Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 January 1880 — American Cartridges. [ARTICLE]

American Cartridges.

Russia was among tho first to make use of the American metallic cartridges, and she attempted in vain to imitate them. After wasting 10,000,000 of cartridges made of inferior material, she wisely concluded to buy here, as other foreign nations have since done. Some of the American cartridges sent to Russia were subjected to the unparalleled test of a five-weeks’ soaking in the waters of New York harbor, the vessel carrying them having sunk off Staten island on her way out. They were fished up as good as new, and, triumphantly passing the ordeal of a new test of their firing quality, went on their way again, and have no doubt long since added their quota to tho list of casualties. For good cartridges American copper is needed, a fact which the Europeans are beginning to learn. Even so long ago as the days of the mound-builders it was discovered that our Lake Superior region produced a copper ore of uncommon purity. Ore of equal purify is not, it would seem, to be found elsewhere, and perhaps the process of annealing is not so well understood abroad. At all events, the brass made of the foreign copper, abounding in the sulphurets, lacks the necessary strength and ductility, and for some reason the metallic cartridges made abroad are liable to deteriorate in quality. During her war with Turkey, Russia purchased large quantities of brass here, one Connecticut firm alone supplying $2,000,000 worth of sheet brass. Other Governments have, no doubt, been purchasers. Ready-made cartridges have also been sent abroad in such quantities that a million has become the unit of calculation. Three forms of cartridge are made—the United States Government cartridge, the Pea-body-Martini cartridge, and the largest, the Sharps or Remington special longrange cartridge. The Government cartridge contains seventy grains of powder and a hardened bullet, composed of one part of tin and sixteen parts lead, weighing 405 grains. The Peabody-Martini has eighty-five grains of powder and a bullet of the same composition weighing 480 grains. The long-range bullet has one part of tin to fourteen parts lead, and weighs 550 grains, the charge of powder being 100 grains. The advantages of the heavier cartridge are well shown in the experiences of the Turkish war, already referred to. Whatever else they may lack, the Turks have certainly shown superior intelligence in the armament of their troops. The English, who use the same gun, had, on a smaller scale, an experience similar to that of the Turks. Tho rifles used by the rifle brigade in the campaign against the Afghans were sighted for 2,000 yards, and at 2,100 yards were found effective. The rifles with which our own army is provided are sighted to 1,200 yards. Some of the sights used by riflemen in long-range shooting, as the Vernier sight, combine a spirit-level and wind-gauge. The ordinary Vernier will register to the thousandth of an inch, and Verniers have been made so as to register the twenty thousandth of an inch, these finer sights being used to regulate the ordinary sights. These very fine sights are not adapted to military service, in which the rifle is subjected to a very different usage from that prevailing at Creedmoor, where the long range aifleman is able to give his weapon all the care that a musician would take of his precious Stradivarius violin or his Tourte bow.— Col. W. C. Church, in Scribner.