Stevens-Pope barrels for Krag military rifles

[waterman]

Did Stevens manufacture special barrel wrench kits for switching Stevens-Pope and Krag barrels?

[Knute1]

Waterman, are you talking about the .22 caliber barrel Stevens-Pope replacement? My initial search yielded this Pennsylvania National Guard document from 1904 to change out to Stevens-Pope .22 caliber barrels and does not mention any special tools that an armorer/gunsmith would require. See the link below.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Of ... frontcover

[butlersrangers]

This publication is a very nice 'find', Knute. Thank you!

It makes a couple of interesting points:

1. In 1904, a Stevens-Pope .22 cal. replacement barrel, for the Krag, cost $15.00. (Not Inexpensive)

2. Various parties, (N.G. Armorers, private gunsmiths, and the Pa. State Arsenal), were used by the Pennsylvania National Guard to do the conversion work.

(I can envision a 'wrench mark' or two)!
It is easy to see why the Ordnance Department put a halt to this 'uncontrolled' work being done on U.S. government owned rifles.

What does not make sense is the refusal to purchase Stevens-Pope and have the conversion work done by Springfield Armory.
The later official GP .22 cal. rifle, developed by SA, was (IMO) a poor rival to the simplicity of the Stevens-Pope conversion.

[waterman]

Joe Farmer's book (pp 174-175) shows photos or scans of official instructions from the state N.G. commanders of both PA and NJ to local units. Unit armorers or local gunsmiths were apparently authorized to exchange barrels. If no qualified armorers were around, N.G. armorers at state HQ units would make replacements. Joe gives reference to similar orders for Illinois and "Washington".

Joe doesn't tell us that "Washington" was the D.C. N.G., not the State of Washington.

Was there a similar order for the Ohio N.G.? If not, is that how Capt. Charles Winder, Ohio N.G., got into trouble?

And did Stevens offer any sort of barrel swap kit?

[waterman]

This publication is a very nice 'find', Knute. Thank you!

It makes a couple of interesting points:

1. In 1904, a Stevens-Pope .22 cal. replacement barrel, for the Krag, cost $15.00. (Not Inexpensive)

2. Various parties, (N.G. Armorers, private gunsmiths, and the Pa. State Arsenal), were used by the Pennsylvania National Guard to do the conversion work.

(I can envision a 'wrench mark' or two)!
It is easy to see why the Ordnance Department put a halt to this 'uncontrolled' work being done on U.S. government owned rifles.

What does not make sense is the refusal to purchase Stevens-Pope and have the conversion work done by Springfield Armory.
The later official GP .22 cal. rifle, developed by SA, was (IMO) a poor rival to the simplicity of the Stevens-Pope conversion.

BR, it is not just your opinion that the official GPR was a poor replacement. In 2008, I was given use of a GPR with a no-drill receiver sight, a really nifty appearing "sporterized" target rifle. I used it in all the matches of our club's summer weekly iron sight prone smallbore matches, with targets at 50 yards, 50 meters, & 100 yards. With good quality match ammunition, the rifle wasn't able to reliably keep shots in the 8-ring at any of the 3 distances. I came in dead last For the last match of the season, I switched to CCI Stingers and put most of the shots into the 10-ring. Still came in dead last because I couldn't hit the X-ring. Groove diameter of the barrel was 0.2261", twist was 1 turn in 18". Because of the trip pin, all of the Krag slickness was gone. A poor design, developed by people who didn't know much about .22 rifle shooting or Krags.

[Knute1]

I might be a bit out of my league on this subject. I tried to do more research on the "net" and found this relatively contemporary article by a person named Waterman. Scroll back to page 84 in this section.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Th ... frontcover

Here is an article relating to Captain Winder with regards to this subject from a Shooting and Fishing article, 1905 (Armory Practice). See page 330.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Sh ... frontcover

Wikipedia about Capt. Winder, later Lt. Colonel:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Winder

[waterman]

I'm the Waterman who wrote that stuff for The Redwood Stumper back in 2007-2009. The Redwood Stumper was our gun club's monthly newsletter. Paul Feist (the other name that appears if you click on that link) was the main feature author. He was also a competitor in the prone matches I wrote about. Remembering back, I recall that Mr. Feist's mother, a local schoolteacher, was the "real" editor. She retired and moved to Arizona. Without her, The Redwood Stumper's literary ambitions came to an end. I'm not astonished that our efforts found their way into the digital universe. Mr. Feist earns his daily crust as an IT guy.

[butlersrangers]

I am not sure of what was meant by the "Trouble", that Colonel Charles Winder (Ohio National Guard), got into:
Something related to .30 cal. "Pope Barrels" on the U.S. Team's Krag rifles at the 1903 Palma Match held in England?

Charles Winder was an exceptional long-range military rifle shot, during the Krag and 1903 Springfield rifle era.
He was prominent in the U.S. National Matches, Palma Teams, and early U.S. Olympic rifle teams.

Col. Winder was the first National Guard Pilot to be certified by the U.S. Army flight school.

I enjoyed learning that Winder intended the Winchester Winder Musket to have the balance and feel of the 1903 Springfield Rifle.
Also, he purposely wanted the sight-hole spacing of the .22 cal. 'muskets' to allow installation of the Krag M-1901 rear-sight.

'Waterman', thank you for your insights on the Steven's-Pope, .22 cal. GP Krag, and Winder .22 cal. Winder Muskets!

'Knute', as always, thanks for the literature!

[Knute1]

Charles B. Winder in a 1903 competition. Is it me or does his Krag rifle look short? He was not a tall man. Off subject, but.... Standin on the right end.

Winder.png (313.36 KiB) Viewed 6332 times

[waterman]

As I understand the chronology, Charles Winder, and now the photo tells us he was a corporal in the Ohio National Guard, was a member of a US Army shooting team that went to England for a series of matches in 1900. While there, team members were introduced to a new military training concept, the use of .22 rimfire military-sized rifles to teach marksmanship to soldiers, both recruits and those already in service or reserves. The Brits achieved good results using .22 rimfire versions of the Martini ("miniature Martinis") and good quality ammunition, at lower cost and over a shorter period of time than they had using reduced loads in their .303 Enfield and Martini service rifles.

Winder (and others) brought the idea back to the US. The Krag was on the way out and the regular Army wasn't interested, but the National Guard was armed with the Krag and would be for years. Roughly 400,000 Krags had been made and some were beginning to get into civilian hands.

At roughly the same time, Harry Pope had designed a .22 rimfire barrel that would interchange with standard Krag .30 Army barrels. Did Pope himself make any of these other than prototypes? I don't know. In 1901, Pope entered into a contract with J. Stevens A&T Co. to make Pope barrels. The Stevens-Pope .22 rimfire barrel for the Krag appears to be one of their first products. Winder (and others) bought the S-P barrels. Some used state (National Guard) funds, some (maybe Winder) used private funds. Their training produced results. National Guard teams scored far better than Regular Army teams at the National Matches at Sea Girt. But Winder apparently had no official permission to convert the Krags, still Army property. Ordered to restore the Krags, in 1904/05, Winder got into a disagreement with high-ranking Army brass. Captains do not talk back to Major Generals, or some such. By late 1904 (?) the Stevens-Pope barrels could no longer be used on the Army's Krags, results be damned.