, produced years before? I am wandering about cannons. Because there was millions of heavy fort guns, ship guns, field guns, etc. Maybe they use muzzle loaders in some forts and colonies, before replayce them? (because replaysment must take some time).
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In second half of 19 century Europe adopts rifles and breech loading guns. So my question is: what about thousands of muskets and canons, produced years before? I am wandering about cannons. Because there was millions of heavy fort guns, ship guns, field guns, etc. Maybe they use muzzle loaders in some forts and colonies, before replayce them? (because replaysment must take some time).
Mostly sold as scrap. Gun carriages tended to become unserviceable after not being in use and maintained in a couple years. At least in the US, civilians could buy old Civil War era cannons with no permits after a time.
I suppose remote posts could have waited a good while before receiving updated weapons. I'm not one to ask.
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Not too long ago the Brits dumped piles of Brown Beess muskets into the sea as it was deemed they that no longer had to be kept!!
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WHA? I want these muskets!
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Another purpose of my question is if I want to buy some muzzle loading artillery where can I use them? Are they suitable for some african, indonesian, middle eastern tribes?
And what about Forts? Is there are any forts and coastal battery in late 19 who use smootbores? Bacause QRF produce some very good naval guns but they are from ACW era :(
I know it is possible in VSF to make some fort in the middle of nowhere with heavy muzzle loaders, bacause it was too remote to re-euquip with neq QF Guns.
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I seem to remember that outmoded gun types were used to equip, in succession, garrison troops, colonial troops, colonial auxiliaries, and finally sold via arms dealers to anyone who would take them.
The very nice two-part "Spear and Gun" article by Chris Peers in Wargames Illustrated issues 262 and 263 (August and September of 2009) has some background info on that, and on the practive of "export guns" manufactured specially for sale in Africa (often of dubious quality).
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Check out www.ima-usa.com. They were selling Martini Henry rifles and some muskets that were recovered from a Napalese armory. ima sells a lot of other neat military stuff, some original and some modern copies.
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The British were still using muzzle-loading artillery in 1879, and probably later :
http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=18474.0
and smoothbore muskets were in use by many native and auxiliary troops throughout Africa and probably India in the late 19thC
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... smoothbore muskets were in use by many native and auxiliary troops throughout Africa and probably India in the late 19thC
And possibly the Middle East too, potentially even into the early 20th. I don't have any actual info on this of course, not my period, but I wouldn't think they'd be out of place used by irregular troops in the Arab Revolt.
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Muzzle loading artillery was still being use by "native armies" into the early 20th century. A lot of muskets were used too. Especially by tribal type levies all over the world into the 20th century. Some Afgans were still using their jazails for sniping against the Russians not all that long ago.
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And possibly the Middle East too, potentially even into the early 20th. I don't have any actual info on this of course, not my period, but I wouldn't think they'd be out of place used by irregular troops in the Arab Revolt.
I wouldn't rule it out altogether, but they would be the exception. A smooth-bore musket is three generations of weapon out of date by the time of the Arab revolt. Most would have acquired something better by that time, and that's even before the Brits shipped them Martini-Enfields by the bucket load. Sniders and Martinis seem to have been commonplace among the Arabs. If you could get those you wouldn't hang on to a musket for long.
You might see one or two, but looking through my books I'm struggling to find a photo of a Sharifian irregular with a single-shot breech-loader, let alone a musket. They all seem to have either Lee-Metfords or Long Lee-Enfields, i.e. magazine rifles - just about the most up-to-date thing it's possible for them to have.
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A number of Brown Bess's (still flintlock) were sold off to the US during the Civil War (mainly to the Confederacy). I remember that the Osprey book on the Taiping Rebellion mentioned that a number were sold to the rebels.
A fair number of Springfield and Enfield rifles left over from the Civil War ended up in France to arm new units in the later part of the Franco-Prussian war. Others got bought for the war of the Triple Alliance and the Pacific war in South America (Paraguay's troops carried Brown Besses).
In America a number of 24 pounders (5.8 inch), and 32 pounders (6.4 inch) were rifled and put in old sea forts through the 1870s till new weapons were available. They even tried putting a steel rifled band in the smoothbore Rodman's to make big rifles out of them. When I was in the Mariners Museum in Newport News I saw a Spanish bronze cannon from 1799 that had been rifled in Cuba in 1861. Also the French, who used Naploeon smoothbore bronze 12 pounders in the Franco-Prussian War, rifled some as a stop gap measure after the war until they could get proper rifled iron cannons.
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The British were still using muzzle-loading artillery in 1879, and probably later...
Brits/Indians used RML screw guns until 1899 or so.
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French Arty in 1870/71 was muzzle loaded, some muzzle loaded weapons about in some of the irregulay French units as well.