M1842 Question

[Paul L]

Hi All,

I recently purchased an original 1842 smoothbore (I thought). After scrubbing and cleaning the barrel bore out, I dropped my light down it and was very much surprised to see rifling! There is no evidence of a rear sight ever being on the barrel, and from all appearances from the outside is a smoothbore. My question is what would have been fired from this musket? The standard roundball or was a conical used even though there was no rear sight? It is an interesting piece for sure!

Thanks!

Paul
15th Virginia Cavalry

[Jim_Burgess_2078V]

I have two Harpers Ferry percussion conversion rifled muskets that have no provision for a rear sight as well as a Frankford Arsenal percussion conversion (with Remington contract Maynard lock) that also lacks a rear sight or dovetail for same. The Manassas Battlefield museum collection has a Harpers Ferry M1842 rifled musket without a rear sight. All have ramrods that are cupped for a .69 cal. Minie ball. Evidently the demand for rifled weapons in the late 1850s far surpassed the armories' ability to fabricate long range sights. I consider these unsighted rifled muskets to be more rare variants.

Jim Burgess, 15th Conn Vol. Inf.
(Museum Specialist, Manassas NBP)

[Chris Einowski 10717]

From College Hill Arsenal :

Between 1855 and 1859 slightly less than 44,000 M1842 muskets were rifled at five US arsenals and armories, including the Springfield, and Harper?s Ferry armories, and the Saint Louis, Frankford and Benicia Arsenals. Of the 43,759 muskets rifled, 23,683 received long-range rear sights. The rifled and sighted alterations took place at both Harper?s Ferry and Springfield, as well as at Saint Louis and Frankford. Benicia Arsenal did not apply long-range rear sights to any of the guns that they altered. Between 1856 and 1859 Springfield rifled and sighted 9,929 M1842s, Harper?s Ferry rifled and sighted 11,060 M1842s. The Frankford Arsenal rifled and sighted 1,313 between 1857 and 1858 and the Saint Louis rifled and sighted 1,381 in 1857. There is some indication that the Ordnance Department attempted to add long range sights to the remaining rifled M1842s on hand when the Civil War erupted in 1861.

[Paul L]

Thanks Jim and Chris for the replies!


Jim, mine is a Harper's Ferry make also. The ramrod that came with mine looks like a blacksmith special and is flat for a roundball. The fact there is no provision for a rear sight and its rifled I think is pretty cool. Based on the information Chris just provided, I would agree with you that these variants are on the rarer side.

Chris, was there any kind of marking applied to the barrels that indicated which arsenal did the rifling?

Thanks again!

Paul Lipka
15th Virginia Cavalry

[Dave Fox]

Worse kind of answer preamble but I "recall", as to at least New Jersey, they were in process of equipping the state infantry regiments at some point with rifled .69s. The flank companies received rifled and sighted weapons, the line companies rifled, unsighted weapons.