It wasn't just the Home Guard who were issued with Ross Rifles in WW2. During the Dunkirk evacuation, no less a soldier than Spike Milligan found himself manning an artillery observation post near Bexhill: according to "Hitler: My Part in His Downfall", the only small arm the OP crew had between them was a Ross rifle with five rounds of ammunition. Probably the only reason why his battery was on the coast at all, was that somebody in London thought that 9.2" howitzers were the same sort of thing as 9.2" Coastal defence guns, which they were not. The coastal defence gun had about twelve times the muzzle energy of the howitzer and the chances of hitting a moving warship or landing craft with the subsonic shell of the latter must have been minimal. A video on the 9.2" Coastal Defence Gun would be interesting: introduced in 1895, it fired a 380lb shell at pretty much the same muzzle velocity as a 1943 17 pounder anti-tank gun. In WW1, the Greek Navy won two important battles on the strength of having a single armoured cruiser with four of the sea-going variant of this gun. The RHS Georgios Averof is still officially in commission and could be visited, should Forgotten Weapons want a working holiday somewhere warm.
I visited Athens back in September last year and popped along to see the Averof - it's surprisingly small. The guns are now pointed at super-yachts, which raises the possibility of the Greek government reactivating the ship for anti-superyacht duty. There's a bunch of Lee-Enfield and other small arms in the below-decks spaces. It's apparently still used for conferences and ceremonies etc.
@@AshleyPomeroy Thank you! This is how a 9.2" was fired from a coastal emplacement; it must have been something of a fiddle on a relatively small ship in even a moderate sea! ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-idOpp1rAGLE.html As built, the Glorious-class cruisers went one better, being armed with four 15" guns or two 18" guns. The trouble with the latter and their 3,000lb shells was pretty obvious, the trouble with the former is that four main guns didn't give you enough ranging shots to get the range before that range changed. The moment the Royal Navy got the idea of an "aircraft carrier" it was pretty obvious which cruisers were going to get converted, and they were!
@John Anon: He mentioned in some video that he was going to film / had filmed some videos on the Ross rifles during a trip up to Canada, so this is not his house. Unless that's just what he wants us to believe so we don't figure out that he has become unfaithful to his French collection (although one could argue that Canada is at least partially French related, so that might still count) XD
There was an automatic rifle conversion called the Huot. I think the few that were made are in Canadian museums. Not sure if they'd let Ian take a look at them, though.
My dad used one in the home guard, they loved the accuracy on the few occasions when they were allowed to live fire however they hated the weight when marching. Like a lot of British troops he was a fetishist of the SMLE for it's handling prowess. He also used P14 in 30-06 too, The armorers marked the rifle butts with a red strip on those to avoid ammunition confusion.
Ben Davies my dad was in home guard as well, and did train with the Ross, don’t know which model, but he told me the the bolt handle was reversible for left handers, don’ know if that is true though.
That an incredible piece of history you hold there. That rifle belonged to the first Commanding Officer of the Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry
Interesting that what probably made it a good sniper rifle (tight tolerances) also made it less than reliable with poor ammunition. Another one of the compromises that needs balancing when designing a firearm. Do you go with a finely tuned machine that chokes on the first sub-standard round or a rugged rifle that will take a beating and keep on ticking but measures its MoA in feet rather than inches. Before the inevitable counterpoints, I am fully aware that is a gross exaggeration.
Thank you Ian , I love the Ross Rifle , My Father had one in WW-2 , on getting it cleaning it and firing it, it had to go in and have its sights adjusted as they where way off . But then again I also love the Mars pistol lol ,
The rifle with proper ammo and proper maintenance is a high degree of accuracy rifle in fact some of the best snipers in the Commonwealth forces in both world wars used it!
The British: 'Eh, this ammo is vaguely close to spec.' Also the British: 'Your rifle is crap because it doesn't like our garbage ammo. This is your fault, Canada.'
@@neutronalchemist3241 because the out of spec, garbage ammo jammed the gun. If my M16a4 or M27 would have had an out of spec cartridges jamming my weapon so severely that I couldn't retract the bolt and there were others laying around, I would pick up a different one too. Fix a severe jam, wasting time and risking death or pick up one off the ground and continue fighting... the choice is simple.
@@XShifty0311X The ammos were in perfect spec, and infact they worked fine with every other weapon, bolt action or automatic, chambered for them. Simply the manufacturer of the rifle, knowing the real dimensions of the cartridges, said the rifle was fine that way. "Every man wielded an Mk III Ross rifle, with some unease. Overseas, the gun had jammed in close combat during the Second Battle of Ypres. It was claimed the rifle was too finely made to tolerate mud and rough handling. There is truth to this, but the fatal flaw was a specific and avoidable mistake. Before the war, the British re-designed the .303 cartridge, rechambering their Lee-Enfields to a slightly larger size than the Ross. Canadian experts said the chamber of the Ross was already large enough to take the new British ammunition in a pinch, and the tighter fit could only increase accuracy anyway. The chambers were not reamed out. It was all about the money. Besides, the experts said, the men would have Canadian ammunition of the right size, so it hardly mattered." www.smallarmsreview.com/display.article.cfm?idarticles=4114
@@neutronalchemist3241 "But, the British Army took all the Canadian-made .303 ammunition away from the first Canadian troops when they arrived in Britain and issued it to their machine guns at the front where it worked quite well. The poorly made British ammunition issued to Canadians in return was responsible for the tragic story of the Ross to follow." Quite literally the next paragraph. Not saying the Ross was a great or magnificent or perfect rifle but when then next paragraph of the article you are quoting in an attempt to prove a point agrees with your opposition; that the cheap British ammo was a major flaw, so much so that the British didn't want to use it in their own weapons, you probably shouldn't quote it and share the link.
@@LilSwinney The Canadians could have required to use their own ammos, had they thought they were necessary for their rifles to work. It was not like they had no say in the matter, but, as already said, "Canadian experts said the chamber of the Ross was already large enough to take the new British ammunition in a pinch, and the tighter fit could only increase accuracy anyway". If they didn't tell the Brits their rifles were useless without their ammunitions, are them the idiots, not the Brits.
I thank you sir. One of the items I missed out on years ago was a free Ross. Some rotter beat me to it. Once had a similar experience with a free M2 BMG. Was taken off a crashed Lancaster Bomber in the Netherlands and hid up in a barn loft. It had sat there for over 50 years. When I looked into scooping it I learned it was given to the Dutch authorities not 1 year previous. Darn! Assume all collectors have similar tales to tell.
These old ross rifles are great they are very strong and have perhaps the best iron sights ever made I actually leave my 300 mag in the safe and grab my old m10 when I go moose hunting . Its as canadian as it gets and the 303 british is a totally underrated preformer .
@@ArcturusOTE It doesn't require improvement rn imo. The problem was it was a sports rifle rather than military and performed poorly when you got mud in it
After the Lee-Enfield replaced the Ross rifle, it was continued in use as a sniper rifle. This may explain why there are examples stamped with '1917' and '1918'. My grandfather used one as a sniper with the 73rd Battalion Royal Highlanders of Canada in 1916/1917 until his battalion was broken up as replacements when it was reduced to 1/4 strength after Vimy. After that he retrained as a medic. He told me about the problems with the Ross rusting quickly, jamming, and being easily affected by getting dirt in the action. He said that he and his mates envied their enemy's Mauser rifles.
Thoroughly enjoyed these videos. As a Canadian it’s pretty cool to see the history of this unique Rifle. Straight pull action is very interesting always wondered if that improved the speed at which follow up shots could be made. Thanks Ian. Love the history in your videos. Cheers!
One of the sexiest bolt action rifles of all time, to me at least; I especially love the magazine. As a Canadian, I really need to get around to getting my license so I can get myself one of these.
Canadian Snipers adored their Ross rifles because they were extremely accurate, and the straight pull allowed them to cycle the action without disturbing their positioning or sight picture, reducing the chance of being seen and allowing them to make rapid follow up shots on multiple targets. Since snipers are known to take much better care of their weapons than regular infantrymen, they were far less affected, or not affected, by the issues that got the Ross pulled from frontline service.
@@justforever96 I have it in one of my books on the subject of snipers. I could look it up although it might take a while. The fact that Ian's example is a hundred some odd years old and and isn't necessarily a matching example could be a factor as well.
Fun fact: The ancient video Ian refers to was cited by an academic whose book concerned Canadian procurement. Look for Charlie Foxtrot by Kim Richard Nossal.
They were also supplied with higher quality, more consistent ammunition, so didn't experience the same issues as ordinary troops. They may also have taken better care of their guns than the average soldier.
I brought my 1918 SMLE and 1916 Ross Mk. III to a punishing day at the range. In the end, the thicker and longer Ross barrel became a wearying thing to wield. A few times the built-in Ross magazine would stick if I pushed too hard on the stripper clip such that the follower would stay down. The only way to spring it back up was to poke a long very thin rod in through the hole at the bottom aft part of the magazine. Maybe in a new rifle this may not happen but the magazine parts were so easy to put out of alignment whereas the Lee magazine could be dropped out and replaced. The Ross magazine also has far too many moving parts. Speaking of loading, the 5 round Ross magazine meant I had to stop to reload twice as often as the SMLE for obvious reasons. The purists may balk but I threw a small bit of soft dirt into the working of both rifles at one point. The Lee still shot. The Ross’ fine and tightly made bolt could not seat the cartridge in the breach and it was irritating getting bits of dirt out of the receiver’s hard to reach teeth. In a battle with flung dirt from artillery fire or crawling in panic under barbed wire this would be a worry. The ergonomics are also not as comfortable. The Ross’ wood is fatter. The SMLE slimmer. All together by the end of a long shoot going back and forth between rifles I started to really just want the Lee. It is handier and less finicky. Taken globally across a whole army one can see why the Canadians soon started to covet the Lee used by the Australians, British, Newfoundlanders, New Zealanders, Indians and such they encountered. I image that stories - even if exaggerated in the retelling as stories often can be - of a private stomping desperately on his bolt handle to extract a case while the Germans were bearing down on him with fixed bayonets spread much horror. I have never had an issue with my Ross’s bolt. Inserting the bolt is not so much of an issue. Taking the complicated bolt assembly apart is. It is here where things can relatively easily be put back together incorrectly. At home on a bench this is no problem. Also, there are two visual ways and one obvious tactile way to know if the bolt cam is locking properly. With shaking fingers, fear, noise and hurry maybe less so. In reality the need to strip the bold in the field in action should not have been common, but given I need to use two hands and my tongue held just right just to get the bolt assembly back into the Ross’ receiver whereas the SMLE bolt goes back in easily is a testament to a rifle that was not troop friendly. Troops deserve the handiest arm they can get to survive war. Once opinion turned against the Ross and old stories of the very rare bolt accidents were overblown as a populist means to disparage the rifle, the end of its use as a service arm was inevitable. Probably rightly so. It’s a shame that a very fine hunting and sporting piece was shoehorned into a service rifle where a tiny bit of better accuracy and so-called faster re-cocking trumped robustness and simplicity. The Ross was famous for winning precise shooting competitions, but at 400 yards an inch or two one way or the other of a British .303 bullet hitting centre of mass doesn’t much matter. Snipers would have a different opinion of course. They may only get presented with a small part of someone for a moment to take a shot at. I said ‘so-called faster re-cocking’ above with reason. The straight pull is faster than the SMLE, but that advantage is lost in having to reload twice as often. Clearly not well thought through. In the end, for my day out, the Ross was a more tiring rifle with a few moments of irritation. I’ve obviously not fought in the trenches of France, but to me the attraction of the SMLE is obvious. However, if I want a lazy day at the range here in peaceful Canada the Ross is just the thing! Mine has been partly sporterized but it still attracts penalty of attention.
Thank you for sharing your experience with both rifles, Terry. I found your observations and comments to be quite insightful. From here in not-so-peaceful US.
Canadian Military: Stop throwing away your broken rifles, keep using them. Canadian Troops: F*** that, there’s Germans coming, I’m using a rifle that works.
I have had and still have a number or Ross rifles of both models. including a .280 sporter. A friend who also collected Ross rifles and I have tried numerous times to get a M10 together wrong and have never succeeded. I have a Canadian soldiers handbook from WWII and it has a section on the care and feeding of the M10 Ross Canadian veterans I have talked to said they had Ross Rifles in the interwar years. They apparently cleaned up as a match rifle in the years after WWI I understood that it was the bolt stop on the M10 that was soft and peened causing the problems. I don't guarantee that is gospel Great video series on the Ross, Thank you
Great video series of the 1903, 1905 and 1910 Ross Rifles, Ian. You make mention of the large chamber for the MK III, but it is a somewhat or little known fact that a good portion of the MK II 3* rifles supplied to the US also had their chambers altered to the same specifications. I own one made in 1909, supplied to the US, and has that same alteration. Shoots great, but fire forms the brass to something that looks more like a Weatherby shoulder than a standard .303. Thanks again!!!
I owned a M-10 Ross for a few years, 1915 date on the stock and the L.C. mark over the chamber and they weren't kidding. Case necks on fired rounds were grossly expanded and also out of round, not surprising since the work was done by field armorers working in haste. Nevertheless, it was surprisingly accurate and I took a few whitetails with it.
Thanks that was a interesting look into the Ross rifles. Can't help but think it would have been no more difficult to design a semi-auto rifle. Certainly no more machine time.
@@TheOwenMajor Even if Ross wanted to use gas operation. It still would have a lower parts count. The auto loaded rifles of the time where not piston operated. Everything but French designs was recoil operated. The British .303 round would have actually been the one of the simplest to build a design to utilize. Only the Japanese and Swiss 6.5mm rounds would have been easier.
@@alt5494 Someone on a previous video reminded us that Ian covered both the semi, and full-auto Ross rifle conversions on his website. www.forgottenweapons.com/ross-semiauto-prototype-rifle/ & www.forgottenweapons.com/the-huot-machine-rifle-a-ross-conversion/ [edit] Although I should say that the semi-auto one was mostly just Ross furniture, and used a completely new action.
Are all these Ross rifles from the past three videos in someone's private collection in Canada? Because this is like seeing a whole herd of unicorns in the wild.
Here's a hypothetical concept for the armament of an early '40s army. Rifle: Ross Mk. III (later improved model) LMG: Vickers Berthier Mk. III SMG: Owen Sidearm: GP-35 Shotgun: Winchester 97
im so glad i have one of these just for the interesting history behind it. mine had been previously modified to fit a rail for a sight. its a very accurate rifle but i could see why it wouldnt be ideal out in the field especially back then with limited resources and info on how to properly maintain them.
Main things that aided it as a sniper rifle were that Canadian snipers were issued the best ammo available (Canadian tolerances), and the slower and more deliberate shooting of a sniper meant the bolt issues were few and far between, and much less likely to be lethal. Basically countered the two biggest problems. Could have easily been used through WWII but by the '30s it was well past its due date in any form, as it was no longer being developed. Had Ross been given a sniper rifle contract perhaps it could have been used through WWII. It was, afterall, incredibly accurate in its era and the accuracy and smoothness likely could have been improved on in a dedicated sniper variant.
My friend and I found this rifle in 1981 near the city of Rzhev (USSR). It lay underground for about 40 years, but is perfectly preserved. We even managed to fire a few shots. I believe that this came to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease. A rare specimen.
One of the biggest "what if" stories of the war isn't it. How much more effective would the Canadians have been if they had had a rifle that ran rock solid reliably (either a Lee-Enfield or a Ross with all the kinks worked out) right from the start as opposed to in 1916..
Well as it was, the 4-division Canadian Corps became Haig's fire brigade by 1917, bailing him out of a couple of jams, and considered by the Germans to be the British Army's most elite formation, who's location at the front had to be kept secret because it meant a high priority assault was coming. Led in the final year by a real estate broker originally from Strathroy Ontario, probably WW1's best allied general, Arthur Currie.
I actually have an original Ross Mk III R-10 Civilian Sporting Carbine. Hands down, the smoothest bolt action I have in my collection, and that's surprising for a straight pull. Still, the speed gains over the No. 4 Mk I is minimal, as I'm good at speed cycling Enfields.
Great series of Videos on the Ross. While he is mentioned in the series Sir Sam Hughes played a pretty big role in the history of the Ross and is a rather "interesting" character in Canadian History. For more on him, I would highly recommend that you take a look at "the Madman and the Butcher" by Tim Cook. A secondary side note on the Ross is that after they were decommissioned, the bayonets apparently weren't compatible with the Lee Enfields and were re-ground after the war and sold off as sporting knives.
My dad was issued a Ross "combat knife" while on guard in port serving on a Norwegian Merchant vessel in 1943-44 in India. It was a repurposed bayonet, with the barrel loop ground off. He kept it and it 3 young men used it as their camp knife in their teens.
I have one that was re-chambered to .303 and holy crap, it is fun to shoot and stupid accurate. Mine also has the same aperture sight, and can ring steel at 300yds. My eyes ain't so great anymore lol.
I'm in the middle of reading "Vimy" by Pierre Berton, which mentions the Ross: “The Ross rifle, which Hughes had espoused with all the fanaticism of a dervish, had also been discarded in favour of the more rugged Lee Enfield. The snipers loved the all-Canadian Ross, which was a marksman’s delight, but the ordinary soldiers hated it because it jammed in the mud. Ignoring orders, they threw it away and picked up the British weapon from the nearest corpse. Alderson, the British commander who had had the temerity to attack the Ross, was also gone, a victim of Sam Hughes’s pique… It’s safe to say that most of the enemy killed or wounded by rifle bullets were killed by snipers using the Ross or were hit at close quarters in the hand-to-hand fighting that took place in the trenches.” Most soldiers in World War I died of infection from the wounds they suffered. I don't remember whether I read this statistic in "Vimy" or somewhere else. There was also a political scandal regarding the inferior boots (they absorbed water and fell apart) supplied to Canadian troops by a company owned by two members of Parliament who resigned after the scandal
These are really nice rifles, I've owned two, a sporterized M10 I traded and an almost pristine M10 I'll never part with. It's too bad they weren't able to iron out all of the problems.
Great series. Watched all 3. There is fact and then there are stories, a " something " most of us have been told up here is that trained specialty snipers kept using the " Rossx? " over everything else, and most complaints came from the men who where in the front and in the mud. The guns where great @ a target range but anything real word , wet & nasty, they became Useless. What ever... Those are the stories... Great Upload!!!!
I'm fairly sceptical about the "out of spec" ammunition story; perhaps thats slightly over-exaggerated or seeking an excuse? There were dozens (70+?) of small arms munitions factories across the Empire, and the .303" round was well defined and well known in its specs. They had quite tight batch testing standards imposed by the War Office. I have hundreds of WW1 rounds, and not one appears different in any way. In fact, due to the way cordite was die extruded and then cut to length, ammunition from different sources is remarkably consistent in performance - a mixed handful will usually form a reasonable group. I expect the major reason Ross' were ordered withdrawn was lack of logistic support for them. By 1916, the UK rifle factories were routinely rebuilding hundreds of thousands of battle-damaged Enfields. That industrial level of rifle refurbishment and re-issue would simply not be possible with the Ross', which would have had to be shipped back to Canada. The Commonwealth and Empire forces in Europe needed to be plugged into the UK armaments support in order to maintain field equipment levels, and so native major equipments would not be sustainable.
The rifle was unsuitable for the conditions of trench warfare, the bolts would frequently jam close, or alternately not close properly. There are witness accounts of Canadian soldiers striking the bolt handle with an entrenching tool handle to re open the bolt. Canadian soldiers were threatened with court martial if they ditched their Ross and got a Lee Enfield. This changed after the first battle of the Somme. Canadians coming out of that battle were all observed carrying Lee Enfields. what happened to their Ross rifles was anybody's business (meaning who cares) and NO disciplinary action was taken against them. The Ross was super accurate and a great target rifle. I have seen one (rare in Australia) in a private collection. It has been drilled through the receiver to render it totally deactivated. In most cases "DP" (drill purpose) meant they were used for rifle drill and not much else, most DP being deactivated by various means, including blocking the barrels.
Numerous officers complained about the unreliability of the rifles. They didn't listen. It took General Douglas Haig to finally persuade them to stop issuing the Ross and replaced with the SMLE.
One of the things I find interesting is why Ross for all his bragging did not adopt the Standard Lee-Enfield Magazine which potentially may have eliminated the Magazine issues (aside from patents and Royalties) but for sake of British conformity. the Ross was very heavy compared to the Lee-Enfield but weak in construction compared to the same points in the Lee-Enfield. part of the weight is the added length required in the bolt design required for the internal bolt rotating mechanism, the other is the physically longer barrel. Politics and Egos created a monster that did not need to happen.
No mention of the additional vulnerability to mud or dirt preventing the straight pull bolt from going into battery. This, of course, was a significant issue on the Western Front. A rotating bolt gives much more leverage on this issues.
All the Ross Rifles I encountered in the markets in Afghanistan were MKIIIB, how they ended up there is anemones guess, but for $100, they were good buying and in hindsight I wish I had of striped one for spare parts... it would save a lot of the stuffing about I've been going through lately trying to find parts to rebuild a bubba'd MkIII to spec.
One section of the Canadian 25th Battalion actually lifted a batch of SMLE's which were under guard while British troops were off on a working party. Source 'Merry Hell: The Story of the 25th Battalion (Nova Scotia Regiment)'.
A limerick I found in a WW1 diary: "There once was a raw young galoot, A Canadian Militia recruit, His Ross Rifle one day In disgust threw away, He wanted a gun that would shoot."
The big problem with the Ross was that--especially with the MkIII--it was designed around the idea that "everyone had to shoot like a Boer guerrilla to snipe out to 2000 yards". So it was oriented towards accuracy--tight chambering, needlessly fine-adjustable sights, overly-long barrels--and then got sent into a war where none of those qualities mattered. Great for Bisley or Camp Perry...but a PITA to deal with the extreme conditions of the Western Front's trenches.
My only exposure to this weapon before this video was the "BOSS" rifle in Hideous Destructor, a doom mod of all things. It... retains a lot of the real-life weapon's flaws.
damn ive watched every one of your ross videos and i still cant figure out what my ross is. its an old family heirloom. it has a mk3 looking stock ( no opening for a second rear sight) a Mk 2 bolt, and a weir peep sight that dosnt match any of the ones you showed here. on top of that there is no quick shooting sight only an aperture. all that plus it has a marksman plate on the stock from a competition in 1910. idk wtf it is but its dope. its been in closets for the past 100 years and I've finally gotten by PAL and brought it to a local gunsmith to be cleaned up.
@@justforever96 Apparently you are not aware that many military rifles in the era had chambers that far exceeded the specified dimensions. This was done to ensure reliable extraction with ammunition that was less than dimensionally ideal. And LOTS of rifles use modified chambers while using the standard round. Basically, ALL the improved wildcats would take standard ammo and you fire form factory ammo to the new dimensions and then resized it to the improved dimensions when reloaded. Modifying chambers far outside ideal dimensions was and still is common practice and does not make anyone an idiot, this has been done by people and engineers far smarter than yourself...
I have my Ross Mk2, I very much enjoy shooting it and if... One day it blows on me, like bolt to the face, It will be written: He died the way he lived, with Ross in mind
I think Ian's previous video about the issues arising from French soldiers playing with their rifles' bayonet attachment system perfectly illustrates that concept
A Ross, converted by the Soviets to 7.62x54R, won gold medal in the "100m Running Deer event" at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics: media.olympics.com.au/dmVideo/92FB8AF0-0863-11E3-8B22005056A37760/displayFrame/ajaxmode/1.html
The amount of ignorance in the comments... British Ammunition (plus ammo made in the rest of the Empire) was very consistent, and no other rifle or machine gun had the same issue. When one rifle has an issue that no other has, you have to consider that the Ross, while a neat idea, was a flawed combat rifle.
Are you suggesting that a rifle precisely made is a flawed rifle? There is no mention of the US version having a problem with ammo with their precisely made Ross. And apparently the precsely made Ross worked fine with precisely made Canadian Ammo. USOG Show how precisely made and smooth the action in his precisely made Ross rifles is.
I remember that video about the Ross bolt you had to Dremel the pin out and even then the damage wasn’t that bad it That was When I subscribed to your channel
