I ran into this picture of the Ross Rifle and thought a vignette of Canadian history would appeal to historians and gun geeks.
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| The Ross Rifle |
The Ross Rifle was a straight pull bolt action rifle, chambered for .303 British rounds. It was invented by Sir Charles Ross, a wealthy British inventor and entrepreneur, in the late 1800s and first used in the Second Boer War 1899-1902. Ross' design was inspired by the straight-pull Austrian Mannlicher M1895 rifle introduced into Austro-Hungarian service in the 1890s and used throughout World War I.
The operating principle of the straight-pull bolt action
comprises a bolt "sleeve" to which the bolt lever or handle
is attached. The sleeve is hollow and has spiral grooves or "teeth"
cut into its inner surface in which slide corresponding projections or
"teeth" on the outside of the bolt head or "body". As the
bolt lever and sleeve are moved, the bolt head is forced to rotate through
about 90°, locking or unlocking it in the receiver of the rifle. The bolt
handle and sleeve thus need only be pushed backwards or forwards to open or
close the action of the rifle.
In conventional bolt-action rifles such as the Lee–Enfield, the bolt is unlocked or locked by the raising or lowering of the bolt handle, before the bolt is drawn back and after it is pushed forward. The single motion required to open or close the bolt of a straight-pull-action rifle is theoretically faster and easier for soldiers to learn, thus perhaps offering a higher rate of fire.
Coming to Canada in 1897, Ross submitted some of his .303-caliber rifles with their straight pull, back-and-forth bolt actions to Canadian Minister of Militia Sir Fredrick Borden, in early 1901. Borden was impressed not only with the Ross rifle, but also by the fact that it could be manufactured in Canada, at Ross’s factory in Quebec City. A five-man committee was appointed including Sir Sam Hughes, who was to become the Minister of Militia and National Defense at the outbreak of World War I.
The Ross rifle proved to have serious problems from the beginning.
The North West Mounted Police tried them in 1902 and went back to the Winchester
’73 because the bolt kept falling out. The British Colonial Office opposed
adopting the Ross because tests found it inferior. They informed Canada but
were ignored. Sir Sam Hughes, the Minister of Militia and Defence, became an
almost fanatical supporter of the Ross rifle, and refused to hear any
complaints against it.
In WWI, Canada was still a colony of the British Empire but
anxious to prove its independence. When Britain refused to arm Canadian troops
with the Lee-Enfield, or even license its production in Canada, Ross convinced
Prime Minister Sir Wilfred Lauier to adopt the Ross Rifle, by building a
factory in Canada and received an order for 12,000.
Numerous modifications had made the Ross Mark III eight
inches longer and more than a pound heavier than the Lee-Enfield. It was
too long for trench warfare. During training, the Ross misfired frequently and the
bayonet fell off the rifle when firing was carried on with fixed bayonets. But
the mud, filth and rotting corpses of the trenches were its undoing. Any dirt
at all on the bolt and the rifle jammed.
Hughes tried to blame it on inferior .303 British bullets as
Canadian bullets were made to a higher standard. Maybe partly but the real
problem was dirt on the bolt.
In April 1915, after the bloody fight at the Second Battle of
Ypres, Belgium, 1,452 of the 5,000 surviving Canadian soldiers threw away their
Ross rifles and picked up Lee-Enfields from British casualties. British
Commander in Chief Sir John French issued orders rearming the First Canadian
Division with Lee-Enfields.
Sam Hughes was fired while in London in 2016 for bad
mouthing the Prime Minister.
The superb accuracy and faster loading capability of the Ross
made it an excellent sniper’s rifle. Although it would be replaced as the
standard issue service rifle, the Ross would remain a valuable sniper’s weapon.
After the war, some Ross rifles were adapted to target shooting and
hunting rifles.
The Ross Rifle became a legend and a lesson. Ego can never
replace facts on the ground.
https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/the-troublesome-ross-rifle-of-wwi/
https://www.warmuseum.ca/firstworldwar/history/battles-and-fighting/weapons-on-land/rifles/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_rifle#
