Black Powder, White Smoke

A French Breechloading Carbine in the Confederacy?

By Joe Bilby · Originally published February 2018 · p. 8

My friend Skip Riddle, who lives in North Carolina and has a special interest in all aspects of the battle of New Bern, sends me firearm related newspaper excerpts he discovers in his research. His latest microfilm clipping, from the April 17, 1862, edition of the Amherst, N.H., newspaper Farmer’s Cabinet, reads: Mr. Hiram Staples of Nashua, in the 25th Mass. Regiment, has sent home a specimen of a secesh weapon which he captured at Newbern. It is a breech-loading carbine of French make, and a very convenient weapon – superior in its arrangement in some respects to any of the American make. This reference to a French breechloader in Confederate Army service was something I had never seen before, so I turned to my mid-19th century firearms polymath, Bill Adams, to see if he had any ideas on the subject. Bill’s response was: Very interesting, but there is no way to determine if the carbine was actually French. There was a French breechloading cavalry carbine carried by the CentGarde, the household cavalry that guarded the emperor Napoleon III, and several period writers mentioned those carbines. According to comments made by American and British writers, these weapons were .36 caliber and not considered very powerful, perhaps due to the small bore size. It seems that the carbines were chambered for a 9-millimeter pin fire cartridge. The cartridge case may have been elongated to give the guns more power than initially thought. Bill did some further research and concluded that the Cent Garde carbine used a center fire cartridge rather than a pinfire, and that the revolutionary ammunition apparently provided an inspiration to the American inventor Jacob Snider. Snider, after meeting and discussing breechloaders with France’s Chief Armorer Gastenne Renette, who demonstrated the Cent Garde carbine for him, created a breech loading design adopted by the British army to convert muzzle loaders. Interestingly, Snider was born in Montgomery, Ala., although he later moved to Philadelphia and London. Since the Cent Garde, an elite detachment, initially composed of about 140 men, later expanded to several hundred, was Napoleon III’s personal bodyguard troop, “renowned for their fine physique and bearing,” it is not surprising that they were armed with the most advanced weapons available. According to other sources, the carbine, also known as the fusil lance, was developed in 1854 directly on the orders of Napoleon III, who had a personal interest in artillery and firearms technology. The French emperor reportedly “demanded the construction of a carbine which should be loaded at the breech by means of a cartridge carrying its own priming, and be provided with a sword forming a bayonet or lance.” With that sword bayonet attached, the weapon was seven feet, seven and three quarters inches in length. Interestingly, the two pistols issued along with the carbine were supposed to be furnished with the same breechloading action. An 1855 article in the London Observer newspaper pointed out that the Cent Garde carbine was “of very small bore and whose exposed breech does not admit of heavy lead, and so does not require powder sufficient to cause palpable recoil.” The absence of recoil resulting from a small caliber was considered an asset by the French, “so that the soldier has full liberty of action.” Apparently, a London gunmaker named Lang produced a similar firearm, in both rifle and shotgun format. The Observer writer, somewhat strangely in retrospect, considered the metallic cartridge a potential design deficit, complaining that the guns “must have the cartridge case extracted after every discharge, frequently a tedious process.” He no doubt thought the Sharps type breechloader that consumed the cartridge in its entirety on firing was more effective. He did have a point, though, in his conclusion that “the rifles…become useless the moment their especial cartridges are exhausted, as these cannot be fabricated in the absence of machinery.” Of course, there were lots of odd firearms around during the era of transition from muzzle loading to breechloading weapons, which began with cavalry arms. It is generally assumed that only about 300 Cent Garde carbines were produced, and the odds of one finding its way to North Carolina, especially when it was in active service in France, were slim, to be kind. The

A member of the Cent Garde armed with a fusil lance and sword bayonet. (Wickimedia Commons & Public Domain)

singular ammunition used also made it likely that the gun could not have been used in any extensive action. So, the weapon described as captured at New Bern that a Yankee soldier believed was French could have been one of several different European designs, including the German Dreyse. No mention was made of a long saber bayonet attached. How the carbine in question, whatever it was, and there is no doubt it was out of the ordinary, ended up in North Carolina, perhaps in the hands of a Confederate cavalryman, is, and will continue to remain, a mystery. Bill wondered if the gun in question had wound up in a GAR collection after the war, something I pondered as well. As posts closed over the years, their collections were dispersed. If any reader has ever seen a weird looking gun declared to be Confederate in a New England historical society, a local flea market or gun show, or in your great uncle’s attic, let me know. We do know that Hiram Staples, a 20-year-old mechanic from Nashua, N.H., enlisted in the 25th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment at East Douglas, Mass., on Sept. 14, 1861, as a private. On Oct. 10, 1863, he was transferred to the Signal Corps. He survived the war. Joseph G. Bilby received his BA and MA degrees in history from Seton Hall University and served as a lieutenant in the 1st Infantry Division in 1966–1967. He is Assistant Curator of the New Jersey National Guard and Militia Museum, a freelance writer and historical consultant and author or editor of 21 books and over 400 articles on N.J. and military history and firearms, and as publications editor for the N.J. Civil War 150 Committee edited the award winning New Jersey Goes to War. His latest book, New Jersey: A Military History, was published by Westholme Publishing in 2017. He has received an award for contributions to Monmouth County (N.J.) history and an Award of Merit from the N.J. Historical Commission for contributions to the state’s military history. He can be contacted by email at jgbilby44@ aol.com