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

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.