Enfield .410?

camster

camster

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Believe in small worlds/coincidences?

Just a few days ago, a fellow CGN'er and I were talking[typing] about Milsurps. He told me of one of his that seemed interesting. It's an Enfield, in .410. Neat story about why he had one (or even, knew of it...).

... Walked into the local shop/smith's today and, guess what's there? An original .410 Enfield, full-wood. Stamped 1949 I think... It's not "touched" by Bubba... He'd asked if I'd ever heard of one....

Yes indeed!
 
I've been wanting to fart around with one of these Indian enfields for some time now.
Some folks have them opened up to accept factory .410 ammo
However under most cases these rifles run a variant of .410 ammo based off the 303 case. If you end up picking one of these babies up make sure you get a chamber cast.

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Muskets are fun!

You can blow out .303 brass (anneal it first) with a light charge of Red Dor or other shotgun powder and a .410 wad with a single .33" piece of buckshot. Trim the case-mouths square and chamfer. Later loadings you can use a couple of .375" pistol balls (for a .36 Navy).

Factory ammo used a single 410 ball with the case-mouth coned over the ball. Long wad column.

Mine shoots pretty much to point of aim at 85 yards.

Muskets are fun!
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In addition to the Indian musket conversions, there were various rifles smoothbored and converted to .410 shotgun in the UK, to allow possession under the less strict shotgun certificate. There were even Brens so converted.
Some importers were reaming the muskets to make sales easier.
I'd suggest, if one has not been altered, to leave it in original condition.
 
I had 2 of them in the UK, interesting to play with but dissapointing to use.
Too cumbersome to be a good shotgun, too inaccurate with slugs to be a rifle. A buddy had one sleeved to .22 which at least was a good rifle.
I'd rather have a good .410 shotgun(single or mossberg pump) or a .303 enfeild, unless it was just for curiosity.
Although I remember a bunch of us setting up a little practical stage where you had to shoot a skeet on the ground, one in the air(on report) and then run up to a carboard box and bayonet it!
 
I found one at a gun show in Glendive Montana about 4 years ago. It was all original, and bore the Dominion of Canada proof marks. The vendor and I surmised it would have been built expressly for use in a prison because my '92 Winchester (initally used in the prison system) has the same proof.

The price - $125. No, I didn't buy it. Wasn't about to go through the hassle of importing it.
 
I've got 3 of these things for some reason, 2 full wood and one I picked up sporterized. All of mine had the chambers opened up and I have fired shot out of the sporter a few times. I have always been going to try slugs, but have never gotten around to it. I think I'm going to sell one of the military ones so I can put together money for a new gun room :D.
 
I believe at one time the British armed certain of the Indian-manned security forces with these. That put the security forces in a much better position than the unarmed populace they were supposed to control, but could not pose much of a threat to the regularly-armed British garrison. Memories of the Indian Rebellion must still have been strong.
 
The original reason for the Musket was as a continuation of the program of single-shot Lee-Enfields for base-gate guards. The problem was the bully boys up in the hills roaring down at night, thumping the gate-guard upside the head and running off with a 1000-yard rifle and 60 rounds of fresh ammo. So they built some single-shot rifles out of older issue rifles and used these. Also issued some of the single-shots to various regiments of troops with unenviable records for reliability.... or the lack thereof.

But the bully-boys still liked the nice 1000-yard rifles, especially as the single-shot mod could be converted back to a repeater. Restricting the ammo just made the prize a bit smaller, so they came up with the Musket. In this way, the Gummint could control the ammunition AT SOURCE..... and the bully-boys wanted nice 1000-yard rifles, not something with a maximum useful range (with ball) of perhaps 40 yards.

The Musket got into the prison service BECAUSE it was so useless. It was a threatening thing to face, especially with 17 inches of steel on its front AND, if it had to be fired, you shot only the man in front of the thing...... and not the 6 guys behind him. Remember, the Mark VI Ball cartridge would knock that 215-grain bullet through FOUR FEET of seasoned pine.

My Musket has no price tag on it. Its just too darned much FUN to play with!

BTW, the proper name for the thing is the LEE-ENFIELD MUSKET. A Musket is a military shoulder firearm with a smooth bore. The LEM is, truly, the Last Musket issued for military use. It is the direct, and final, descendant of Brown Bess.
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I've finally got a reason to start reloading .410 hulls after picking up one of these old jewells.
They're a great piece of history.

Cant wait to break a hand thrown clay with a No.1 Mk lll with a bayonet mounted.
BT-99's beware!!
 
smellie said:
Muskets are fun!

You can blow out .303 brass (anneal it first) with a light charge of Red Dor or other shotgun powder and a .410 wad with a single .33" piece of buckshot. Trim the case-mouths square and chamfer. Later loadings you can use a couple of .375" pistol balls (for a .36 Navy).

Factory ammo used a single 410 ball with the case-mouth coned over the ball. Long wad column.

Mine shoots pretty much to point of aim at 85 yards.

Muskets are fun!
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Click to expand...

Think they were meant as a guard gun and one of those British quirks to make ammunition unavailable to "unauthorized " personel.

Grizz
 
TV-PressPass said:
Bren gun would be amazing in .410!
Click to expand...

I don't know if they actually worked, other than as a single shot. It was just a modification to facilitate ownership of something other than a dewat.
I saw a very nice Lee Speed sporting rifle that had been similarly smoothbored. Had the shotgun style tang safety. Anyway, it was rebuilt with a SMLE barrel on this side of the pond.
 
I've heard the explanation of this being a guard rifle before. Frankly, I'm inclined to discount it. The Yanks produced a gallery and guard round in .30-06, using a 150gr bullet and Bullseye powder (ya gotta love Bullseye). If the intent was to produce a less dangerous weapon, it would have been much cheaper and simpler to down-load the .303 in the same fashion. To go to all the trouble of rebarrelling rifles, it seems to me that there had to be something more to it. Could be wrong, of course.

BTW, there were supposedly Lee-Metfords converted to this round as well as Lee-Enfields.
 
If you check the Muskets themselves carefully, you will find that they WEREN'T rebarreled. Muskets very often were made from rifles which were even poor candidates for an FTR. The barrels were line-bored and reamed out and someoby ran a chamber reamer through them and that was IT.

Rather than messing about with a Guard round, the Yanks should have used some of those million condemned 1903 Springfields. Oh well, they weren't trying to deal with people who saw armed guards as a chance to get a free modern weapon.

The Musket solution was brilliant. You make available firearms which are noisemakers essentially, with a handful of short-range ammo which cannot be used in a good rifle. Ammo for the Musket won`t even fit into the Rifle, Rifle ammo was useless in a Musket, the Muskets themselves are made almost for free, from junkers...... and the ammo, which can be controlled at source, fits NOTHING else in the world, is made from semi-finished .303 (so NO new production facilities or equipment needed)...... and the whole finished package is just about the IDEAL prison-guard rifle.

Talk about making your garment according to the cloth you have available!

Really smart!

And fun!
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