Traces the development of rifles, pistols, carbines, and other weapons and examines the impact of firearms on the history of the West

Firearms of the American West, 1803-1865

Science & Math

Garavaglia, Louis A.

Worman, Charles G.

Technology

Univ. Of New Mexico Press

Firearms of the American West, 1866-1894

History

Americas

University of New Mexico Press

The gun, like the axe and the plow, was an essential tool in the exploration and settlement of the trans-Mississippi West. It provided food for the cooking pot as well as protection against two- or four-legged marauders. As the century progressed, firearms also provided various forms of recreation for both men and women, primarily target and competition shooting.
Of course the employment of the gun, whether for good or evil, depended upon the user. The men and women who lived the nineteenth-century western experience sometimes described in detail the role firearms played in their lives. Such accounts included a trapper in the 1830s, a woman crossing the plains by wagon in the 1850s, a drover ("cowboy" in modern terminology) enduring the dangers of a long cattle drive, a professional hunter engaged in the slaughter of the once seemingly endless herds of bison, or a soldier campaigning against American Indians. 
Each account adds to our knowledge of firearms and our awareness of the struggle faced by those who were a part of the western experience. Gunsmoke and Saddle Leather describes the gun's impact on the lives of those in the West--men and women, whites and American Indians--using their own words to tell that story wherever possible.

Gunsmoke and Saddle Leather: Firearms in the Nineteenth-Century American West

This is the second volume of a two-part study of firearms in the nineteenth-century American West. It traces the development of the firearm from the close of the Civil War to the beginning of its modern era, marked in 1894 by the initial army issues of a new high-velocity bolt-action rifle designed for smokeless-powder cartridges. The Winchester Model 1894, a civilian arm adapted for smokeless-powder ammunition, also appeared at that time. Within this period, the authors discuss all the important military and civilian firearms used in the settling of the West, as well as the guns favored by Indians. As in the first volume, this study is encyclopedic in its detail on rifles, shotguns, and handguns and draws on advertisements from newspapers, catalogs, and other primary sources as well. Over five hundred photographs illustrate the weapons and the famous and now-forgotten men and women who used them. This lively and thoroughly researched book examines guns as a integral part of the frontier experience in a society where peace officers and judges were few.

Firearms of the American West, Vol. 2, 1866-1894

University Press of Colorado

In 1803 Lewis and Clark set out on their epic expedition across the American wilderness west of the Mississippi, armed with the typical weapon of their day, the single-shot muzzle-loading rifle. By 1865, a variety of breech-loading and repeating arms had been invented there were both easier to use and more accurate. This encyclopedic study, part one of a two-part book, traces the development and uses of firearms on the frontier during that period, drawing on primary sources such as correspondence and diaries, newspaper accounts, government reports, and patent materials. Equally significant are the many rare photographs and illustrations that accompany the text. Then, as now, most of the advances in weaponry were made in response to the military’s needs, becoming available somewhat later to civilians, and then to Indians. The authors thoroughly cover the refinements and adaptations of weapons for employ by these three groups and by explorers and trappers, describing in detail each gun, its modifications, operations, and uses. Some of the varieties of the weapons discussed include rifles, smoothbores, carbines and musketoons, and pistols. In many ways the history of firearms on the frontier parallels the history of the development of the West. This engrossing, detailed study adds an important new dimension to our understanding of many of the pivotal events in the settlement of the region, broadening, too, our knowledge of the individuals who took part in them.

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Antiques & Collectibles

Univ Pr of Colorado

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Books by Worman, Charles G.