RIFLE-SHOOTING IN THE UNITED STATES.

Press, Volume VIII, Issue 930, 31 October 1865, Page 3

RIFLE-SHOOTING IN THE UNITED STATES.

The special correspondent of the "Spectator" writes: —Col. Berdan,three years ago plain Mr., owes the military rank, which he has just laid aside without being able to divest himself of the title, to the fact that he has the reputation of being the best rifle shot in the country. The curious in such matters soon after the outbreak of the rebellion instituted a search into our sporting records, and ft was found that although there was proportionately more, rifle-shooting at the South than at the North, the Northern men were theCbest shots, and that at a match in a Slave State —Kentucky, I believe — Mr; Berdan had borne off the honors, and' made a succession of the best shots ever made and recorded in the country. Therefore to him was committed the formation of a body of sharpshooters. He raised two regiments, which had an organisation of their own, but which were distributed by companies through the army of the Potomac, and did excellent service, — in fact made movements possible which hut for them would have been impossible, man was admitted into this corps who did not make in the presence of appointed judges a certain shot at a distance of 250 yards, and the

standard was very rigidly maintained. v Odo day, when the Colonel himself was on the trial ground, two or three men . who had failed to come quite up to the mark, and who were therefore "rejected, said grumblingly that the Colonel himself, unless he were in full practice, must fail sometimes. He had not fired a shot for years, but he at once loaded a rifle, and asked where he should hit the target, which was in the shape of a man in uniform. The forehead was named. He put the ball in tbe centre of the forehead. At call he then perforated the right eye, and afterwards the left. When he asked where he should put another the reply was, "What good of picking out work for you, pick it out for yourself?" " Well," he said, " let him

look "out for his nose." He fired and put the ball right through the point of the nose, so that a line through the centre of the bullet hole in the middle of the forehead fell vertically through the .centre of that in the nose. I took with wet paper, and have kept, an impression of the target with the shots. As the war went on the great

_ desideratum in arms was found to be * the same which has been so eagerly sought of late all over the world —a breech-loading rifle, trustworthy for fine- shooting, and which should be safe, reasonably clean, and not too heavy to be carried on a march. Col. Berdan, who had a high reputation as a mechanician and a mechanical inventor, when his skill with the rifle was entirely unknown except to a few friends, set himself to .work to supply this want, and he disajpp_ared irom the field and from the Bigot, oi men. After some months he Carney light again, bearing a rifle which he expressed a willingness to lave tested and compared with any other on all the important points just named. A trial was made, many riflemen and various rifles entering the lists. The target was set up at 1,200 yards, and at that distance Colonel Berdan put six balls out of seven into the bull's eye. No other man and no ."other rifle did anything worth mentioning. At this trial I was not pre- . ■eofr; "that to witness which we went . down to Flatlands was made to bring • . the new rifle to the attention of our Ordnance Bureau, some of whose officers were present. The shooting ground lay about two miles away from the house, near a low range of sandy , hills, which runß through tbe island _ about midway between the shores, and which is called the Backbone. Upon the-first rise of one of these bills the

target was set up, at a distance of £ three-quarters of a mile, measured with *' a surveyor's chain. To the great disappointment of those of us who had not a professional interest in fire-arms, we found that the trial was to be one of rifles, and not of riflemen, The rifles of all the celebrated -takers and investors in tbe world were there. There were more than twenty of them, British and American, including the Whitworth muzzleloader, and the Whitworth with Westley'Bichard's breech-loading attachment, confessed on all hands then and there to be the best breech-loading rifle in existence. As guns were to be tested and not men, the officers all agreed that the rifles should be fired by one man, a foreign expert, and from _ an iron standard or carriage made for It was dull business ■robing this work, done by the aid of

screw elevators, telescopes, and human specks m the distance carrying little red flags. But the result was that with the Berdan rifle balls were put into the, bull's eye, while with the others it was impossible to hit the target at all ; the shot from the best ot them falling almost vertically, either just before or just behind it, owing to the necessary elevation of the piece. On trying the -penetration of this rifle it was found that while the most powerful of the others penetrated twenty-seven inches of deal board, this pierced thirty-two inches. As it was a breech-loader the inventor had of course provided for it fixed ammunition, and this was used without a particle of grease, and, what seemed to please the officers quite as much as anything else, after all the firing the gun was just as clean at the breach, and from breach to muzzle, as it was just after the first shot. This result of course is due to the construction of the cartridge. The gun is of the size and weight of the ordinary full-sized Enfield rifle. 1 remember that in the " Spectator's " comments upon the last great rifle match in England, it was remarked that the fine shooting was all done with pea rifles, and that for effective service a heavier ball was necessary. This seemed to mc an important point, and I therefore mention that this breech-loading rifle with which Colonel Berdan put six shots out of seven in the bull's eye, at 1200 yards, carries a ball which weighs considerably more than an ounce. The war ended before this rifle could be introduced into the army. 1 wish that my correspondent had had an opportunity of beating it, or beating with it at Wimbledon.