@@ObsceneSuperMatt ok thhe rifles where only part of the problem .. the austrians had old school bayonet charge tactics ... and well that is a shitty idear when the enemy has a fast firing middle range accurate gun .....
@@ObsceneSuperMatt nur shure about that specific battle but they had a lot of "old school" generals same problem as in the civil war some generals fought like in the napoleonic wars
In historical context the objections to the needle rifle are pretty logical and solid. Your video on soldiers not making full use of rifle muskets in the Civil War also indicates that even if the US army had adopted it the troops may not have been able to fully utilize it in a similar way.
@@trauko1388 the higher rate of fire was a limitation given the logistical situation at the time, especially with fresh or minimally trained like in Civil War units
@@Corvinuswargaming1444 Given that the average combat range was 100m, it wouldnt have been a problem, any unit standing in a line in front of them wouldnt last a minute, which is less than 10 rounds per rifle. Battle over. The only issue is that while you can delay opening fire... getting them to stop is another matter but, given the tactics of the time the enemy wont stay in range for long. It is a pretty valid conceern, if you look at the War of the Pacific, Chilean troops ran out of ammo in an hour of combat, 130 rounds per man for their Comblain and Gras... and had to retreat with the Bolivians and Peruvians in pursuit... until THEY ran out of ammo when trying to fight off a Chilean counterattack adn were defeated.
I will say an advantage the needle rifle would have had over the rifle musket in the American civil war is the amount of times (anecdotally though) were it was said panicked soldiers would continue repeat loading without firing. Billy Yank won’t load a second round without firing the first one.
Very interesting video, its curious that today sometimes we only see the advantages of the Dreyse because we know what happend in 1866 and after that with the muzzleloaders, but back then i understand even more watching the video, how one could think adopting such a rifle as a bad compromise and even a risk. Its interesting that the prussians were always since the adoption of conical touch holes and cylindrical ramrods in the 1780s, trying to imroove the rate of fire. Here in brazil german merceneries that were contracted in 1850 received a few Dreyse M1841 rifles adquired in Hamburg basically for trials. In 1866 during the Paraguayan War a lot of Breechloading systems were trialled, so the dreyse were taken out of storage, a few M1857 Dreyse rifles were adquired and equipped a company during an assualt against a paraguayan fortified position. Probably because of bad quality of the cartdiges produced here, the rifles were misfiring all the time and is described in several sorces that the soldiers throw their rifles away and catch the Minié rifles of their dead comrades. The dreyse ammo was produced with assistence from german merceneries in Laboratório Pirotécnio do Campinho. After the failure in this assault in 1866 the M1841 & M1857 Dreyse would be on storage again forever, about 150 to 300 rifles in total. Sorry for my english, my best regards, best channel
In Latin America soldiers have also had similarly bad experiences with the Chassepot rifle. For some reason there has always been a problem with these needlefire cartridges. Maybe because of the humidity.
@@FantadiRienzo this is a valid point, the field tests in Paraguay were in a very swamp area, the humidity might play an very important element in the Dreyse problems here, problems with quality of the cartridges also existed probably, since the first Spencer carbines issued were unreliable, but just 6 months after with corrections in production of cartridges they were issued and really loved. An thats also totally True with the Chassepot, in 1872 just after the Paraguayan War, Brazil adquired around 5000 chassepot for large trials fearing a new War, this rifles were also not considered reliable at that time. The result was adopting in the next year the Metallic Cartridge rifle as standard, the Comblain
Another thing to perhaps consider is that by 1855 the US military was aware of other breechloading guns like the Sharps rifle, which was being made in America and, on paper at least, is just as capable as the Dreyse. If they did adopt the Dreyse, it probably would have been in small numbers for sharpshooters and cavalry, which is exactly what they did with the Sharps. I'm not sure how they compare in price, but I imagine it can't be far off. Great video!
@@sharonrigs7999 I've never fired either, so I can't comment too much, but yea the Sharps was firing a big 52 caliber roundnose with alot of powder behind it. 50 grains of powder was alot back then, and it would have been almost as fast to reload as the Dreyse.
@@sharonrigs7999 Well I think even the Maynard version could still use normal caps too, so really there was no downside there. The Sharps is really underappreciated IMO, super cool gun with lots of history in America.
@astrotrek3534 I wouldn't say underappreciated. It's a legendary American firearm that's as associated with the Civil War sharpshooter as it is with the Buffalo Hunters. The .45-90, .50-110 and .50-140 Sharps cartridges are very potent, even by modern standards. The Sharps is legendary enough for reproductions to be produced by several gunmakers, of varying quality and price.
And there were very few of them, I believe like, two battalions max. Standardisation was not in the Paraguayan War dictionary. Battles would see Spanish pike heads and cannons from the 1600's alongside metal cartridge rifles
the funniest part about the Austrian love for excessive charges was because the French had successfully used it against them 7 years prior... they forgot to take into account that the French were charging against poorly trained troops armed with muzzle loaders. and even then there still were many battles where this actually resulted in horrible losses (but it did achieve victory) Had the French charged into better trained troops people would have probably been more keen to revise their favor for 18th century tactics.
Yup. When the Austrians were able (and decided) to stay at range, such as the Bistritz sector of the battle of Koeniggraetz, their superior artillery and the longer range of the Lorenz negated the advantages of the Dreyse. But to the right of that, other Austrian corps commanders fed their infantry into exactly the worst circumstance against the needle gun, close firefights and combats in the Swiepwald wood.
@@josephahner3031The bayonet charge in WW1 worked just as well, or even better than in the 19th century. The problem is that they had no cover before the line of contact before trench warfare was truly discovered. Once it was, suddenly, melee was back on the menu, shock troop tactics was in fact the most effective way to fight in WW1. Canadians in particular, who were feared by the Germans, basically used the rifle mainly as a spear, as it was very unreliable when in contact with mud. It made them into one of the most dreaded and effective forces of the war. Charging as fast as possible was key, standing out in the open meant being shot by machine guns by an entrenched enemy.
The Greene bolt action under hammer rifle was produced from 1859 to early 1860s. Around 1500 rifles were produced, of which 900 were made for the U.S. Army. It used an oval bore style rifling like the modern HK91 rifle. The Greene was actually the first bolt action rifle adopted by the U.S. military.
I have a Greene and made a video a year or two back. Definitely superior to the Dreyse in every ballistic aspect, and had a much better breech sealing system with locking lugs on the bolt. A little clumsy to shoot though!
@@papercartridges6705 Thanks for your reply! I found your older review of the Greene rifle. It was excellent! I also own a Greene rifle, in excellent (95%) condition which I got from N. Flayderman & Co. the old Civil War antiquities purveyor. You did a lot of research on it, that I didn’t even know, especially the construction of the paper cartridge. Did you have a .53 caliber mold made for your bullet, or resize a .54 bullet? I found your website, excellent. I also own an excellent condition Swiss Vetterli rifle too. I was fortunate to get that one from Military Antiques & Museum (Petaluma CA) where I worked over ten years ago.
I think the spencer wasn't a standard issue infantry rifle. But I agree, any 1850's rifle was outclassed by this gun. Especially for it's rate of fire, range and metal cartdriges it was beyond compare.
@@trauko1388 the ammo was about a wash cost wise, metallic machine made cartridges vs hand made paper cartridges and the metallic cartridges were much hardier in the field … and waterproof. I think all told the Spencer company made 200,000 rifles and carbines and they were both adopted but the US. I don’t know how many actually saw service, Reynolds had 9000 carbines at Gettysburg.
@@taggartlawfirmI agree. for both a needle rifle and a metal cartridge one, substential manufacturing capacities on industrial scale were needed. Then the costs for one cartridge sure wasn't way different. It was reported that the paper cartidges for sharps rifles got easily "busted" (probably due to moisture) if stored over a longer time. So, yeah - probably with the Spencer available at the time of the war, the needle fired guns were completely obsolete.
1866 - yup, tactics implementation difference was the key element. I am looking forward to hear your take on it very keenly. I already watched and rewatched Balasz of capandball channel fame describing it. Zundnadelgewehr was good for tactics implemented on the field that day and also on operational level it was awesome undertaking. While 'our guys' had perfect long reach accurate and destructive rifle perfect for shooting tactics long range engagements of smaller sized units company or less, yet Austrian doctrine of the time was battalion sized Stoss taktik of brute close assault (that worked so perfect in 1800s and 1810's) skewed more recently by experiences from 1859 campaign of Solferino and so on reassuring the command staff in their decision to go with less shooting more bayonet charging. Also whole bait and switch game that drag whole wing in to Svib Forest was absolute disaster ... Only effective units of infantry on Austrian side were Feldjaeger units as they were company and lesser sized detachments that opened up on their enemy from greater distance, yet lot of them ended up bound in close forest fighting of Svib (Sweib) losing their accuracy and distance advantage over their adversaries. +][+
Though we have to applaud both sides for the incompetence no tell how much longer and far more bloody the civil war would have been with breach loaders.
@@hexapon133In fairness if troops can shoot five times as fast then they'll consume five times as much ammo and that would strain the hell out of a Civil War-era logistics chain. A higher rate of fire is wonderful until you've got nothing left to shoot.
@@hexapon133I mean for the CSA it was already struggling with Arms and Ammo Procurement, to the point most CSA Soldiers ended up bringing their own rifles to War. Which ended up helping the CSA get more casualties on the Union thanks to familiarity with Terrain and Weapons. Blowing that Ammo 5 times as fast *per Solider* would wipe out the fleeting Logistics chain from Atlanta far better than Sherman tearing up Train tracks and burning down towns would have.
I spit when I heard that. Okay, so don't arm the militia with these rifles. Firing as fast as possible, when you should be firing, is the most important thing.
@@ssjjshawnhaving a faster rate of fire will save ammunition, if you're only firing when you're supposed to. May as well go home, and not fight, if your solution is to use inferior weapons.
In Prussia's grip, the needle gleams, A weapon worthy of soldier's dreams. With Dreyse's pride, they march in line, Valour bound to every spine. Through fields of fire, their honor sealed, The needle rifle, their battlefield shield.
@@elkpants1280 my husband is a gunsmith so he checked the integrity of the rifle and made ammunition for the rifle and she shot perfectly all those years and the rifle is still 100%
It’s simple Because it’s extremely expensive, even when things were being mass produced with the same level of health and safety of a Chinese factory, is because everything back then was all hand built, everything from the springs to the barrel itself and considering the delicacy of the internal parts of the needle gun, in order for it to reach a certain standard, vs a musket which as pretty advanced for the time but was mostly tailor made to fit military specifications, ie how cheap and cost effective can the military make it, vs the more finely tuned and detailed versions of say more personal rifles and weapons most of the troops were using, again take the British lee enfield or any bolt action rifle being archaic by design and yet weapons like the noisan negant is still being used including guns from ww1 where most other weapons of much later or even more modern equipment has been used for less than five years before being overhauled or replaced completely since whilst your grandfather might be using the same M2 heavy machine gun that your modern day marines still uses, doesn’t diminish the fact that outside of a few mechanical enhancements and material changes it’s basically the same weapon as used pre ww2 because it’s simple, rugged, reliable and is liable to drop anything or any one of severely motivated enough to dum as many high caliber rounds into a target before it either becomes Swiss cheese or stops being in its entirety as well as the basic fact that it’s simply cheaper to keep the platform going for as long as possible without needing to build a new factory or set up a whole new logistics department for a new weapon that does exactly the same as it’s predecessor
It’s kind of mind-blowing that the ability to fire 8 rounds per minute, instead of 2 to 3, was seen as a disadvantage. But the government was already having difficulty delivering enough ammunition to the soldiers on the field. To the logistics people, it must have seemed that faster firing would increase the supply problem fourfold.
The Dreyse cartridge also required a sabot, that was made by rolling up a strip of paper over a meter long, and then pressing it tightly down on a mechanical press. The sabot held the bullet and the “primer” in the base. That made these cartridges much more complex to make, and several times more expensive per cartridge compared to an ordinary musket round. Once you have all the machinery in place to mass produce them, it’s not quite as bad, but trying to set everything up from scratch, would be massively expensive and difficult.
Concerning paper cartridge breechloaders in the Antebellum United States, there were actually two American gunsmiths who designed breech-loading conversions during the late 1850s: Edward Lindner and James H. Merrill. Both the Lindner and Merrill conversions were used to convert several M1841 Mississippi rifles into breechloaders. Neither designs were widely adopted by the US Army before the American Civil War for various reasons, but mostly because of their obsolescence in favor of metallic cartridges. Ian McCollum of _Forgotten Weapons_ has done separate videos about the Lindner and Merrill breech-loading conversions.
The decision not to adopt the needle rifle, was just simply wrong. Many of the objections were simply not reasonable. The fright of to fast rate of fire, proofed to be nonsense. The Prussians went up against the Austrian with their Lorenz rifled muskets and the rifled musket proofed to be inferior. Rate of fire did beat out range. The lack of accuracy is also inflated, the Dreyse is accurate out to about 300 meter. How many are anyway able to shoot accurately beyond that. The range of the Dreyse is about 600 meter. The Dreyse held it's own even against the Chassepot in the Franco Prussian war, demonstrating that the limited range is a secondary concern. More range is an advantage, but not a deciding one. Being able to load the gun sitting, or lying down in cover, is a rather huge advantage and it is difficult to see why the experts did not realize that. It would have been an advantage to reduce the bore of the Dreyse to 11 mm, but that would have been a huge change for the Prussian Army, after adopting 15.4 mm. The main problem that fuels those decisions is trying to fight the last war.
"The Dreyse held it's own even against the Chassepot in the Franco Prussian war" Not really, the training of the Prussians was better, so they could in some cases compete at 200m, however, the French rifle was considered much better and captured rifles were used extensively.
@@olafkunert3714 That is a matter of opinion. Range, except under special conditions, is not as important as oven made the argument for. Of course the captured Chassepot were used, as there were always to few rifles. The Chassepot was a much newer rifle than the Dreyse.
I am just over twenty two seconds in, and by look alone I am convinced this man is a 1910's gun smuggler who has somehow evaded justice this entire time and turned his profession into a youtube channel.
I love my Dreyse Fusilier. Although I need to make another needle as my homemade replacements don’t last too long. Although the paper sabot are very cool, and I do make them from time to time, it’s far easier to load a round ball over a fiber wad.
1869/71 Vetterli, showed how rifles were advancing. The Italians took the rimfire tube fed design and said center fire and box mag, and then we'll buy them. Then the Mausers were already starting their advancing of it all. Black powder gave way to smokeless etc.
I'm currently reading about experienced British colonial regiments dealing with smokeless powder for the first time used by entrenched Boers with magazine rifles (Mauser) and how dumbfounded they were by their inability to scout the position of their antagonists. They could see neither the men nor the puffs of black powder smoke. Yet repeatedly they advanced under orders from their officers using outdated tactics with unmatched bravery.
"Rate of fire is not everything" Technically speaking, yes... in the historic context of the USCW... I believe it was, since the Minie range advantage was not really being used. Edit... should have finished the video first... 🤣
There was a misconception about the Dreyse. Needle fire rifles did not fire more ammunition than muskets, but rather less - they simply fired this ammunition more quickly, but when the shooters hit their targets, the firefight was over quicker and the troops could move on. The Prussian officer Von Ploennies addresses this very specifically in "Neue Studien über die gezogene Feuerwaffe der Infanterie" ("New studies on the rifled firearm of the infantry") from 1867.
I have an original copy of Ploennies, it is a very great primary source. The relatively low expenditure of Prussian ammo in 1866 (only 1,8 million) launched a lively debate and discussion. Assuming these numbers are correct, a fair conclusion, based on broad research, is that the Prussian infantry were held under such strict fire discipline by officers, who had been inculcated with the need to conserve ammunition, that when they did open fire, it was at relatively close range, and the Austrians conveniently presented themselves as close-range targets with their “Drauflosgehen” bayonet assaults. Ammunition expenditure was massively higher in 1870.
@@papercartridges6705 I think what's easily overlooked is the shock factor of getting hit with such an increased rate of fire, and how it would be liable to quickly break the morale of and drive back an infantry formation - the same outcome that bajonett charges were normally aiming for. Meanwhile when muzzleloader-wielding formations that weren't willing to use bajonett tactics clashed against each other they would tend to whittle each other down in extended firefights, leading to greater casualties and ammo useage overall just through the sheer length of these attritional gunfights.
Considering that even smokeless powder bolt-action rifles almost up to the beginning of the XX century had the capability to not feed from the magazine and single-load, ammunition consumption was a real thing to be taken into consideration. It made sense before the advent of smokeless powder and further industrialization when all the cartridges were made by hand, as you said, but stopped making sense afterwards. It's one of those cases where armament development made several great leaps, but doctrine and how to use it was still behind behind.
Ammo consumption is still extremely important today. I am a U.S. Army logistics officer, and fire discipline and ammo consumption rates are very carefully managed and controlled. A soldier today can fire all their ammo they can carry in about 5 minutes, in about the same time as a Prussian soldier could fire his in 1860. Resupply is never guaranteed.
@@papercartridges6705 Soldiers win battles, logistics win wars. Gen. Robert H. Barrow, USMC (1980): "Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics."
The US had better alternatives that were developed during the Civil War: a number of breech loading Carbines using linen, brass, rimfire copper cartridges and revolvers that used rimfire cartridges. They would eventually lead to post war centerfire cartridges made from drawn brass.
@@trauko1388 the Dreyse had bad breech leakage, it could not really properly seal at the breech. There is a term we call that: blowback. Prussian soldiers in 1870 went as far to hold the rifle away from their face.
@@trauko1388 the German troops held them away from their face and the leaking of that rifle proves what I was saying. Anyway, the Dreyse rifle was second rate in the Franco Prussian was, that a matter of record.
Rate of fire is why the Army didn't use lever action rifles during their heyday, the same reason they stopped using full auto M-16s in Vietnam. If your men are a bit green, they tend to fire as many bullets as they can as fast as they can. Your point as to cost shouldn't be understated either. This was long before the US became the #1 military spender in the world. It was far more likely to find expensive and unique weapons in the hands of citizens signed up for a 30day chit. Speaking of green, in many cases those civilian volunteers (the original model for military service in this country) would shoot first (even on parties under a white flag) and break first leaving "regular" soldiers exposed on the flanks. In that time period the debate between having a standing army or not was still a healthy debate. Changes to weapons, and poor performance from Civilian volunteers are all part of the story brining us to the military model that we know today.
That's what I enjoy so much: reading a mid 19th century report, written by a high ranking and certainly well educated officer who's funny misspellings get enshrined in history to be later rediscovered and serve a source of education and amusenment of some foreign history nerd a hundred and seventy years later. In the text at 2:27 the correct spelling is "Zündnadel" or (Zuendnadel if Umlauts don't show up correctly on your computer) - not "Zundnädel". But at least, the officer was trying to include that misterious pair of dots somewhere and he seemed to be aware that they had to fall on some vowel. So 7 points already just for that alone 🤓👍
Please don't use eu to replace ü or any others, ss for ß is alright-ish, but still bad. So please for the love of the German language, use the Umlauts!
There's an option on most computers to be able to switch through multiple keyboard languages by installing a keyboard language package through keyboard or language settings.
Our military has always been resistant to new technology. For years, we were stuck with single-shot rifles because they didn't trust soldiers with repeating rifles. There were better rifles than this available at that time, which weren't widely used.
do you think the union would have took and used them in the middle of the war if they somehow got them for dirt cheap from Prussia with the better ammunition ????
Also the Prussians (Mauser 1871, design started in 1867) and the thieving hill tribe aka Bavaria (Werder 1969, again design starts 1867) where already developing more modern cartridge rifles and adopted them in huge numbers from 1872 on (2 Million in less than 10 years). So by 1866 the germans knew the Dreyse was outdated
The only non metallic cartridge rifle worth a damn is the French 1866 Chassepot. Why? Breech leakage. Every paper cartridge up to the Chassepot has a lessor degree of gas escaping from the breech. As firing increases the leakage becomes critical. That is called *Obturation* . The Germans and French were so worried about gas leakage they put channels in the Gras and Mauser rifles. The French solve the obturation issue by putting a rubber seal in the Chassepot. However, after about 100 rounds it has to be replaced. By the early 1870s - just after the 1870 Franco Prussian war - most major powers go over to the center fire cartridge. Paper cartridges were a dead end.
If I remember correctly, was the gas channel in the mle 1874 Gras rifle, done as an later upgrading (M80?) of the rifle. So either they did not know how to solve the problem, or they where not too worried about this kind of gas leakage from metal cartridges at the start.
The needle for this gun wears out after about 200 shots. This problem also is an example of why Caseless Ammo is still out of reach. Lastly the makers of the gun were already busy re-arming the Prussian Army and the Prussian Army was too busy learning how to adapt this weapon into its tactics and doctrine. Just a guess based on what I know. Still watching the video now!
I have a selfish request: could you bring up the noise floor on your videos somewhat? They tend to run significantly quieter than most videos on RU-vid. I have to work with noise canceling headphones on and maximum volume won't get loud enough to be audible.
The audio will improve on future videos, I’ve bought some Rode microphones that work really great. You’ll be able to hear every creak and gurgle in my melodious voice. Unfortunately videos I recorded before I deployed (like this one from October 2023) are with the old microphone and the audio is just really bad. Kind of frustrating because those microphones weren’t exactly cheap either, I expected much better from them.
Nice But you have failed to understand the evolutionary advantage of being able to use cover when firing. Just the act of lying down will reduce hits to half. on a unit. The Austenian infantry in 1866 just died toying to fight the Prussian infantry. with in weeks the Austrian's infantry would just fall back from the Prussians. This weapon was a game changer.. As soon as this war (1866) was fought everyone in Europe rearmed.
You can take cover just fine with a muzzleloaders, loading and firing from kneeling position. Prussian drill allowed for shooting from the kneeling positioning, but not lying down. Sure it was done, but it massively slow you rate of firing, since you are now lying on top of your two cartrideboxes. If we look only on a battalion vs battalion fight in 1866, then doctrine and training was the deciding factor. The needlegun was good at only one thing. High rate of fire at close range. And Austrian doctrine based on closing the distance and wining with the bayonet... minimizing own advantages and maximizing Prussian advantages.
Side note: the Empire of Brazil (1822-1889) also had contact with the Dreyse. Some say the rifles came with a legion of german mercenaries in the early 1850s, but i find that impossible; a more reliable claim is that the Empire bought around 3000 to arm an experimental battalion during the war against paraguayan dictator Solano López, between 1864 and 1870, one of the last (and hardly talked) wars of the musket era. The infantrymen hated it and replaced with the regular belgian Minié rifles, or Enfields that armed some of the Volunteer battalions. I have to recall from memory what i read once since sources are hard to find again. The Dreyse had complains on jamming (no doubt by fouling, and maybe broken needles), humidity on the theater (affecting lubricants or gaskets?) and weight (the experimental unit was light infantry, and the fighting had much broken terrain and quasi-guerrilla clashes). Two other side notes: The Imperial cavalry loved the Spencer carbine and used them to great effect late in the war. Apparently it was so successful that even Winchesters were rejected later in its favour. Spencers served the cavalry in distant corners of the Empire to its end in 1889, and in the initial years of the military dictatorship that followed. After 1868 some Chassepot rifles arrived in the Empire and may have been tested in the conflict. I don't know how, but i guess Count d'Eu - husband to the great Princess Isabel, chief of the Imperial Army and final victor over López - had an influence in the acquisitions since he was grandson to deposed King Louis Phillipe I (no relation to Napoleon III, but i don't believe they were enemies). The evaluation by the Army post-war was somewhat sketchy, plus, by 1873 the robust belgian Comblain was adopted anyway.
Great question - and great video. That makes a lot of sense. A good example of the speed by technology went on back then is the French Chassepot needle rifle, which outranged the much older Prussian design by far. That said, the Cassepot was introduced a year _after_ the American Civil war. So if the US would have wanted a needle rifle in the late 1850's, I agree they would have had to make an improved design and in addition would have to ramp up an ammo production + infrastructure. In a simple comparison, Prussia's entire territory in the late 1800's was roughly about the size of Wyoming and had largely spread railway and postal services, including long range telegraph networks. So for the European powers in genreal, it guess it was much more realistic to supply large armies with "rapid fire" firearms.
Breech loading rifles were all criticized by the Ordnance Board for excessive ammunition use. The Sharps rifles were not issued by the government for that same reason. Unit commanders would equip their units at their own expense.
the firerate problem has an interesting parallel later in history when the thompson SMG would be replaced with the m3 which had a more controllable and logistics-friendly firerate. granted economics was probably a bigger factor, but economics is always a factor with armaments anyways.
Ive got a Chassepot, definitely one of the earlier bolt guns. Paper carteidges are what stops me from shooting it, I definitely prefer loading brass for the Gras
.-Great Analysis! Everything Mordecai noted proved true 1848-1870. Germany was able to impose far greater fire discipline upon its troops than America upon its militias going tinto the Civil War. The French Chassepot rendered the Dreyse obosolete by 1870 which in turn was rendered obsolete by brass cartridges by 1871. German Swarm Tactics and Krupp breech loading artillery compensated for the Dreyse's obsolecense in 1870 but neither needle gun made it passed 1871 while the U.S. Allen conversion took America thru the Indian Wars and into the War with Spain which was actually the best point for America to consider a bolt action if not everyone, considering how many bolt guns came up in between, tube magazine vs box magazine.
You make a good point about fire discipline with the Germans, and that’s going to be part of an upcoming video. In the Prussian regulations the fire is always controlled, and given upon an order. There’s no order for “Schnellfeuer.” And I need to get a Chassepot someday but the ammo is a little intimidating to make…
@@FantadiRienzoalthough there was the eventual development of the cartridge during the civil war for the sharpes, in the early days they did use paper cartridges with a seperate cap
@@FantadiRienzo The needle on the Dreyse is prone to breaking though so its a trade off. I don't think the percussion cap would halve fire rate but it would reduce it.
I think another factor in the US selection of weapons prior to 1860 was the relative cultures of both Prussia and the US. The Prussians had developed a martial culture after the Napoleonic wars. The US had a gun culture, but a gun culture and a martial culture are not the same thing. The Prussian martial culture was based on discipline, compulsory service as a young man, then refresher service through life. There was a large standing army in Prussia, with a larger reserve to call on in war. Their troops were well trained in weapon use and battlefield tactics, and most importantly disciplined in their use of these weapons. The US by comparison had a 'gun' culture, where most people had access to weapons on the farm or for hunting, but a great variety of weapons and often no training whatsoever in battlefield tactics. Therefore, when the Civil War started, the small professional US army (then divided into two) had to train huge numbers of volunteers very quickly, with more focus on drill and formations rather than weapon discipline and accuracy. The decision in the 1850s to reject breech loading rifles makes alot of sense if you don't have a large full time professional army and reserve. You choose a rifled musket, you also choose standing fire/ reload and Napoleonic line/ skirmisher formations. If you choose the Dreyse, you want your troops firing from the prone position most of the time. You also reject Napoleonic formations and train for more skirmisher formations. This takes more time than was available in the US Civil War (generally speaking anyway, there were exceptions with well trained troops).
I’d generally agree with you. Prussia’s army was an instrument of national survival while the US Army was basically a police force on the frontier to deal with Indians. When the Civil War began, even the rifle-musket’s modest capabilities were squandered on the untrained volunteers that filled the army. Moltke supposedly called the U.S. and CS armies “armed mobs.”
I like how the first "defect" of the Needle Rifle according to the Army was that it's "too easy to waste ammunition"; reminds me of reports about the M16A1 that resulted in the A2 variant having burst fire instead. I think this is especially interesting because current M-16/M-4 variants have gone back to full-auto; presumably because the having the option to put out that kind of volume of fire was found to offer significant tactical advantages even if it brings back the issue of troops potentially "too-easily wasting ammunition". To me this sounds a lot like what also ended up happening during the Civil War: people suddenly realizing "hey being able to throw this much lead at the enemy is actually really really useful" and scrambling to find as many breechloaders (e.g. the Spencer) as they could. Not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison since at the time a rifleman being able to fire so quickly was quite the novelty and the tactics to take full advantage of that ability didn't really exist yet, but it does seem like a bit of history repeating itself. Now that I think about it, I'd love to know if other militaries at the time had similar concerns about "excessive" rates of fire with these breechloaders. I know the US military has always had a somewhat pathological focus on marksmanship due to being very small for most of its existence and thus wanting to maximize the effectiveness of each rifleman, but I don't know much about other countries. *EDIT* AH never mind, this was addressed literally 30 seconds later in the video (for Prussia at least) from when I felt like posting this!
I was an army ammo officer for six years and let me assure you, we are still very very much obsessed with fire discipline, and afraid of shooting our ammo supplies away before achieving the desired results in an operation. The ongoing ammo shortage in Ukraine continues to prove that there is no unlimited supply of ammo, that you can’t just shoot and shoot and shoot forever. NATO has given Ukraine essentially our backup contingency go to war stockpile of ammo, and it’s gone, and we can’t manufacture replenishments fast enough.
@@papercartridges6705 Prussia overwhelmed the superior Austrians and their allies in 5 weeks (even as it is called 7 week war). The dreysa shooting 6 times from prone positions while a musket shoots back twice from a standing position might have bern part of that success.
@@papercartridges6705As far as I'm aware, small arms ammunition is one of the few things nations rarely run out in war. It's really the shells and missiles that run out. As far as the individual soldier goes, I've not seen a lot of footage of soldiers shooting full auto at people that aren't extremely close, and I've watched more footage of military engagements than most sane people probably should. Seems like even Ukrainian conscripts aren't too keen on running dry while on the battlefield and waste ammunition. The only exception I've seen is in conflicts in Africa, it's like every guy with an AK is a machine gunner, destroying all the enemy dirt in front of them. Are small caliber bullets harder to manufacture than I think?
It's often the same objection throughout history when it comes to this subject. From muzzle to breechloading, from single shot muzzle loaders to magazine bolt action and from bolt action to semi auto. "The grunts will waste all their ammo,". When magazine bolt action rifles came out, many were fitted with magazine cut offs to disable the magazine and the privates were expected to single load until given the order to use magazine fire (in some last stand scenario). It's also worth remembering that at this point in history, the prevailing military tactic was still volley fire in ranks, so rate of fire was less of an advantage in that type of situation. It wasn't really until you got to WW1/WW2 that rate of fire was especially important. In the days of the Civil war and Crimean war etc, soldiers were expected to charge defensive positions with the bayonet. Besides, by the late 1860's the Dreyse was out performed and outranged by the French Chasepot (as seen in the war of 1870).
If you hunt around you can find some video of the magazine cutoffs in use, and they definitely weren't a stupid idea. Load your magazine, engage the cutoff, then single-load while the enemy is far away and you're taking time to aim carefully. Then when they charge your magazine is still full and you can break the charge with rapid fire at close range where speed matters and you can't miss instead of being caught out with an empty magazine.
In regards to the Austrains in 1866 it's rather simple. Austrian army was lead by a man who had no experience on this front of the empire, part of his chain of command was refusing to reinforce him playing defence thinking the Olomouc fortress will have to be taken first and they failed ot take advantage of the range. Also doesn't help they were up against Helmut von Moltke, one of the best commanders in modern military history.
Benedek was an excellent corps commander. He struggled to rise to the enormous demand and vision needed to command an army. A very interesting figure. I wish someone would do a good biography of him.
Given that the average combat range was 100m, it wouldnt have been a problem, any unit standing in a line in front of them wouldnt last a minute, which is less than 10 rounds per rifle. Battle over. The only issue is that while you can delay opening fire... getting them to stop is another matter but, given the tactics of the time the enemy wont stay in range for long. But yeah, fire discipline would be crucial.
1. For a long time it was a German state secret and even once it was known of internationally after they started using it in combat, they still weren't giving the design away. 2. Say we wanted to engineer our own needle rifle based on the concept, arms acquisition is slow and what we were experimenting with worked fine enough. Then once the war started we needed to equip a vast army and fast, that's not the best time to experiment with new designs.
Fantastic video, clearly explained as always. I think it is easy to default to technological ‘what-about-isms’ with conflicts of this era, when military technology was advancing so quickly, when we can use hindsight, but that ignores the actual factors which influenced military procurement at the time.
I can tell you so much, in Bavaria (who fought on the Austrian side against Prussia) there is still a proverb when someone wants to take a rushed decisions/wants to give up: "relax, the Prussians don't shoot THAT fast .." "Ruhig bleiben, so schnell schießen die Preusen nicht" That's almost 160 years after that war and the effect of the dryse is still acknowledge on the receiving end. Thats something you want to consider when you go and peel back that "myth" that the dyse had a significant effect on the war.
I think an 1864 danish soldier has some thoughts on the importance of rate of fire vs muzzleloader rifles. Not that it's the only reason why they were having a rough time. 😬
Think the biggest issue, not in general mass production yet. True also with other breach loaders comming online with Sharps. One fear was overloading and breakage. Still a problem with springfields and Infields but they were known weapons at the time. Fire control was also a concern. Would have been an asset in limited numbers but the minnie targeting also made up for the rate of fire. Not long after the CW bolt actions would be adopted but as of the CW just not ready or availible in numbers.
Another thing to bring up would be that with black powder ammunition, a higher rate of fire means the battlefield gets smokier faster, making maneuver and coordination harder.
From a European perspective, we tend to focus on 1870. Prussian has almost completed its wars of unification and invades France. Chassepot dominates Dreyse, in spite of superior Prussian strategy, tactics, numbers, logistics. However big guns win the battles where the Breechloading Krupps dominate the Muzzle-loading La Hitte cannon. Prussian infantry are frequently pinned by superior French musketry, but then advance again after the Prussian artillery suppresses the French lines. The Dreyse proves "good enough" in the resulting close fighting, but everybody knows its days are numbered.
12.24 "in 1841, the Russians opposed the Prussians" - the author, what are you talking about? In 1841, these were allied states with a common military doctrine - opposing possible revanchism from France.
>smoothboore flint-lock >maximum effective range of 150 yards my guy, the maximum effective range of formation against formation was 400 yards. Stop looking at an individual gun and look at the entire line. The majority of the spread was lateral, not vertical. They wouldn't even be fireing within 100 yards because they'd be affixing bayonets to meet a charge if the enemy got that close.
It was untested. The moment the results of the Austrian-Prussian war were in, even the Brits started converting their Minie rifles into breech loaders (Enfield Pattern 1853 ->Snider-Enfield).
"Cause we ain't filthy Prussians!!!" (spits in American) Edit: And the Dreyse was soundly outclassed by the Chassepot shortly after this. It was very long in the tooth by then.
The needle gun was the brainchild of king Frederic William III. It was however not aproved by the military specialists who more or less wanted the accurate and deadly Minie rifle. During thebrevolution of 1848 the needle gun had to hastily issued to untrained Prussian soldiers. The soldiers imediately liked it. For the first time in war a soldier could lie down , hide behind a parapet or a bush and shoot a gun(needle gun) from behind cover. The manhandling of a muzzle loader had to be standing up with a ramrod. Nearly all leading international military men then and later became friends oft he Minie Rifle. The US Ordonance Board at the same time fought against the revolver the metallic cartrige gun. The men oft he US Army were completely against all modern guns. It was Abraham Lincoln had to force the Ordinance Board to accept the Spencer rifle.
That really is a key factor people forget. These people were not in a world where wartime mass production for fully mobilized armies was a thing. At best, you had an army of roughly just 100,000 that was being supplied by craftsmen in workshops and then transported via horse and cart. Even for Prussia itself, it wasn't the adoption of the needle rifle that made them dominant in the 19th century, it was the fact they learned how to efficiently supply their army with said rifles via rail.
Just about in every job, only, like, 10% of the people are really good at what they do. So I'm not surprised Ordnance gets the hate it gets. Especially since it's so, so easy to blame that time you screwed up and 5 guys died on faulty equipment.
Weapons already stored in armored represented sunk cost from multiple federal budgets. Regarding with the needle rifle for entire ages while also paying the enormous costs of simply finding those armies was too much. Then add simple institutional mistrust of new "untried" technologies and the barriers to transition simply could not be overcome.
If I remember right, it was a piece of junk. The French Chassepot was better. That was probably the last time that French military technology was better than German.
They did it for the same reasons that the Austrians did not: riflemen were supposed to conserve ammunition. Needle guns waste the precious bullets and can not hit as long a range. Thus at the battle of Königgrätz, the Austrians were winning because the shots were at long-range, where the Austrians were at an advantage. Conserve by firing less and hit with more of the shots. The English developed the Lee-Enfield .303 and shot enemies dead with this strategy. It was only when the trains disgorged more Prussian troops and the battle became closer that the Prussians were able to route the Austrians. Picket's Charge would have had a better chance of success against needle guns, for example. It shows the problems of Generals giving orders down to others: the Generals' thoughts of the battles past, in America's case the Mexican-American War, which are no longer relevant, are in the minds. It may have been the wrong decision but it was the natural decision in the higher-ups' calculations.
extreemly interesting! The Danish army considered the Dreyse after the 1. Schleswig war, and basically came to the same conclusions. The Dreuse is often named as the "winner" of the 2. Schleswig war, but in reality its the artillery (and numbers) that decides that one.
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It's interesting that today our mindset simply assumes mass-manufacturing of precision weapons, reliable metallurgy & volume materials transport on a staggering scale. It's very hard to switch off these assumptions. Indeed, even before the beginning of the 20th century these factors were already transforming preparations for war, the tactics that would shape warfare. The consequences of these factors would kill tens of millions in each war in the new century.
It’s funny how back then using up all their ammo was a concern. To this day soldiers have relatively low capacity magazines simply because it forces them to pause more often thus increasing overall accuracy.
Rate of fire is a double edged sword when we are talking black powder. The weapon quickly becomes fouled and inaccurate. For instance when you look at Crook's battles with the Sioux both sides fired a ton of ammunition at each other but generated few casualties.
In the 1866 war the Austrian rifle had a better precision and longer shooting range than the Dreyse. They didn’t exploit that advantage in the war. I think the armies in 1860 had their doubts about the efficiency of the Dreyse rifle on the battlefield. Therefore they needed a confirmation on the battlefield.
Im thinking this is a Prussian arm and the Prussians didn't allow the sell of it, the Confederacy got so much from England either the head of the Confederate Ordnance Department didn't like the gun and consider it junk, or Prussian kept ahold on the manufacturing.
Another reasson why Austria lost was that Feldmarshall Radetzky was stuck in the Balkans humiliating italians while the much less competent but politically connected leaders make butchery of prtussian war.
The Union should had bought a few hundred for sniper and recon, and train special units. The CSA had the Whitworth sniper rifle, they had very few but were only used by sharpshooters in special units.
The age old reason for militaries NOT to adopt weapons with better firepower: fear of wasting of ammunition if shooting is fast and easy. I guess men were cheaper than ammunition so it was preferred to employ more soldiers with slower guns to less soldiers with faster guns. The same has been said somewhere every time there was an improvement in small arms firepower, be it the addition of a magazine to a bolt gun, adopting a semi-auto or adding full auto capability. Obviously it's a matter of training also, a poorly trained person with a full auto (or even semi-auto) weapon will indeed waste all their ammunition very quicly but on the other hand a trained soldier who knows when NOT to use full auto (full auto being of very limited practical use in a personal service rilfle) can in some situations still have some advantage from it. Of course the needle rifle had some very real problems with reliability and durability, reliable sealing of the chamber on a small arms scale weapon was very problematic before the advent of metallic cartridge cases so breech loading weapons tended to be finicky with maintenance and, especially if not properly maintained, prone to early failure of the sealing surfaces.
"Moltke. Mission-orientated-tactics. Shock-tactics". No single weapon wins a war, or very,very rarely. If you consider a whole Army as weapon system, perhaps the Prussian weapon system was just better than the Austrian? That said, interesting video. After all, if King Weapon always rules the day, Isandlwana wouldn't have gone the way it did.
Simple the Prussians probably were not looking to sell this since why arm a potential enemy. They did use themselves though and another reason was that they could not keep up with the demand and the initial factory could only make around 30,000 a year.
