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CARTRIDGE CASE HISTORY

The US Civil War had provided a tremendous impetus to new inventions and methods in the field of arms and ammunition. By mid-nineteenth century, all foreign governments realized that they had to change from muzzle loading to breech loading firearms. Having many thousand stands of old muzzle loaders on hand their first immediate preoccupation was to convert these to breech loaders. In the ten year period 1866 to 1876, inventors had been very active in designing new systems not inhibited by having to start with an old gun. At the beginning of this period there were practically no standardized cartridges. Paper cartridges with powder and ball had been satisfactory for muzzle loading weapons, but they were fragile and subject to damage from moisture. More seriously, they were not adaptable to breechloaders, as they provided little or no seal for the joint between breech and barrel. Hence development of breechloaders and repeaters was directly tied to availability of suitable ammunition. Designers of effective early breechloaders had to come up with a practical cartridge too. As usable cartridges were not readily available, inventors of gun mechanisms often had to design their own, usually favoring the gun design by making a cartridge which nowadays has a weird appearance. Their main preoccupation must have been to make the gun design at the expense of cartridge design. It is still a truism that design of a good weapon must be concurrent with that of its ammunition. The term cartridge is used to mean a self-contained ammunition for breech-loading arms, with bullet or shot, propellant, and means of ignition conveniently combined in a case, usually metallic, which also serves as obturation for the breech opening. The origins of such cartridges are uncertain, as little has been recorded about them, and many of the basic patents, issued abroad, are relatively unknown in the United States. Extensive research on late 19th-century patent litigations left considerable doubt about the early cartridge patents, their claims, and especially their capabilities and effectiveness. Erroneous classification of small arms ammunition specimens as dangerous explosives led to the discarding of most of the collections entrusted to public institutions. Consequently little accurate historical information on ammunition development is conveniently available. The only published source on cartridge patents is the excellent digest of American, British, and French cartridge patents compiled in 1878 by Bartlett and Gallatin of the U.S. Patent Office. In all three countries firearms and cartridges are classified separately, and cartridges for specific firearms are often described only in the corresponding firearms patent. The digest included cartridges shown in U.S. firearms patents, but only those listed among cartridge patents in England and France. American inventors apparently sought to protect their ideas by taking out patents abroad, but British and French inventors for some reason seldom bothered with patent protection here. Hence for lack of information we often credit Americans with originating inventions which were already patented abroad. At that time, patents were considered of secondary importance to getting the job done. But they had important bearings on the story, both as to sources of ideas, and recognition to the holders.

The following discussion on early cartridge patents is based mainly on the Bartlett and Gallatin Digest, amplified by a study of some of the actual patent papers and contemporary publications concerning their implementation. It was common for a design not to actually perform as claimed by the patentee. Sometimes this was the result of a faulty idea, but often it was due to lack of technical proficiency. As communications were often lacking, or at least slow, the ideas from abroad were either unknown or rendered obsolete by contemporary American innovations. The knowledge of deep drawing for cartridge cases, however, was probably more advanced in Europe than here in the early days of metallic ammunition, due to the earlier availability of breech loading shotguns, such as the Robert and Le Faucheux. The cartridge (the word comes from the French cartouche and cartrages, or Italian cartoccio or cartuccia). It consisted of a charge of powder and a bullet in a paper tube. Thick paper is still known as cartridge paper from its use in these cartridges; they were no more than charges of powder, boxed or wrapped individually to speed up the process of loading. In the latter case, these might be made of paper, linen or other materials which might also be greased or waxed to improve weather resistance. Leonardo mentions the existence of paper cartridges circa 1500. The original cartridge for military small arms dates from 1586. By 1590 reference was made to . . . cartrages with which musketeers charge their pieces both with powder and ball at one time. In 1620 the army of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden was reported to carry measured powder charges in paper packets, which had the bullets attached. Though rifles and pistols continued to be loaded with loose ball predominantly, the use of the paper cartridge for muskets became quite general and persisted as long as muzzle loaders were in service. Early in this period, powder and ball were combined in metal cases, but these were really stiff (not obturating) auxiliary breeches, were not expendable, and were generally limited to use in expensive custom made weapons. This cartridge was used with the muzzle-loading military firearm, the base of the cartridge being ripped or bitten off by the soldier, the powder poured into the barrel, and the bullet then rammed home. Before the invention of the firelock or flint-lock, about 1635, the priming was originally put into the pan of the wheel-lock and snaphance muskets from a flask containing a fine-grained powder called serpentine powder. Later the pan was filled from the cartridge above described before loading. The mechanism of the flint-lock musket, in which the pan was covered by the furrowed steel struck by the flint, rendered this method of priming unnecessary, as, in loading, a portion of the charge of powder passed from the barrel through the vent into the pan, where it was held by the cover and hammer. Fulminates of mercury, silver and gold had been known for many years. Samuel Pepys mentions fulminate of gold and its explosive properties in his famous Pepys Diary, it mentioned the subject under the date of 11 November 1663, where with Dr. Allen some good discourse about physique and chymistry. And among other things, I telling him what Dribble the German Doctor do offer of an

instrument to sink ships; he tells me that which is more strange, that something made of gold, which they call in chymistry Aurum fulminans, a grain, I think he said, of it put into a silver spoon and fired, will give a blow like a musquett, and strike a hole through the spoon downward, without the least force upward; and this he can make a cheaper experiment of, he says, with iron prepared. (sic). According to Howard Blakemore, the first man credited with making fulminate of mercury was a German Alchemist by the name of Johann Kunckel (1630-1703). However, it was not until the late eighteenth century that reasonably safe methods of manufacture were developed. Percussion Ignition The possibilities for break through began in the late eighteenth century with new experimental work on explosives. In 1788, a French chemist, Claude-Louis Berthollet, replaced saltpetre in gunpowder with potassium chlorate. The resulting compound turned out to be too dangerous to make, unpredictable and powerful for use as munitions. Berthollet abandoned this line of enquiry. Similarly, in 1800, Edward Howard, a member of the Royal Society, published a paper on the preparation of mercuric fulminates. He had tried the latter substance as a propellant substitute but had blown his laboratory up in the process. I must confess, he observed afterwards, I shall [now] feel more disposed to prosecute other chemical subjects. Alexander Forsyth, 1807 percussion ignition All these efforts were not wasted, however. They led the Scottish cleric and chemist, Alexander Forsyth, to attempt similar experiments. He began to consider the use of the violently explosive new compounds as detonating agents rather than as propellants. He tried them in the pan of a normal flintlock, but found that they flashed too quickly to ignite the main charge. Eventually, it dawned on him that he might use a hammer blow for ignition instead of the conventional spark. It was a thought which would change the world. In 1805, Forsyth created an experimental lock (the mechanism that causes the weapon to fire) using the percussion principle and attached it to a sporting gun which he used for a seasons game shooting. The ignition was more reliable than with flint and steel, it was much faster, making shooting easier. Immediately realizing both the sporting and military potential, Forsyth set off for London in 1806 to obtain official backing. Lord Moira, the Master General of the Ordnance was sufficiently impressed with the revolutionary lock to arrange for its inventor to be set up in a secret workshop in the Tower of London. Moira wanted the system applied to a strong, waterproof lock, suitable for firearms and cannon. Forsyth worked for almost a year and produced prototypes, but his tenure came to an abrupt end when John Pitt, brother of William, took over as Master General of the Ordnance. Evidently, he was not much of a shooting man. Forsyth was ordered out of the Tower forthwith and told to take his rubbish with him. In 1807, the somewhat disillusioned cleric sought patent protection with his friend, James Watt, of the condensing steam engine fame, acting as adviser. The result was British patent 3032 of 1807 which was most carefully worded and which proved to be extremely strong when later challenged at law. It stated instead of giving fire to the charge by a lighted match, or by flint or steel, or by any other matter in a state of

actual combustion applied to a priming in an open pan. I do close the touch-hole or vent by means of a plug or sliding piece, or other fit piece of metalso as to exclude the open air, and to prevent any sensible escape of the blast or explosive gas outwardsas a priming I do make use of some or one of those chemical compounds which are so easily inflammable as to be capable of taking fire and exploding without any actual fire being applied thereto, and merely by a blow, or by any sudden or strong pressure. In the years that followed, Forsyth and competing gun makers (who were continually trying to circumvent his patent) developed a number of improved percussion locks and detonating compounds. It is hard to over emphasize the importance of Forsyths invention, it allowed for the creation of vastly improved, quicker firing firearms and led directly to the development of the self-contained, central fire cartridge. Few inventions have had more profound consequences for good and ill. The Percussion Cap The percussion cap was developed shortly thereafter and continued as the favored means of ignition, which, with minor changes and the perfection of self-contained metallic cartridges, evolved into the modern primer. In the second decade of the nineteenth century (there is much argument about the exact date) the metallic percussion cap was introduced. In it, detonating compound was placed in a soft metal cap which could be placed over a nipple at the guns breech. It was not Forsyths invention (indeed, his patents appear to have held back its introduction), but his work had made it possible. Percussion cap locks, unlike earlier detonators, were suitable for mass production, but there remained great dangers connected with the bulk preparation of detonating compounds. William Eley, one of the founders of the Eley cartridge making dynasty, perished in an explosion in his factory in Bond Street in 1841 aged 46. To quote Hawker, he: was blown to atoms by an awful explosion of fulminating mercury, from which everyone around him escaped with, comparatively, little injury and his sons carried on the business (Eley Bros. was formed). Joshua Shaw, 1822 - the percussion cap An American patent on the percussion cap was granted to Joshua Shaw on 19 June 1822. An English gunsmith who emigrated, he claimed in his U.S. patent application to have originated the idea in England in 1814, but the honor is disputed by British gunsmiths Joseph Egg, Colonel Peter Hawker, Joe Manton and Purdey, and others. Possibly conflicts of these claims with Forsyths basic patent had precluded a British patent for the percussion cap at that time. He claimed to have made a cap from iron sheet in 1814 and pewter and copper examples by 1816. Nine years later, he wrote, I have been in the habit of using copper caps for at least 13 years and for the past seven years have manufactured and sold them at the rate of two million annually.

A French patent for it was granted to Franois Prlat, a French gunsmith and inventor who sketched and described a percussion cap in his 1818 patent claim. The idea had probably emanated from England.5 In any case, Shaw was recognized in the United States as originator of the cap in a practical form and was retained by the Government to install a machine for their making and to assist in their testing at Frankford Arsenal. Hall carbines using Shaws percussion caps had been introduced in1834, but these caps were procured from commercial sources. By 1845 the U.S. Army was manufacturing caps on a large scale, having adopted the percussion system in 1842. This invention was gradually developed, and used, first in a steel cap, and then in a copper cap, by various gun makers and private individuals before coming into general military use. The alteration of the military flint-lock to the percussion musket was easily accomplished by replacing the powder pan by a perforated nipple, and by replacing the cock or hammer which held the flint by a smaller hammer with a hollow to fit on the nipple when released by the trigger. On the nipple was placed the copper cap containing the detonating composition, now made of three parts of chlorate of potash, two of fulminate of mercury and one of powdered glass. When percussion ignition compositions were successfully adapted to guns in the early 19th century, the first sound approach to a satisfactory cartridge became feasible. The objectives were to combine all three elementsignition, powder, and ballinto a unit, which would be sturdy and water repellent, and would provide an adequate breech seal. The detonating cap thus invented and adopted, brought about the invention of the modern cartridge case, and rendered possible the general adoption of the breech-loading principle for all varieties of rifles, shot guns and pistols. Gun designers, however, pursued the development of a breech seal, sacrificing the improvement of the internal system. Therefore, throughout the 1860s, otherwise excellent cartridges, employed external ignition systems. As usable cartridges were not readily available, inventors of gun mechanisms often had to design their own, usually favoring the gun design by making a cartridge which nowadays has a weird appearance. Their main preoccupation must have been to make the gun design at the expense of cartridge design. Johannes Samuel Pauly, 1814 first practical use of the new percussion ignition compounds by incorporating them with powder and ball into a complete cartridge, paved the way for the selfcontained metallic cartridge. On September 12, 1812 the Swiss-born former artillery officer, Johannes Samuel Pauly, obtained a French patent covering a centerfire, breech loading .64 pistol which used an obturating cartridge, for which he also received a British patent (no. 3833, under the name Samuel J. Pauly) in 1814, and another (no. 4026) in 1816. The latter two were novel in using compressed air (fire-piston) to ignite

the fulminate instead of a mechanical striker. The fire-piston relied on the heat generated by a fastmoving piston to ignite the cartridges priming. Although improvements on Paulys ideas were patented in France between 1816 and 1824, Paulys invention was the first practical use of the new percussion ignition compounds (a fulminate mixture of potassium chlorate, sulphur and powdered charcoal bound by gum Arabic), by incorporating them with powder and ball into a complete cartridge. The cases were of heavy brass, sealing the breech by a tapered head, like a rubber drain plug. The first of them (1812) used a patch of detonating compound or a pellet which was placed in a shallow recess in the head. In 1814, he added a short percussion nipple, using a metallic cap. His 1816 shot cartridge had a brass head equipped with a hollow screw in its forward face. The charge and shot were placed in a paper cylinder having a hard wad in the base. A hole in this wad was perforated by the head screw, through which ignition passed. Another big step was the Galy-Cazalat cartridge (French pat. no. 3355 of 1826). A parchment case contained an inside centerfire primer in its base. An X-ray photograph shows the interior construction. This cartridge lacked only obturation and a means of extraction to be a complete cartridge in the modern sense. Clement Pottet, 1829 shot shells In 1829, Clement Pottet received French patent number 3930 covering a removable base, with a pocket for fulminate. It was probably derived from the Pauly patent but it also covered a percussion cap on a base nipple, which, with his improvement (French pat. no. 12746 of 1855), evolved into the modern shotgun shell. This last design used a cardboard case and metal head with reinforcing wad inside. The cap screwed into the wad, holding the unit together. An Englishman, G. H. Daw, obtained British patent number 203for the central-fire cartridge in1861 (covering minor improvements in the ignition of the Pottet case, improved upon by Schneider). This design has been the guide in construction of shot shells ever since. It gave rise to much litigation in respect of its patent rights. Daw was subsequently defeated in his control of the patents by Eley Bros. In this cartridge the cap in the center of the cartridge base is detonated by a striker passing through the standing breech to the inner face, the cartridge case being withdrawn, or, in the most modern weapons, ejected by a sliding extractor fitted to the breech end of the barrel, which catches the rim of the base of the cartridge. This is practically the modern cartridge case now in universal use. In the case of shot guns it has been gradually improved in small details. The cases are made either of paper of various qualities with brass bases, or entirely of thin brass. The wadding between powder and shot has been thickened and improved in quality; and the end of the cartridge case is now made to fit more perfectly into the breech chamber. J. A. Robert rimfire cartridge

It was J. A. Roberts primed case (French pat. no.8061), however, which eventually was developed into the rimfire by later omitting the composition from the center. This was done by Smith & Wesson, whose patented rimfire cartridge used a cardboard disk in the center of the base, thus restricting the priming composition to the rim. Since the priming is considerably more violent than the powder, minimizing the amount of priming used results in better control of the pressure generated in the cartridge. Casimir Le Faucheux, 1835 first efficient self-contained cartridge system pin fire cartridge that made the Le Faucheux gun the first good breechloader featuring a pin-fire mechanism Casimir Le Faucheux patented a breech action in 1835, with its cartridge. This was a paper case with a thin brass head. A pin entering a small hole at one side of the head struck a percussion cap placed against the opposite interior surface. It was this pin fire cartridge that made the Le Faucheux gun the first good breechloader possible. This first pin fire, however, had no internal reinforcing, just the pin with its cap, (the pin being held in place by a thin wire passing through the head), so that a heavy charge caused failure around the pin hole. The final form of the Le Faucheux cartridge was extensively used in revolvers by both sides in our Civil War. In 1858, the Lefaucheux pistoletrevolver Mle. 1858 became the first metallic-cartridge revolver to be adopted by a national government. Frenchmen like M. Galy-Cazalat, Clement Potet, Eugene Schneider, and J.A. Robert made significant contributions to cartridge technology; still, none achieved the success of their countryman, Le Faucheux. In the case of military rifles the breech-loading cartridge case was first adopted in principle by the Prussians about 1841 in the needle-gun breech-loader. In this a conical bullet rested on a thick wad, behind which the powder was, the whole being enclosed in strong lubricated paper. The detonator was in the hinder surface of the wad, and fired by a needle driven forward from the breech, through the base of the cartridge and through the powder, by the action of a spiral spring set free by the pulling of the trigger. Johann Nikolaus von Dreyse, 1827 first military breechloader using a complete cartridge A Prussian, Johann Nikolaus von Dreyse, worked for Pauly in Paris from 1809 to 1814. Dreyse applied lessons learned from Pauly to perfecting his famous bolt-action needle-gun and cartridge. Pauly had originally developed his cartridge before the widespread availability of the percussion cap. He was thus denied a reliable method of incorporating fulminate powder into his cartridge cases. This often resulted in the powder becoming dislodged from the depression in the cartridge base during use. Dreyse addressed the problem by securing the fulminate within the case in a cavity in the base of the bullet, where the propellant charge both protected it and held it in place. Dreyses experience with Pauly also provided the basis for his development of the aptly named needle-fire mechanism for which he gained fame. The Prussian modified the original Pauly internal firing pin by lengthening it so that it could pierce the length of the cartridge, passing through the powder case to

strike and detonate the fulminate in the bullets base. The detonator was fired by a needle driven forward from the breech, through the base of the cartridge and through the powder, by the action of a spiral spring set free by the pulling of the trigger. He produced his needle fire gun and its cartridge in 1827. After extensive tests, starting in1836, Prussia ordered 60,000 von Dreyse rifles for field tests in 1841. They were made in secret at von Dreyses Sommerda plant. The system was standardized for all Prussian infantry in 1848 and remained in use until the Mauser was adopted in1871. The von Dreyse needle gun was the first military breechloader using a complete cartridge. In this a conical bullet rested on a thick wad, behind which the powder was, the whole being enclosed in strong lubricated paper. Louis Nicolas Auguste Flobert, 1849 In 1841 John Hanson and W. Golden obtained British patent number 9129 for a charged bullet, with fulminate in a base cavity. It was also designed with a small case attached to a ball, loaded only with fulminate or with both fulminate and powder. The same idea was included by Parisian inventor Louis Nicolas Auguste Flobert in his breech loader French patent (no.8618) of 1849. This well-known action used the bulleted breech cap, a simple copper case, round ball, and fulminate priming sufficient to send the ball a short distance. This is the first rimfire cartridge, but was not technically rimfire but nothing more than a small caliber lead pellet pressed into the open end of a modified percussion cup. In Floberts cartridge the fulminate acted as both primer and propellant. An example of the Flobert-type cartridge of European origin is shown in plate 2a. It is characterized by absence of a distinct rim at the base, the cartridge not being positively positioned in the chamber by the rim, but only wedged in place by the taper. Professor Shonbein, 1846 introduced guncotton as a propellant In 1846, Professor Shonbein, a Swiss, introduced guncotton as a propellant for small arms ammunition, taking out a U.S. patent that year. Extensive experiments to determine safety factors and means for controlling the burning rate were conducted by Baron von Lenk, an Austrian. Some of his cartridges which used finely braided material to slow burning were tested by the United States Army. These were the first clean burning smokeless cartridges. However an inadvertent double charge would burst the barrel, so they were not adopted. Benjamin Houllier, 1846 all the basic requirements of a self-contained cartridge were patented by 1846; the Lefaucheux system and Flobert cartridge design would be improved upon by Houllier, who introduced an entirely metallic cartridge of copper or brass The earliest efficient modern cartridge case was the pin-fire system, patented by a Paris gunsmith, Benjamin Houllier (sometimes Houiller), French patent no. 1936 in 1846; it was an improvement on the Le Faucheux pin fire and Flobert cartridge design, reinforcing the head, and putting the cap in a recessed base washer. It consisted of thin weak shell made of brass and paper which expanded by the force of the explosion, fitted perfectly into the barrel, and thus formed an efficient gas check

(obturation). A small percussion cap was placed in the middle of the base of the cartridge, and was exploded by means of a brass pin projecting from the side and struck by the hammer. The cartridges were prone to accidental discharge if handled carelessly. This pin also afforded the means of extracting the cartridge case and they were easily reloadable. Houllier included in his patent claims thin copper or brass cases, with pin, rim, or centerfire priming. Thus just about all the basic requirements of a self-contained cartridge were patented by 1846, though actual production was limited by drawing techniques of making larger cases. Probably no invention connected with firearms has wrought such changes in the principle of gun construction as those effected by the expansive cartridge case. This invention has completely revolutionized the art of gun making, has been successfully applied to all descriptions of firearms, and has produced a new and important industry that of cartridge manufacture. Its essential feature is the prevention of all escape of gas at the breech when the weapon is fired, by means of an expansive cartridge case containing its own means of ignition. Previous to this invention shot guns and sporting rifles were loaded by means of powder flasks and shot flasks, bullets, wads and copper caps, all carried separately. Horace Smith & Daniel B. Wesson, 1860 satisfactory rimfire cartridge about as we know it today The Horace Smith &Daniel B. Wesson, Letters Patent No. 27933, dated April 17, 1860, covered a satisfactory rimfire cartridge about as we know it today. It had a straight case and a definite flange for the first time in the United States, though essentially the same as Houlliers 1846 patent. Smith & Wesson used it in the Number 1 (caliber .22) revolvers which they started to manufacture in 1857. A feature peculiar to this cartridge was the perforated paper base wad, which restricted the priming mixture to the rim of the case. The example shown in plate 3; is for the caliber .54 old model Ballard carbine, used during the American Civil War. An external characteristic of most cartridges made by Smith & Wesson, or under their patent, is a slightly dished unmarked head. This shape was thought to help distribute the priming composition. Otherwise the bullet and case resembled the familiar caliber .22 cartridge. George A. Morse, 1856 - held the basic U.S. patent on features of the modern centerfire cartridge Another 1856 U.S. patent (no. 15996) covered George A. Morses metallic centerfire cartridges. The common version had a rubber disk in the base, surrounding a cap held on a hairpin-shaped anvil which soldered to the case walls. In March 1858 he recorded two other cartridge patents, numbers 20214 and 20727. Though not included in his patent drawings, his caveat filed with them mentioned a centerfire cartridge without the rubber gasket, using only the cap for obturation. Plate Sh shows an intermediate type, with solid head. Thus Morse held the basic U.S. patent on features of the modern centerfire cartridge i.e., flexible metal case, crimped-in bullet, and a primer pocket in the head to

receive a percussion cap, itself sealing the primer opening. His system for a breechloader using his ammunition was adopted by the U.S. Government in September 1858 as the best available method for converting muzzle loaders to breechloaders. Trial rifles and ammunition were made, and arrangements were begun at Harpers Ferry Armory to convert rifles by the Morse method, but the start of the war and loss of the armory prevented completion of the work. His ideas, which included the rebounding firing pin, spring-loaded double-claw extractors, and other features generally found in subsequent rifles, were far ahead of his time. E. M. Boxer, 1866 base cup attached to a base disk by a hollow rivet which forms the primer pocket Meanwhile, Boxer (Edward Mounier Boxer, of the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, in the county of Kent, England, Colonel Royal Artillery), was working on a primer cap design for cartridges, patenting it in England on October 13, 1866, and subsequently received a U.S. Letters Patent No. 91, 818, dated June 29, 1869, covers a wrapped case of metal (coiled brass case) and paper, with a base cup attached to a base disk by a hollow rivet which forms the primer pocket. It was the type adopted by the British in caliber .577 for the Snider arms, being manufactured initially at the Royal Laboratory at Woolwich, where Colonel Boxer was Superintendent. This cartridge incorporates several features of the 1863 Crispin patent (see above). A Snider Mark II cartridge is shown in plate Ah. Though primitive looking by todays standards, the coiled brass case was a remarkable breakthrough in metallic cartridge development. The reason behind the coiling of the cartridge is best described in Col. E.M. Boxers own patent, My invention has for its object to construct the cases of cartridges for breech loading firearms and ordnance in such a manner that they shall rapidly expand by slightly uncoiling and stretching on firing so as to fill the chamber and will contract slightly after firing so as to admit of the empty case being easily removed. Eventually, a solid, drawn brass cartridge was adopted to replace the rolled or coiled brass cartridge. It was found to be resistant to rough handling, it produced superior muzzle velocities and had the same qualities of expanding to fill the chamber and form a seal as did the coiled brass case. Best of all, it had fewer parts and required no assembly, as did the coiled case. Boxer primers are similar to Berdan primers with one major difference, the location of the anvil. In a Boxer primer, the anvil is a separate stirrup piece that sits inverted in the primer cup providing sufficient resistance to the impact of the firing pin as it indents the cup crushing against the pressure sensitive ignition compound. The primer pocket in the case head has a single flash-hole in its center. This positioning makes little or no difference to the performance of the round, but it makes fired primers vastly easier to remove for re-loading; the spent primer assembly is removed by pushing a thin metal rod through the flash hole from the open end of the case. A new primer, anvil included, is then pressed into the case using a reloading press or hand-tool. Since the primer cup, ignition compound and anvil are together as one piece, the anvil depth must be the correct match for the primer that is being inserted, so that the primer does not suffer excessive crushing potentially causing

ignition (priming is done as the first step, after cleaning and resizing the empty case before the powder is added). Boxer priming is universal for civilian factory ammunition, and contributes to the large number of shooters who reload their ammunition. Boxer-primed ammunition is slightly more complex to manufacture, since the primer is in two parts with a drop of pressure sensitive compound, but automated machinery producing primers by the hundreds of millions has eliminated that as a practical problem and while the primer is one step more complex to make, the cartridge case is simpler to make, use and maintain. For users who buy brass cases for reloading, the initial cost is more than equalised by the decreased cost of firing reloaded rounds compared to buying factory loaded ammunition, which is often an excellent source of reusable brass (reloading ammunition can save significant costs compared with new factory rounds). In 1867 the British war office adopted the Eley-Boxer metallic central-fire cartridge case in the Enfield rifles, which were converted to breech-loaders on the Snider principle. This consisted of a block opening on a hinge, thus forming a false breech against which the cartridge rested. The detonating cap was in the base of the cartridge, and was exploded by a striker passing through the breech block. Other European powers adopted breech-loading military rifles from 1866 to 1868, with paper instead of metallic cartridge cases. The original Eley-Boxer cartridge case was made of thin coiled brass. Later the solid-drawn, central-fire cartridge case, made of one entire solid piece of tough hard metal, an alloy of copper, with a solid head of thicker metal, has been generally substituted. Central-fire cartridges with solid-drawn metallic cases containing their own means of ignition are almost universally used in all modern varieties of military and sporting rifles and pistols. Around 1970, machined tolerances had improved to the point that the cartridge case was no longer necessary to seal a firing chamber. Precision-faced bolts would seal as well, and could be economically manufactured.

Hiram Berdan 1866 describes a metallic cartridge having an outside centerfire primer recessed into the head Hiram Berdans U.S. Letters Patent No. 53388, dated March 20,1866, describes a metallic cartridge having an outside centerfire primer recessed into the head. The primer pocket is an integral part of the case, the bottom of the pocket being bumped up to form an anvil. This cartridge was featured in the production of the Union Metallic Cartridge Company (UMC) for many years and it is still the principal type used in Europe. Berdan primers, although normally associated with European ammunition, actually originated in the United States of America. Colonel Hiram Berdan is generally credited as being the inventor although it is only fair to note that Berdan may not have been the only person involved in developing his priming system. Alexander Rose points out in his excellent book American Rifle: A Biography that Berdan may have gotten his inspiration from a prototype of a primer that Frankford Arsenal was developing. Philip B. Sharpe mentions in his excellent book, The Rifle in America, that Berdan was not the original inventor as official government records show although Sharpe does not list the records he alludes to. Colin Greenwood, a retired Superintendent of the West Yorkshire Police and author of Firearms Control, writes in The Classic British Rook & Rabbit Rifle that Berdans 1866 patent was for the primer pocket and not the primer that bears his name. Roy Marcot lists Berdans primer pocket patent along with many others secured by the colonel in Hiram Berdan: Military Commander and Firearms Inventor including a statement by Major Treadwell to the effect that Berdan essentially copied a primer and pocket designed by Colonel S.V. Benet, Frankford Arsenals Commanding Officer at the time. A close study of cartridge development also shows a steady progression in design and improvement from some of the early priming systems developed in the U.S. from the early 1800s to Berdans final product. George W. Morse received 2 patents in the 1850s that are the genesis of the modern centerfire cartridges so familiar to shooters today and it is probably fair to assume that Berdan was at least aware of Morses patents. Still, history credits Berdan as the inventor of Berdan primers and so it shall be. Berdans patent for his primer pocket was used by Marcellus Hartley and Alfred C. Hobbs of Union Metallic Cartridge Company in the production of UMCs centerfire cartridges beginning in 1867. For those of you that are curious, George Hoyem has drawings of early and improved Berdan priming systems in his 1990 edition of The History and Development of Small Arms Ammunition volume 2 that show the anvil on the earliest Berdan primed ammunition was actually offset to one side. The improved version, which is the one still used today, has the anvil in the center of the cartridge cases primer pocket.

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