The Fenian Musket

by Graham Burnside

Figure 1. Two example of the eedham conver ion of the U.. pringfield rifled mu ket, Model 1 63. The e conver ion were made
at a factory in Trenton, ew Jer ey ex pre ly for the Fenian Brotherhood, for their raid into anada in 1 70. The lower mu ket h
an 1 6 pringfield r ar ight, mounted backward to more easily conform with the conver ion. (Photo by ~ichael ama ho. Dundee. Ill.)
he Lord works in trange and
mysterious ways: or i it Lady Luck?
erendipity? We live in a co mic world .
Coincidence may be nothing more than
a part of the ma ter plan. eek and ye
hall find - the truth will out.
I don't mean to wax philo ophic, but
ometime it' hard not to. I really don't
know why I bought that Needham
conver ion. Maybe it becau e it had a
Springfield lockplate again t the u ual
Bride burg. Then again , it wa in very
fine condition. Anyway, for ome rea on
I aid, "Two hundred,"and the auctioneer
tared at me and bellowed, " old to
number 164."
The truth is, I don't care for auction I've never done well at them. The thing
I like ell for far more than I would ever
a k. I'm just no good at auctions.
When you add a firearm to your
collection , the true collector automat-

Pag-e 24

ical ly as umes an obi igation - the

re pon ibilityoffindingouta much a
you can about that particular product.
When and where it w made, by whom,
and maybe even why.
A very long tim ago om on aid,
"When you buy a gun you hould buy a
book." I thought that wa g d advi
o
I grabbed every book I could afford, and
fortunately a lot of my fri end who
authored book on one arm ubj ct or
another gave me autographed copie .
Right now I have over 2,000 volume on
firearm , military hi tory , and r lated
addenda.
I know the Needham conver ion of
the 1 61 and 1 63 pringfield .5 caliber
rifled mu kets are covered in a number
of volume . In brow ing, I've read about
them many times. But now I own one of
the thing o I'd be t read or reread
everything I can find. The fir t book I

checked was the RudolphJ. Nunnemacher

Coll ction of Proj ctile Arms by John
Metschl. Thi book , in two volume , i a
bull tin of the Public Mu eum of the
ity of Milwaukee of May 25th, 192 ,
and in year past was considered 'the
Bi bl 'by practically every gun collector.
The complete de cription i included
here for rea on which will become
obviou . (Volume one, page 193):
"(N366 ) Rim-fire rifle caliber .5
thirty- ix and three-quarter -inch,
barrel , equipped with an angular
bayonet. The rear ight i ighted to
1,000 yard . Thi . rifle wa altered to
a breech-loader by a method pateneed
[ ic] by J . & G.H . Needham in 1866.
The breech-block wings horizontally
to the right and forward. Thi gun i
common ly known a the 'Bride burg

THE GUN REPORT

Rifle' because nearly all conversions

were made in the shops of Alfred
Jenks and Son , proprietors of the
Bridesburg Machine Works. Guns of
this kind were issued to the regular
army and the militia. Thenoseofthe
hammer is extended in order that it
may strike the cartridge. An eagle
and the name 'Brides burg' appear on
the lockplate. Guns of this type were
also known as 'Fenian' rifles, so named
after the Fenian Brotherhood, a secret
Irish-American revolutionary society
founded by John O'Mahoney in 1858.
The Fenians twice endeavored to
invade Canada, first under John
O'Neill, who with 800 men crossed
the Niagara and captured Fort Erie
on June 1, 1866; and again under the
same leader, crossing the frontier
near Franklin, Vermont in April of
1870. The would-be invaders were
largely armed with rifles of this kind ,
hence the name."
Well, that's interesting and broaches
a subject about which I know nothing.
Maybe it will be enjoyable digging out
the details of my musket conver ion and
the "Fenian Brotherhood." ne mall
problem; my Needham conversion is in
centerfire and the one in the famou
Nunnemacher collection is a rimfire. Oh
well, cartridges in .58 caliber for the
various musket conversions were made
in both centerfire and rimfire. I'll just
have to gooutand find another Needham
of the rimfire variety. In the meantime
it would be well to go back to the library
and find some more information.
The next book I examined was, United
States Muskets, Rifles and Carbine by
Colonel Arcadi Gluckman, United States
Army, published back in 1948. Since
twenty years had passed since the
Milwaukee publication, one might assume
that a bit of scholarly research had been
accomplished and additional information
made available. No such luck . The
description of the Needham conversion
on page 282 merely rehashes the same
wording, including:
. "The breech-block swung by a knurled
projecting knob, horizontally to the
right and forward, exposing the breech
for the insertion of a rim -fi re
cartridge."
Actually this is understandable, as in
Appendix XI, the bibliography, there is
a listing"Metschl-Bulletin of Milwaukee
Museum,Nunne:macherCollection." What
happened was that Colonel Gluckman
couldn't possibly examine every firearm
described in his book o he had to go to

FEBRUARY 1990

Figure 2. The br e hblock and firing pin ofthe two N dham conversions. Both rifled
mu kc have obviou ly be n converted to centerfire ignition. The de ign was lacking in
ufficient rigidity and wa never u ed after the Fenian epi od . (Photo by Michael Camacho.
Ound

. Ill .)

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Page 25

other references-a very common method

of research.
A few years went by. I went to gun
shows and visited other collectors and
occasionally a Needham conversion would
surface. Every time I would examine
the piece, and every time it was a
centerfire. I located two in Wisconsin,
both centerfires. Three in Illinois, two in
New York, four in the Springfield
Arsenal Museum, one in the West Point
collection-and all were centerfire rifle .
Now this is getting ridiculous! Where
the devil are those Needham rimfires
that all the books are describing? I kept
looking and one day at a Memphis,
Tennessee gun show there was a Needham
conversion with a Bridesburg lock in
excellent plus condition and the price
was right. I picked it up with great
anticipation, opened the action and it
was center/ire. I couldn't leave it th r .
In spite of it being centerfire, I did not
have one with a Bridesburg lock- o I
bought it. Now when you hav two of
something your intere t, curio ity, and
possibly fru tration oar to a new high.
Back to the library for more research-

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The Milwaukee Public Museum stated

that "Guns of this kind were issued to the
regular Army and the Militia." That
would mean that the system should be
covered in another book, namely The
Breechloader in the Service by Claude

"Springfield Rifle , Needham System,

58 centerfire, length 36 in., weight 9
lbs ............ $5.00"
I really don't know why ome company
would issue a catalog on Chri tma day,
but it ure was refreshing to find that at
least someone wa talking about a
Needham in centerfir .

Fuller. This monumental work covers

the government trials of July, 1867 which
were "Conversion of Muzzle-Loading
mall Arms into Breechloaders" and
the Needham is included. Although the
trials called for the U.S. muskets to be
converted to centerfire cartridges, some
rim fire arm were tested.

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and the story wa the ame. If they

mentioned the Needham conver ion it
was always a rimfire, except I found a
copy of the "E.C.Meacham Arms Co."
catalog of December 25th, 1884 (St.
Louis, Mo.) and there was listed:

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Page 26

THE GUN REPORT

Scrutiny of the Needham trial report

and patent drawing do not reveal that
the arm wa centerfire or rimfire, but
all arm that were in rimfire were so
mentioned. I can only a sume that the
Needham in the trial wa actually
centerfire. The trial itself did not elevate
the stature of Jo eph and George H.
Needham. Their musketconver ion came
in about last! To give the readers some
idea, the Remington y tern had only 17
mi firesoutofone thou and round . The
Milbank conversion, 36 misfires; the
Roberts rifle , 43 mi fires and the
Needham, 84.
I am sure that no Needham rifles
" ... were issued to the regular Army and
the Militia." I'm ure that John Metschl
said that back in 1928 because he
encountered more than a few of themthey were all in military configurationand he gue ed.
To bring our re earch up to date we
must check probably the mo t inclu ive
arms book in the history of our countryFlayderman' Guide to Antique American
F irearms." Naturally, theN dhammu t
be included and ure enough, on pag
457 in the third edition (19 3) and on
page 456 in the fourth edition (19 7)
there is pictured a clo e-up of th
Needham action. The description include
".58 Rimfire Cartridge." To come up
with a book of this magnitude, Norm
had to have literally dozens of knowl edgeable people out there to help him.
Obviou ly the per on upplying the
information on the Needham ystem
checked published source and just
a urned that the Needham have to be
in rimfire.
One day I wa pa ing through my
upstairs hall and happened to glance at
the door to the gunroom and there,
leaning again t the door frame , wa one
of my Needham conversion. In that half
light I suddenly had a strange feeling.
With that hammer mounted on the right
side and knowing that the hammer
extension went straight forward into
the mechanism , it looked like a rim/ire!
I know that John Metschl made a few
mi take back in 1928, but how could he
blatantly call omething a rim fire when
it wasn't? By thi time I'm convinced
that all Needham are in centerfire with
the pos ible exception of some few
experimental pieces made Lord knows
where, for what purpo e. The only thing
to do i to go to Milwaukee and examine
specimen "N3668" and find out whatinell
they have.
I topped in to the mu eum a time or
two but it wa the wrong day of the week
and the right people were not available.

FEBRUARY 1990

Figure 3. A number of variant form of the .5 caliber centerfire cartridg

u din
go rnment trial of 1 67. Th round that app ar to be rimfire are example of the
"in id prim d" nt rfir - a y t m u d by
rdnance into the 1 0 . (Photo by
Mi huel ma ho. Dundee. Ill.)

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Page 27

Finally I got in touch, by mail, with H.

Michael Madaus who is the Assistant
Curator of History and under the date of
March 2nd, 1989 he sent me a very
kindly and informative letter which
included the following:
"We have checked the specimen in
question, our collection No. N3668,
and find as you suggest that the arm
is indeed centerfire. The firing pin
passes directly through the center of
the breech-block."
Over sixty years of misinformation
has finally been rectified. No longer do I
have to ask and seek for a Needham in
rimfire. Somehow I still can't believe it.
Do you mean to mean to tell me that not
one knowl edgeable person in some
po ition of authority ever took a look at
one of tho e things? Well , shame on you ,
whoever you are.
My deliberations and study cone rning
the Needham/ Fenian ituation ha
covered a period of over fiv y ar . In
the meantime I haver ad thr book on
the subject and om
undry other
published information.
I have learned a lot and although it is
not the purpo e of this article to give a
detailed history of the Fenian movement,
I mu t impart relevant facts which will
at lea t set the situation straight.
For starters, contrary to what John
Metschl sugge ted, the conversion should
not be called "Bridesburg Rifle." The
reason that the vast majority ofNeedhams
have Bridesburg locks is because the
large batch of muskets purchased in
1866 came from the Bridesburg Works.

These muskets were the arms used in

the Fenian raid into Canada on June 1st
of 1866 and have nothing whatsoever to
do with the Needham conver ion.
Further:
"A total of 4,220 muskets were purchased from the Bridesburg Arsenal ,
Philadelphia and distributed among
the Fenian on May 3rd." (again 186 )
With these Civil War muzzleload r
they went into Canada. Their uc e
was brief and upon returning to th
United States their arm w r tak n

F igure 4. Fenian m u kets are u ually mar ked in one way or a nother. Both of the
author' conver ion bear an "IN" on the left ide of the tock. The pin een protruding
from the hammer hold the hammer ex te n ion in place. (Photo by Michael Camacho. Dundee. Ill.)

"Tevis was sent to Philadelphia to

purchase arms from the arms company
of Jenks and Mitchell."

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from them . We must remember that

political pressures have existed since
shortly before the stone age; consequently,
because of politics and the desire for the
Irish vote the muskets were returned to
the Fenians. I'm sure that the authorities
reasoned that these Irish-Americans had
more or le s learned their lesson and
outside of having a convention or two
and maybe a few beers were all-in-all a
fairly harmless group.
What they didn't realize was that
more than a few of the Fenians were
v ry erious in their intent. They wanted

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THE GUN REPORT

Figure 5. With the center barrel band lid forward, one can see that the musket with the Springfield lock plate (above) ha a one-piece
tock. T he lower mu ket that utilize a Bride burg lockplate ha th two-piece tock. (Photo by Michae l amacho. Dund e. 111.)

to conquer Canada, and bargain with

England for complete Iri sh in dependence.
The Fenians reorganized, collected
more money from their sympathizers
and membership and planned another
raid into Canada. By this time it was
1869 and Civil War muzzleloaders were
not the order of the day. They somehow
got hold of someone who, for a priceand probably a very low price- would
allow them to alter their muskets to the
Needham system. After all, the Needham
conversion was a dead duck by that
ti me; Joe and George would take about
anything.
In spite of what the books say and
correspondence from the West Point
Museum (1986), the conversions were
not done at the Bridesburg Works!
"...That the organization have a factory
ator near Trenton, N.J. where muskets
and rifles are being converted into
breech loaders."
--and-"I am further informed that they are
very busy now in their factory at
Trenton, N.J. altering arms into
breech loaders."
--further-"lt was in Trenton that the greater
part of the rifles were manufactured
or altered, under the supervision of
FEBRUARY 1990

P.J. M han , who r nt d th armory

there for that purpo . o qui tly wa
this work executed that th citjz n
of Trenton outside of the Fenian
Organization were in ignorance of
it."
Just exactly where in or around
Trenton this factory was located, I do
not know. One would assume it was the
same arms works that supplied the21 ,995
regular Model 1861 rifled muskets that
were purchased by the government
during the Civil War. However, that
location is in ome doubt. In reading the
correspondence between the ordnance
people and the two co ntractors, A.M.
Burt and J .T. Hodge, the following are
encountered: "Trenton Locomotive and
Machine Manufacturing Co."; "Trenton
Locomotive Work "(probably the same);
"Trenton Iron Co."; " ur own factory"
and "Our own shop ." Po ibly ome of
our collector friend s in th Tr nton locale
will unscramble this on .
After much confusion and some delay,
the Fenians went back to Canada, thi
time by way of Vermont. They were
carrying their Needham conversions in
.58 centerfire. This is not to say that
other arms were not used. Many of the
Irish Brotherhood, as in the first raid,
had their own firearms. Some were
carrying Spencers and converted Sharps
carbines. There are, in collections today,
various Civil War carbines with marks

lik I tt r and hamrocks that could

w 11 mean Fenian as ociation.
At any rate , on May 25th , 1870, two
hundr d of the Fenians charged across
the border to a dismal confrontation. If
the fir t Fenian "invasion" was an
unmitigated flop, this brief skirmish
was the fatal fiasco. Their leader was
arrested by the U.S. authorities and
their arms confiscated. Actually the U.S.
Government didn't know what to do
with the equipment confiscated from,
and abandoned by, the Fenians.

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Page 29

"They are of little value, made of the

poorest material and it cost the
Quartermaster's Dept. a good deal
for their transportation; that the stocks
of the muskets and rifles are sawed in
two, so a to fold up and be packed in a
short trunk or case. I advise that the
articles had better be burnt than be
returned to the Fenians."
The rifles were not burnt. They remained in governmentstorage until some
unknown later date when they were sold
off, probably by auction, to tho e who
dealt in such merchandise. As noted
above, the E.C.Meacham Co. had them
for sale in 1884 for five dollars. I don't
know when Francis Bannerman Sons
got into the act, but they offered the
Needham in 1925-the price oared to a
handy $25.00.
The Bannerman de cription i interesting. They showed a very accurat
drawing of the Needham action-you
can even see "Bridesburg" on th lockplate. They did not tell their cu tomer
what caliber the arm was or whether it
was a centerfire or a rimfire and then

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Page 30

they compounded the confusion by calling

it a "Milbank."
"Mi Iban k's breech-loading alteration
of Civil War Spri ngfield musket.
Patented in 1867, by I.M. Milbank
and submitted to the government
along with some others as a means of
utilizing the thousands of muzzleloading arms then on hand. Some of
these rifle found their way into
Canada in 1870, and were u ed by the
Fenians in their raid. The breech
block swings to the right and forward
exposing the chamber: the point of
the hammer acts as a lock upon
discharge. An interesting American
weapon. Price, $25.00"
This identical ad wa faithfully r peated in the Bannerman atal g of
193 and 1940. It ev n app ar d in
Bannerman' lOOth anniv r ary atalog
in 19 - how v r, with th pric tag. To
onfu
th N dham and Milbank
y t m i not urpri ing. They both
have a breechblock that wing to the
right and forward and the Needham
patent, name, or what have you, does not
appear on the Fenian muskets.
Opinion and Conclusion
Needham/Fenian muskets will be
found with both a one-piece stock and a
two-piece stock. The two-piece stocks
will have an il'!verted "V" cut under the
middle band.
The tock flat on the left ide may have
a Fenian mark. Bothof mine are marked
with an "IN" (lri h Nationali ts?), other
will be found with an "I R" and a
ham rock.
Other than the one lockplate marked
" pringfield" that I have, all other
either examined or described to me have
had "Bride burg'' lock .
The weak point of the Needham
onver ion i that the hammer ex ten ion
deliver a glancing blow to the firing pin
as against a direct blow. Al o the hammer
xten ion acts a a locking tud without
being firmly held in place.
All thing considered, the Fenian
mu ket deserve greater attention from
the collecting fraternity. We may collect
item of one ort or another, but the
truth is, we collect history, and for all its
mi guided enthusia m, military failure,
and hattered dreams , the Fenian
Movement is a permanent part of our
hi tory.
It's been a long time getting thi
article together. I've run into a few
nag , met ome interesting people and
enjoyed the challenge. Fortunately
friends and trangers have aided in my
efforts. I would particularly wi h to

acknowledge the help of the following:

Don Blyth, Guelph, Ontario, Canada;
Robert W. Fisch, West Point Museum;
Jim F. Hogan, Bayport, New York;
H. Michael Madaus, Milwaukee, Wisc.;
Bill Meuse, Springfield Arsenal Museum;
Tom Posniak, Carpentersville, Illinoi ;
Bill Rutter, Menomonee Falls, Wisc.;
H. Brooks Smith, Lake Forest, Illinois.

Bibliog raphy
Bannerman Catalogs, 1925, 1938, 1940,
1966.
D'Arcy, William, The Fenian Movement
in the United States 1858-1886. Russel
and Russel, New York, 1947.
Flayderman, Norm, F/,ayderman's Guide
lo Antique American Firearms. Northbrook, Ill., 1983 and 1987.
Fuller, Claude, E., The Breech-Loader
in th ervice. New York City, 1933.
Th Rifled Musket, The Stackpole Co.,
Harri burg, Penn., 1958.
luckman, Arcadi, United States
Musk ts, Rifl , and Carbines. Buffalo,
New York, 1948.
McCarry, Charles, "The Wild Irish War,"
True Magazine, August, 1958.
Meacham, E.C., Arms Catalog, Dec.,
1884.
Metschl, John, N unnemacher Coll~ction,
Milwaukee, Wisc., 1928.
Neidhardt, W.S., Fenianism in North
America, Pennsylvania State Univerity Pre s, 1975.
Tansig, Charles C., America and the
Fight for Irish Freedom, 1866-1922,
reenwich, Conn., 1957.
Walker, Mabel G., The Fenian Movement,
Colorado prings, Colo., 1969.
Ed. Note: The excellent deep re earch by
Mr. Burnside is an intere ting comment
on "old collecting" versus "new collecting."
Until very r cent times we all tended to
ignor the le popularly collected guns,
and blindly accepted whatever re earch
t as done on them year ago, right or
wrong. Basically a matter of no one
caring enough about the unpopular pieces
to do the work needed to clear up the
mi take of the past. Colts, Winche ters,
tc., got the public attention and thus
re earch and new information. I am sure
that there are many other nice but unpopular or ignored guns that for many
year have been accepted as being X and
not Y, while, in f act, some deep re earch
would prove mo t of the books wrong! We
just need someone to care enough about
that particular field or maker to take the
time to research it and then write about it.
The Gun Report welcome any careful
res arch of this nature, and will be happy
to consider it for publication.
o

THE GUN REPORT

~UN
REP@RT

Editor and Publisher

Kenneth W. Liggett

Publication Director
Kandy Liggett-Harrison

Dedicated to the Interests of Gun Enthusiasts E verywhere

Volume 35 Number 9

February 1990

Publication Manager
Kathy Jackson

Production Manager
Nancy Bowker

ARTICLES

Circulation Manager

14

Business Manager

Dory Skaalen-Liggett

Boyd & Tyler-An Unusual

American Made Double

Greg Liggett

by Wm. M. Furnish and CDR Roy Gu nth r

24

The Fenian Musket

36

On Our Cover- A Souvenir of th

Eiffel Tower

by Graham Burnside

by Eric Vaule, Staff Editor

42

Collecting the Winch t r M

Part 5- onclu ion

l7

78

An 1851-61 Colt Navy

82

A Quick Guide to Martial R min t n

Percussion Revolvers

by Wm F . Boyer

by Stephen B. Cook, M.D.

REGULAR FEATURES
Powder Flask
by C. R. Suydam

12

32

Reader's Forum
The Cartridge Collector
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40

84

Gun Show Calendar

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88

90

St ff Photographers
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Norm f'layderman
111 rh Glas8
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clvl ory Board

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