"Breech-loading" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Dick who gave the command for the return volley, and with a mighty shouting they swept the woods with their breech-loading rifles. They were not sure whether they hit anything, but as the gully blazed with fire they presented all the appearance of a formidable force that ...
— The Tree of Appomattox • Joseph A. Altsheler
... blunderbusses joined forces against him. The odds then were often on his side, for many of the red men were armed with the rifle, while the troops had but the musket and carbine. The appearance of the breech-loading rifle in the hands of the United States dragoons on the frontier just fifteen years ago let in new light upon the Camanche and Apache mind. Up to that period the badgering of a detachment of "heavies" was a favorite pastime with these gentry. They got up ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... some people won't call it a hoyden!" said Mrs Dene, with the tender pride that made her faultfinding like a caress. "The idea of a girl carrying an absurd little breech-loading rifle all over Europe!" ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... home. The advantages of being able to transfer all screws, springs, nipples, hammers, &c., from one musket to another, are so manifest to the most infantine comprehension, that I suppose they considered it beneath their notice; nor can I make out that they have duly inquired into the various breech-loading systems used in the States, some of which they have been testing in their Navy for years. As, however, we are beginning to copy their application of machinery, I dare say the next generation will take up ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... thirty bullets, thirty caps, and half a pound of powder—in addition he must be provisioned for eight days. That there should have been an alternative to the rifle was due to the fact that the law was made at a time when only a few burghers possessed breech-loading rifles—achterlaaiers, as we ...
— Three Years' War • Christiaan Rudolf de Wet
... occasion of the Jameson incursion, the Transvaal had in readiness extensive parks of the most modern quick-firing Maxims and Nordenfeldts of various calibres, and breech-loading field artillery of the Krupp make. The Orange Free State hurried to their assistance with similar artillery, each burgher armed with a Martini-Henry rifle. Besides all that, there was the dynamite and explosives factory equipped ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... Guard did not make a bad appearance. They were a trifle awkward, perhaps, in their dark-blue hooded cloaks, with their tin-plate buttons, and armed with breech-loading rifles, and encumbered with canteens, basins, and pouches, all having an unprepared and too-new look. They all came from the best parts of the city, with accelerated steps and a loud beating of drums, and headed, if you please, by their major ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... for a time of attending to their duties." "Then a person could have escaped without their seeing him?" "A whole regiment of persons might have escaped. You will understand the situation exactly if I compare this corridor to a long cannon, the room at the end being the breech-loading chamber. Two guards were inside the room, and two others stood outside the door that communicated with this corridor. These four men were killed instantly. Of the guards inside the room not a vestige has been found. The door, ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... and compared their cartridges, when the king, who had felt suspicious of their whispering, also smiled, and took great interest in the breech-loading guns, exhibiting quite a childish delight in seeing the breech opened, and in being able to look right through the shining barrels. After which he had the pleasure of thrusting in the cartridges with his own fingers; but when ...
— Off to the Wilds - Being the Adventures of Two Brothers • George Manville Fenn
... its square uprights of pine wood the Stand resembled one of our own pistol-galleries at a fair, with this difference, that the amateurs brought their own weapons, breech-loading muskets of the oldest pattern, which they managed, however, with some adroitness. Tar-tarin, his arms crossed, observed the shots, criticised them aloud, gave his advice, but did not fire himself. The Russians watched him, making ...
— Tartarin On The Alps • Alphonse Daudet
... sea-cannon, which we have mentioned, were also breech-loading. They were mounted on a sort of iron wheel, at the summit of a stout wooden staff, fixed in the deck, or in the rails of the poop and forecastle. They were of small size, and revolved in strong ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... will carry no big guns, for the reason that the uses for which she is intended will not require them. Not a gun will be in sight, and the battery will be abnormally light. There will be four six-inch breech-loading rifles, mounted in the open, and protected with heavy shields attached to the gun carriages; eight four-inch breech-loading rifles; twelve six-pounder, and four one-pounder rapid-firing guns; four machine or Gatling guns, and six torpedo-launching tubes. Besides these she has a ram bow. The ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... the charge. Then the pressures, though sharp, were of short duration, and were not thoroughly transmitted through the body of the gun, so that the solidity, mass, and compression of the surrounding coils proved usually sufficient to support the interior lining. Now that breech-loading and slow powders have been introduced, these conditions have been changed. The strains, though less severe, and less tending to explosive rupture, last longer, and are more fully transmitted through the body of the gun. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 324, March 18, 1882 • Various
... times as formidable as he was before; and the breech-loader, first attempted by John Hall of Yarmouth, Massachusetts, more than seventy years ago, was generally adopted in Europe. It is said that the greater number of the military arms made in the United States for Europe are on the breech-loading system. The invention of what is called the principle of "assembling," which consists in making the various parts of a machine "in distinct pieces of fixed shape and dimensions, so that the corresponding ...
— The Nation in a Nutshell • George Makepeace Towle
... passion too deep for hurry or carelessness he made his preparations. The army was submitted to a complete reorganization. A change in the weapons of the infantry was effected, which was as momentous in its day as the introduction of the breech-loading rifle in ours. The old inefficient firelock was replaced by the flint musket, and the rapidity and certainty of fire vastly increased. The undisciplined independence of the officers commanding regiments and companies was suppressed by the rigorous and methodical ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson
... were also ordered, without any reference to the saving of ammunition, to shoot off their carbines on the least possible pretext and without pretext. The armories were then beginning to send to the front Sharp's repeating carbines. The invention of breech-loading rifles came too late to be of service to the infantry on either side, but during the last year of the War, certain brigades of cavalry were armed with Sharp's breech-loaders. The infantry weapon used through the War by the armies of the North as by those of the South was ...
— Abraham Lincoln • George Haven Putnam
... the harness from Brigham, mounted him bareback and started after the game, being armed with my new buffalo killer which I had named "Lucretia Borgia," an improved breech-loading needle-gun which I had ...
— An Autobiography of Buffalo Bill (Colonel W. F. Cody) • Buffalo Bill (William Frederick Cody)
... see that a conflict meant serious results. With the advantage of its defensive position, Lawrence was as strong as the sheriff's mob. On one point especially the Border Ruffians had a wholesome dread. Yankee ingenuity had invented a new kind of breech-loading gun called "Sharps rifle." It was, in fact, the best weapon of its day. The free-State volunteers had some months before obtained a partial supply of them from the East, and their range, rapidity, and effectiveness had been ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... continual advance has been made in the construction of the implements of war. The whole science and art of war have been fundamentally changed, mainly in consequence of these modern inventions. Reference may be made to the invention of rifled cannon, heavier ordnance, breech-loading guns, and shells and explosive bullets. It was the needle-gun of the Prussians, which gave them a signal advantage in their war with the French. The building of armored battle ships has been followed by the construction of small swift vessels from which to ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... breech-loading, repeating rifle of the very latest make, a weapon yet but little known on the border. In the packs were two more rifles of the same kind, two double-barreled, breech-loading shotguns, thousands of cartridges, several revolvers, two strong axes, medicines, extra blankets, and, in truth, ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... I knew his meaning. When my services were no longer required, he would, with his cowardly instinct, devise a means to kill me. The three soldiers were a fair sample of the poor ignorant Peruvians. They were armed with breech-loading rifles of French pattern, bayonets fixed. After Rodrigo had muttered his threat, he went into the little coach, sitting directly behind me, and could, by his position, observe every move I made. Manuel was standing on the left watching ...
— Where Strongest Tide Winds Blew • Robert McReynolds
... were of a varied assortment, including the three breech-loading rifles, ammunition, tool-chest and contents, a portion of the medicine-chest, some biscuits, cooking utensils, and a trunk of calicoes, linens and materials such as are used in the making of feminine costumes. It was a ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis
... British;" he had formed one of a gang that had infested the mountains, and his brother had murdered a friend of Georgi (the van-driver), and was now in gaol at Rhodes for the capital offence. The Turk was very intelligent, and thoroughly conversant with the various methods of breech-loading firearms; he examined several rifles and guns belonging to me, and at once comprehended the mechanism, and explained it to the admiring crowd. When this individual left our camp in the evening, the story that I had heard in outline was corroborated by the driver ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... were a special class.) Culverins are mentioned occasionally and demiculverins rather frequently, but most common were the falconets, falcons, minions, and sakers. At Fort Raleigh, Jamestown, Plymouth, and some other settlements the breech-loading half-pounder perrier or "Patterero" mounted on a swivel was ...
— Artillery Through the Ages - A Short Illustrated History of Cannon, Emphasizing Types Used in America • Albert Manucy
... it was known that the Ameer had already manufactured enough breech-loading rifles to give arms to fifty thousand soldiers. It is uncertain what became of this store, but it was supposed that they were being kept for the Afghanistan troops. Now the English are wondering whether the Ameer has not been ...
— The Great Round World and What Is Going On In It, Vol. 1, No. 53, November 11, 1897 - A Weekly Magazine for Boys and Girls • Various
... accurate it might be. But to this little Purdey weapon I had been accustomed from my youth, and that, as any marksman will know, means a great deal. I seemed to know it and it seemed to know me. It hangs on my wall to this day, although of course I never use it now in our breech-loading era. Unfortunately, however, a local gunsmith to whom I sent it to have the lock cleaned, re-browned it and scraped and varnished the stock, etc., without authority, making it look almost new again. I preferred it in its worn ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... thirty robes in size. They commenced the work of destruction along the road west as far as Junction Station, 100 miles from here. Their forces in this fight were not less than 2,000, well armed with breech-loading carbines and rifles. A desperate attempt on their part to burn the overland-stage station near this post was made at this time, but was frustrated by the gallantry of Captain N. J. O'Brien, Company F, Seventh Iowa Cavalry. Every ranch and stage-station from Junction Station ...
— The Battle of Atlanta - and Other Campaigns, Addresses, Etc. • Grenville M. Dodge
... service, and they are being discharged as rapidly as they can be replaced by regular troops. The Army has been promptly paid, carefully provided with medical treatment, well sheltered and subsisted, and is to be furnished with breech-loading small arms. The military strength of the nation has been unimpaired by the discharge of volunteers, the disposition of unserviceable or perishable stores, and the retrenchment of expenditure. Sufficient ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... repeating rifle of the very latest make, a weapon yet but little known on the border. In the packs were two more rifles of the same kind, two double-barreled, breech-loading shotguns, thousands of cartridges, several revolvers, two strong axes, medicines, extra blankets, and, in truth, everything needed by a little army of two on the march. Boyd, a man of vast experience in the wilderness, had ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler
... Brigham, a noted buffalo horse, and he was armed with a breech-loading Springfield rifle, and a weapon which had sent many a red-skin to the ...
— Beadle's Boy's Library of Sport, Story and Adventure, Vol. I, No. 1. - Adventures of Buffalo Bill from Boyhood to Manhood • Prentiss Ingraham
... walks with a madman, knowing that if his own courage should for one instant seem to waver, the maniac will be upon him. In his journey to town he had been alone, and between one station and another he had opened his portmanteau and taken therefrom a small breech-loading revolver and a stiletto. He laid his hand upon these now and again, and ...
— An Old Meerschaum - From Coals Of Fire And Other Stories, Volume II. (of III.) • David Christie Murray
... an enormous tree at the far end of the village street, and a short time after the tents were up we had a visit from the Shan magistrate. He was a dapper energetic little fellow wearing foreign dress and quite au courant with foreign ways. He even owned a breech-loading shotgun, and, before we left, sent to ask for shells. He presented us with the usual chickens and I returned several tins of cigarettes. He appeared to be quite a sportsman and directed us to a place on the mountain above the village where he said ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... a patent on which, was obtained through the Scientific American Patent Agency, June 11, 1867, is destined, in our opinion, to become a formidable rival to the breech-loading rifles which have already attained popularity. It is one of the most simple and effective guns we have yet seen. Only three motions are required to load, discharge the piece, and throw out the shell of the cartridge. The breech-block ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... cannon is loaded from the rear, or breech, just as is a breech-loading shotgun or rifle. That is, the cannon is opened at the back and the projectile is put in by means of a derrick, for often the projectiles weigh a thousand pounds or more. Next comes the powder—hundreds of pounds of it—and then it is necessary ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton
... over from a vessel not more than 80 feet long. Experiments have been carried on in the United States by Captain Ericsson to dispense with the internal machinery of the torpedo, and to rely for its traverse through the water upon the original impulse given to it by a breech-loading gun, carried at the requisite depth below the water level in a torpedo boat. This gun, having a feeble charge of powder at a low gravimetric density, fires the torpedo, and, it is said, succeeds in sending it many yards, and with a sufficient terminal velocity to explode the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 488, May 9, 1885 • Various
... some of them were desired for their beautiful feather-covered skins, which make most valuable and beautiful caps and muffs, it was decided that Souwanas and Kennedy should take the missionary's breech-loading rifle, in addition to their own guns, and ...
— Algonquin Indian Tales • Egerton R. Young
... other with bands playing, discharged their muskets when they were near enough to see the whites of their opponents' eyes, and then charged with fixed bayonets, fighting it out hand to hand. That sort of battle went out of fashion with the introduction of the breech-loading rifle and the machine-gun; and now, with between fifty and sixty thousand men in action, there were periods when not a solitary human being could be seen. And when any did appear, which was only at ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood
... warned by anonymous letters to leave the State. "But," he said simply, "I have a right to be here and can't be scared away from my home and family." Continuing, Stephens told me how well he was prepared for emergencies; and he displayed two single-barreled, breech-loading Derringers. He showed me how rapidly he could load them and seemed expert in handling the weapons. He carried a pistol in each side-pocket of his coat, within easy reach. He said he never permitted any one to approach unless he knew him to be a friend; that he always carried ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 7, 1922 • Various
... instruments and small necessaries, such as soap, sugar, tea, coffee, Liebig's extract of meat, pemmican, candles, &c., which make a total of 153 loads. The weapons of defence which the Expedition possesses consist of one double-barrel breech-loading gun, smooth bore; one American Winchester rifle, or "sixteen-shooter;" one Henry rifle, or "sixteen-shooter;" two Starr's breech-loaders, one Jocelyn breech-loader, one elephant rifle, carrying balls eight to the pound; two breech-loading revolvers, ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... with the muzzle-loading rifle. Toward the close I had one brigade (Walcutt's) armed with breech-loading "Spencer's;" the cavalry generally had breach-loading carbines, "Spencer's" and "Sharp's," both ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... opinion obtains regarding the kind of rifle that is the most efficient and best adapted to Indian warfare, and the question is perhaps as yet very far from being settled to the satisfaction of all. A large majority of men prefer the breech-loading arm, but there are those who still adhere tenaciously to the old-fashioned muzzle-loading rifle as preferable to any of the modern inventions. Among these may be mentioned the border hunters and mountaineers, who can not be persuaded to use any other than the Hawkins ...
— The Prairie Traveler - A Hand-book for Overland Expeditions • Randolph Marcy
... 8 inch, all steel, breech-loading rifle, manufactured by the West Point Foundry, upon designs from the Army Ordnance Bureau. The tube and jacket were obtained from Whitworth, and the hoops and the breech mechanism forgings from the Midvale ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 561, October 2, 1886 • Various
... Prussia and Austria for the prize of ascendency. Both parties were confident of success,—Austria as the larger State, with proud traditions, triumphant over rebellious Italy; and Prussia, with its enlarged military organization and the new breech-loading needle-gun. ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord |
