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INDEX

introduction

childhood - railways -
inventions

India - the Mutiny - illness - investigation

bullets - barrels - telescopic
sights - explosive bullets

hollow front bullets -
Volunteers & the NRA -
Sir Henry Halford

rifling - the small-bore rifle

Mitrailleuse - breech-loaders

military rifles - bullet design

the latter years

Memoir

of

William Ellis Metford

From a photograph
taken in 1878

In 1867, Mr. Metford and his friend Capt. (now Lt.-Col.) Fosbery, V.C., went to the Paris Exhibition and exhibited to the French artillerists their respective explosive rifle bullets, for Capt. Fosbery had used one of his own design with great success, especially for finding ranges, in the Umbeyla Campaign. The Montigny Mitrailleuse had then just been produced, and Capt. Fosbery reported on it to the India Office and War Office. He was instructed by the Government to get one of these machines made in Belgium, and with Mr. Metford's assistance provided an improved barrel, with the result that its efficiency was much improved, and that it afterwards made as accurate shooting at 1,000 yards as it had before at 450.

One advantage of the ousting of the Whitworth system of deep grooving and a non-cylindrical bullet was that the difficulty of producing a satisfactory breech-loading rifle became less formidable, and before long this question was occupying Mr. Metford's attention. The Martini action, in combination with the Henry barrel, had been adopted in February, 1869, by the Small Arms Committee, who had before them the work of all the prominent rifle makers. of the day, but not Mr. Metford's. In 1870 he embarked seriously upon the problem. His very practical mind at once saw that the solid-drawn brass cartridge-case was, for strength and simplicity, far ahead of the compound rolled case adopted for the Service; and that, especially considering the needs of hot climates and other practical conditions, lubrication of bullet or cartridge was inadmissible. Every detail of the barrel and cartridge received close attention from him, and especially the form of the chamber and of the "entry " conducting the bullet from the cartridge into the rifling. The adoption of a grooving of segmental form was also found to give great advantages in preventing the accumulation of fouling. It was not long before his first experimental breech-loaders made their appearance, and at Wimbledon, in 1871, two rifles and a limited supply of home made ammunition were used. Mr. Metford was extremely anxious that his rifle should win, if possible, H.RH. the Duke of Cambridge's prize for military breech-loading rifles, a single prize of 50 pounds, and twelve competitors used these two rifles in the first stage of the competition, at 800 and 900 yards. Sir Henry Halford, who was the only one of these to shoot against ten other competitors in the final stage of ten shots at 1,000 yards, won the single prize in this stage with two points to spare, and the average score made by the rifle in the hands of the twelve who used it in the first stage was much higher than that of any other rifle.

The Metford rifle again won the Duke of Cambridge's prize in 1872, and in the same year the "Withingon" match, between teams armed with breech-loaders and muzzle-loaders, proved that, while the latter were certainly still superior, the Henry match breech-loader was quite out-classed by the Metford military rifle with match sights attached. By 1877 the rifle and ammunition had passed out of the experimental stage, and were made by makers of repute, to whom great credit is due for the good workmanship, which was an indispensable condition of the success of the rifle. From that time the record of the military rifle is an unbroken series of triumphs; and in the whole twenty-three years up to 1894, when military rifles of larger bore than .315 were no longer recognised by the National Rifle Association, the Metford rifle only four times failed to win the Duke of Cambridge's prize, while it took a preponderating share of the other prizes. The Martini-Henry, adopted so recently by the Committee on Small Arms as the best breech-loader, soon found its level, and after 1882 absolutely disappears from the long-range prize lists for the military breech-loader class. The superiority of the Metford rifle was notably shown in the matches with the military rifle between the Volunteers of Great Britain and the National Guard of the United States, in 1882 and 1883, when the American rifles proved to be decidedly inferior to the British, notably at the long ranges. In 1882 ten, and in 1883 eleven, of the British teams of twelve used the Metford rifle. Meanwhile, Mr. Metford's match rifle was always prominent in the long range competitions.