THE MARTINI HENRY.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Any ideas on the provenance on these?

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Martini Henry Parts. For a lot of mixed detail on this weapon see https://www.google.com/search?q=mart...WFG5Oou22g3wM:

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by kahnjar1

Interesting stock shape on this one.......It strongly resembles the Albanian Rasak stock.
Was there a caption with this pic and if so what did it say?
Stu

The Martini Henry was adopted by the Ottoman Empire and a number were highly decorated for VIP gifts see https://www.google.com/search?q=otto...0NcRPQQ22K9dM:

[eftihis]

Here is another one

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Ah nice... Oh I see the loaded indicator arrow is fitted upside down...

[kronckew]

australian issue?

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by kronckew

australian issue?

HAHAHA !

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

THE INVENTOR; Alexander Henry was the Scot who developed the rifling for the Martini-Henry rifle.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

The other Inventor Friedrich von Martini .

[Jon MB]

Some Pics..

Note Butt disk: End of a Kynoch cartridge?

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

But probably the most important ...Mr Henry O. Peabody;

The Martini-Henry Rifle is a weapon of Empire. Unlike the Snider-Enfield it replaced, it was England's first service rifle designed from the ground up as a breechloading metallic cartridge firearm. It protected and served the British Empire and her colonies for over 30 years. This robust weapon utilized a falling block, self-cocking, lever operated, single-shot action designed by Friedrich von Martini of Switzerland. The barrel used the Henry Rifling System, designed by Alexander Henry.

Henry O. Peabody, an American, was actually the father of the Martini action. His design utilized an external hammer to strike a firing pin for cartridge ignition. Mr. Martini's refinement of the design basically consisted of conversion to an internal coiled spring activated striker. Martini's improved design flourished and Mr. Peabody's is nearly forgotten. Later in the British Martini's career, other rifling patterns such as the Metford System and even a system devised at Enfield were adopted. It is therefore common to hear these weapons also referred to as Martini-Enfields or Martini-Metfords.

[Jon MB]

some more pics..

Note use of brass cap on blade of foresight...

I assume this is Omani, but could be from elsewhere on the Arabian peninsula.

See how the sling is short for being slung underarm, with the weapon carried almost under the armpit whilst riding.

Not sure about manufacture...traces of decoration..Belgian export? Or based on post nr.3 of this thread, maybe Pakistan/ Kyber area manufacture.

Note markings on barrel behind rear sight: 'Birmingham'?

Also, see the unit disk, I suppose in imitation of a British rifle..

[Richard G]

Interesting to see the Rasak version (Post no 50) seems to be sporting a date of 1866, which is before the the general adoption of the Martini action and possibly it's invention.
Best wishes
Richard

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Bayonets!

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by Richard G

Interesting to see the Rasak version (Post no 50) seems to be sporting a date of 1866, which is before the the general adoption of the Martini action and possibly it's invention.
Best wishes
Richard

In answer to Khanjar! and Richard G; The Razak butt is similar to the one on Martini Henry shown, however, the inscribed almost scribbled date is spurious as they hadn't supplied them yet. Add to that; the butt may have either been a special consignment for this presentation piece or simply a standard Martini Henry heavily worked on and specially carved.. In fact the supply of Martini Henrys was to be a fiasco of huge proportions as lawsuit on top of lawsuit as well as skulduggery and even ships sinking on route plus financial documents from Bodaciea's chariot which may well have been signed Mickey Mouse...etc.

The Rasak below is described as Quote"Description: A flintlock rasak gun dating: second quarter of the 19th Century provenence: Balkans round, smoothbore, 18 mm cal. barrel with a molded muzzle and an iron foresight, sighted breech with a small engraving; flat plate-lock engraved with floral motifs; long.'' Unquote.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

At Omdurman. The Martini Henry was there although not with the 8,000 British contingent though a few may have still carried it perhaps in the cavalry carbine role etc but the 16,000 plus Sudanese and Egyptian contingent had them... and the artist has clearly captured the huge powder cloud building up in front of the firing line obscuring the target somewhat.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

One excellent reference sits at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martini%E2%80%93Henry covering the technical and practical data of the Martini Henry.

Another reference covers the battle at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Isandlwana

One of the darkest days for the British Army was the battle of Isandlwana against the Zulu. Much of the blame was initially rumoured upon malfunctions or getting the MH ammunition boxes opened. This was untrue and although a number of weapons went unserviceable due to soft case ammunition separating in the breach; this would have been manageable under normal battle conditions.

Essentially the sacred maxim of absolute solid all round defense at all halts was disobeyed at their peril and in particular an uncontrolled mish mash of troops all over the battle field surprised by a huge fast moving tribal infantry ...which essentially over ran the British before they were able to regroup. All they needed to do was form a defensive square and laager up the wagons in it perimeter. Such was the lethality of the Martini Henry that such action would probably have saved the day...

Later some distance away at Rourkes Drift another group of 140 British armed with the same weapon were to beat off 4,000 Zulu by being organised into just that...a solid all round organised and well led defence... if not a little Welsh singing by the Sergeant Major...

[kronckew]

unlike the movie, they were not really a welsh regiment yet - that came later.

there are some who say the two officers, bromhead and chard were fairly incompetent (bromhead was quite deaf and chard was just thick) and most of the defence was set up by one of the other officers & the sargent major.

i've seen adiscussion video on yootoobe that showed the cartridge boxes could easily be opened with a sharp blow from a rifle butt. they were designed that way.

lord chelmsford was even thicker, and blamed everybody but himself for the fiasco at islandwhana, his great friend victoria whitewashed him. the zulu king also warned his brother commanding the zulus at rorkes drift to never attack a dug in british position, which was ignored with the expected result, most of the zulu dead occurred at300-600 yards, the fierce hand to hand melee combat of the movie did not happen. the martini henry was just too much. it was the real hero.

islandhwana was played down and the great victory -really a minor skirmish at best - at rouke's drift got all the media attention and the medals to cover up chelmsford's negligence and stupidity.

[Pukka Bundook]

The last couple of posts are a fair overview of the battles at Isandlwana and Rourk's Drift.

Best books on the subject are;
"Like Wolves on the Fold", and "How can men die Better" By Mike Snook.

There was quite a bit of hand-to hand at Rourk's drift, but not of course as much as in the film.
The bayonet was used, but the Zulu appear to have had a very healthy respect for it, and tried to keep their distance!
The long thin "Lunger" bayonet was the best for the M-H, even if some bent in use.

[kronckew]

yes, there was some. most of the zulu's 800 odd dead were at long range tho. three of the brit dead were from the zulus appallingly bad gunfire, 14 brits were killed by their iklwa and iwisa.

i wonder what would have happened if there had been a detachment of gurkhas there instead of the 24th foot. probably a lot more dead zulus.

the brits at omdurman apparently had troubles with bent bayonets, there was quite a scandal in the UK about bad batches of blades being issued that had not been heat treated. some of these were apparently at omdurman, the soldiers straightened them over their knee and carried on, the kink not affecting their use. some picked up a fallen comrade's weapon with a straight one and carried on. again, most of the charging enemy was killed at long range, in the main charge against the british ranks, only one old man with a flag got to within 50 yards of their lines, staggering on most had been killed or wounded or fled at 100. they of course were amazed at this, then shot him. they had enfields, the egyptians had m-h's tho. they also had machine guns and artillery and the dervishes did not. there was again, a fair amount of hand to hand on various parts of the field, winston churchill in particular had some close calls in a charge there.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Originally Posted by kronckew

yes, there was some. most of the zulu's 800 odd dead were at long range tho. three of the brit dead were from the zulus appallingly bad gunfire, 14 brits were killed by their iklwa and iwisa.

i wonder what would have happened if there had been a detachment of gurkhas there instead of the 24th foot. probably a lot more dead zulus.

the brits at omdurman apparently had troubles with bent bayonets, there was quite a scandal in the UK about bad batches of blades being issued that had not been heat treated. some of these were apparently at omdurman, the soldiers straightened them over their knee and carried on, the kink not affecting their use. some picked up a fallen comrade's weapon with a straight one and carried on. again, most of the charging enemy was killed at long range, in the main charge against the british ranks, only one old man with a flag got to within 50 yards of their lines, staggering on most had been killed or wounded or fled at 100. they of course were amazed at this, then shot him. they had enfields, the egyptians had m-h's tho. they also had machine guns and artillery and the dervishes did not. there was again, a fair amount of hand to hand on various parts of the field, winston churchill in particular had some close calls in a charge there.

That is not quite the case at Omdurman~ see http://www.historytoday.com/david-sh...attle-omdurman

The British position proved unassailable being not only in depth but included gunships to the immediate rear in direct support and covering the gaps. It included recce groups forward as well as various squadrons of lancers capable of offensive action and covered by artillery and machine guns. This was a heavily fortified dug in position and to boot the weapons they had were the most modern of the day. Viz;

Quote"Kitchener’s army of 17,600 Egyptian and Sudanese troops and 8,200 British regulars, was heavily outnumbered, but had at its disposal fifty pieces of artillery, ten gunboats and five auxiliary steamers on the Nile. It also possessed forty single-barrelled, water-cooled Maxim machine-guns, each capable of firing six hundred rounds a minute. The British infantry was equipped with Lee Metford rifles, or its successor, the .303 Lee Enfield. They both had a range of 2,800 yards, and a skilled rifleman could fire up to ten rounds a minute.

The Khalifa’s army consisted of about 60,000 tribesmen, mainly ansars or servants of Allah, referred to as Dervishes by the British. According to the young war correspondent, Winston Churchill, it resembled nothings so much as a ‘twelfth-century Crusader army’ armed with spears, swords, and with hundreds of banners embroided with Koranic texts.

In terms of weaponry, however, the Khalifa’s army was not quite as primitive as it looked. The Dervishes possessed some 15,000 captured shoulder arms, even though they were poorly maintained. Their riflemen were dispersed among the spearmen and swordbearers in the hopes of giving the latter a better opportunity of getting to grips with the enemy. They also possessed some captured pieces of artillery and machine guns but hardly any appropriate ammunition.''Unquote.

Where the enemy went wrong ~and I disagree with the outnumbered situation since when attacking an adversary the number of troops to task should be three to one...The factor here was less than 2 to one...but it was the fact that this was a no surprise, frontal, daylight attack on well trained, prepared troops with support weapons which commenced continuous firing at a range of about 2 miles...If one factor was to play an important part in this battle it was the nonsense of a daylight strike when a night attack would have probably halved the casualty rate and could have been decisive if done with covering fire... They simply weren't trained to do this.

What I find amazing is that many British were left almost out of ammo... and had the enemy brought in reserves at the critical moment the situation could have been different.. Men were down to two rounds... The enemy however were by then shot to bits and still held at range...totally out gunned.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Outgunned indeed. The daylight attack was met with a hail of bullets at 600 rounds a minute from the machine guns both on the frontal position and flanking gunships floating just to the rear and in the gaps. Rifle fire from Enfields and Martini Henry would have been pouring into the massed tribal infantry and in those days before the Geneva convention the British all had dum dum bullets which particularly at 100 to 200 metres would have been devastating..As in fact, was Martini Henry.. You can see rifles being exchanged because they were probably cooking off... too hot... and the reserves in rear with extra resupply of ammo and casualties being recovered... all very modern stuff and in addition British artillery with its new explosive shells was having literally a field day.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

In terms of different ammunition the Martini was trialed with various improvements to the thin paper like crinkly brass case variant that was infamous for jamming in the breach. See http://thebiggamehuntingblog.com/201...ritish-empire/ for an interesting page of detail on the rounds.

Below a belt of my own ammo for the Martini Henry, A british Infantryman with the weapon, a 3 d Image of the system and the evolving ammunition ending with the 303 on the right..

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

There is a good publication on The Martini Henry.

Its states Quote" The breech-loading, single-shot .458in Martini-Henry rifle has become a symbol of both the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879 and the numerous battles in Egypt and the Sudan in 1884-85, but continued to be used by both British and colonial troops well into the 20th century. Its invention and introduction into British service were in direct response to the success of the Prussian Dreyse needle gun, which demonstrated that the breech-loading rifle offered faster loading, improved accuracy and superior range; significantly, the weapon could be loaded and fired from a prone position, thus offering the rifleman greater security on the battlefield. Due to the longevity of service, many Martini-Henry rifles survive today, both in museums and in private collections, and the weapon is highly prized by shooting enthusiasts. Featuring specially commissioned full-colour artwork and an array of arresting first-hand accounts and written by an authority on warfare in the Victorian era, this engaging study tells the story of the powerful Martini-Henry and its impact on the battlefield, from the Anglo-Zulu War to the opening months of World War I."Unquote.

There is a very substantial preview at https://books.google.com.om/books?id...0hENRY&f=false

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

When it came out...The Martini rifle was actually defective. The ejection mechanism was weak. The ammo was paper thin crinkly brass that had a habit of jamming in the breach and the barrel, though reasonable, was not a patch on the Metford that could drop a man at 1000 yards ... Metford himself showed that by using his own weapon in a shooting competition that he won at that very range.

The Martini Henry weapon development can be viewed at~ https://books.google.com.om/books?id...0works&f=false

[kahnjar1]

Originally Posted by Ibrahiim al Balooshi

When it came out...The Martini rifle was actually defective. The ejection mechanism was weak. The ammo was paper thin crinkly brass that had a habit of jamming in the breach and the barrel, though reasonable, was not a patch on the Metford that could drop a man at 1000 yards ... Metford himself showed that by using his own weapon in a shooting competition that he won at that very range.

The Martini Henry weapon development can be viewed at~ https://books.google.com.om/books?id...0works&f=false

Yes....and that is the reason that the lever is so long, so that it gives strong leverage on the cartridge head to extract stuck rounds.
Stu

[Pukka Bundook]

The Martini does have a weak extraction system, and this was made worse by the foil cases. With drawn brass, it works much better.

We use them and other Victorian arms at our annual shoot.
Apart from paper at short range, the P'53, Snider and M-H are also shot at longer range, of about 700 yards.

They can produce quite respectable targets.

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Thanks to kahnjar1 and Pukka Bundook for spot on detail regarding the Martini Henry. The new ammunition and longer ejection handle did a lot to correct the initial fault and looking at the rate of fire in the hands of a trained infantryman the net effect was close to magazine fed weapons with more than 20 rounds a minute being recorded.

One of the big problems; using black powder ammo was a great billowing smoke cloud causing the target to be obscured as seen in the many portrayals of the MH in artworks of the time.

[kahnjar1]

Originally Posted by Ibrahiim al Balooshi

Thanks to kahnjar1 and Pukka Bundook for spot on detail regarding the Martini Henry. The new ammunition and longer ejection handle did a lot to correct the initial fault and looking at the rate of fire in the hands of a trained infantryman the net effect was close to magazine fed weapons with more than 20 rounds a minute being recorded.

One of the big problems; using black powder ammo was a great billowing smoke cloud causing the target to be obscured as seen in the many portrayals of the MH in artworks of the time.

True about the smoke but then all black powder weapons suffered the same problem. The Martini of course was later made in .303 which were smokless, so the target was not obscured.
Stu

[Ibrahiim al Balooshi]

Here's that crinkly case ammo that was a problem when it fell apart in the breach..