Chris Kyle, American Gun, A History of the U.S. in Ten Firearms

[gunsmith]

http://www.harpercollins.com/books/American-Gun/?isbn=9780062242716

  Just finished the book, rereading several chapters because of it's general awesomeness.
Some of it will be old news to most of us, but there was also a whole lot that I didn't know.
Sgt York for instance, I guess because all I knew was that old black and white movie about him - I should have realized that movies are the worse ( especially the older ones ) for representing history accurately.
I had no ide that when he captured those Germans that he had started off with the 1903 Springfield
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M1903_Springfield but transitioned, during battle to his (Colt?) 1911...

The Chapter on the M1903 barely mentions York but the Chapter on the 1911 really goes into thrilling detail.
Now I want both.

He went into a little detail about his sniper rifles but there is probably a lot more of it in his other book that came out in 2012 - I think it was 20212 - not 100% sure but I will be reading it soon.

However the little detail he went into makes me want a Remington 700 in .338 Lapua ...
Or this
http://www.americanspecialops.com/special-ops-weapons/tac-338-sniper-rifle.php
As well as this http://www.springfield-armory.com/armory.php?model=11

Your local library will have this book if you have not read it yet-or buy a copy and give it to yourself or someone as a gift...I'm now really looking forward to his first book.

[vaskidmark]

Alvin York's WWI diary on-line http://acacia.pair.com/Acacia.Vignettes/The.Diary.of.Alvin.York.html

He admits to using "an old Army rifle".

stay safe.

ETA - typo

[gunsmith]

Alvin Yorl's WWI diary on-line http://acacia.pair.com/Acacia.Vignettes/The.Diary.of.Alvin.York.html

He admits to using "an old Army rifle".

stay safe.

reading it now, it looks like to me that he is talking about being in bootcamp - not in battle.

[gunsmith]

MARCH, 1918
Camp Gordon: Well, they gave me a gun, and oh my, that old gun was just full of grease and I had to clean that old gun for inspection. So I had a hard time to get that old gun clean, and oh, those were trying hours for a boy like me, trying to live for God and do His blessed will. So when I got this gun, I began to drill with the gun, and we had to hike once a week. So I have seen many boys fall out of the hikes. We would have to take long hikes with all our stuff on our back and carry that old gun. Ho ho. And we would have to go out before daylight and have sham battles. So I began to want a pass to go home. That first Army rifle they issued me was all full of grease. Of course I didn't like that. The rifles we used in the mountains were always kept clean. They were muzzle-loading rifles, cap and ball. They make their own guns there in the mountains. They are the most accurate guns in the world, up to 100 or 150 yards. I would rather have had a clean army rifle than a muzzle loader for what we were going to use them for, on account of the repeating shots, but they are not any more accurate than the muzzle-loading rifles. The Greeks and Italians came out on the shooting range and the boys from the big cities. They hadn't been used to handling guns. And sometimes at 100 yards they would not only miss the targets, they would even miss the hills on which the targets were placed.

MAY 21, 1918
LeHavre, France: So we got to France at Le Havre. There we turned in our guns and got British guns. Well, we went out from Le Havre to a little inland camp. I had taken a liking to my gun by this time. I had taken it apart and cleaned it enough to learn every piece and I could almost put it back together with my eyes shut. The Greeks and Italians were improving. They had stayed continuously on the rifle range for a month or two and got so they could shoot well. They were fairly good pals, too. But I missed the Tennesseans. I was the only mountaineer in the platoon. I didn't like the British guns so well. I don't think they were as accurate as our American rifles. Ho ho.

My buddies were some boys from the East. There was Corporal Murray Savage--he got killed in the Argonne-- and Harry Parsons from Brooklyn, New York. I think he was a vaudeville actor. And there were a lot of other Eastern boys who were in my platoon.

It sure was a mixed platoon, with the Greeks and Italians and New York Jews, and there were some Irish and one German. I sure did miss the mountain boys from Tennessee and Kentucky. But I got to like those other boys in my platoon. I was the largest in the platoon.

We got our first gas masks in Le Havre. I was still a private. The man in charge of my platoon was Lieutenant Stewart from Georgia. The company commander was Captain Danforth of Augusta, Georgia. Our platoon sergeants were Sergeant Early and Sergeant Harry Parsons.

Early was busted for being A.W.O.L. after we left Le Havre. After that he was acting corporal. He was a good soldier. Parsons was never busted. He was a good soldier, too. I was made a corporal just before we went into the St. Mihiel drive.

In this battle I was using a rifle and a .45 Colt automatic pistol.

I guess we are both right skid-he says he used "that there old army rifle" in this passage describing the Battle of Argonne - the one that got him all the medals.

[lee n. field]

There we turned in our guns and got British guns.

I remember reading that Sgt. York had actually used the 1917 Enfield. 

[gunsmith]

I remember reading that Sgt. York had actually used the 1917 Enfield. 

& I thought it was the 03 Springfield, I wonder if the official investigation which precedes the awarding of the  Medal Of Honor reports what rifle.

[Scout26]

I remember reading that Sgt. York had actually used the 1917 Enfield. 

I remember seeing that also.  There was some stuff about Alvin York at Ft. Gordon when I was there back in 19eightysomething or other that we were taken to went and saw when I was in AIT.  But I disremember and at the time I wasn't all that into guns like I have been since getting out. 

It might have been there where I saw it.

[gunsmith]

he does say in the online diary that the British gave them guns but he didn't think they were as accurate as our guns, but that was at least a few months before the battle of Argonne

[MechAg94]

I remember reading that Sgt. York had actually used the 1917 Enfield. 

I thought I had heard he was issued an Enfield, but traded or otherwise obtained a Springfield. 

[K Frame]

Interesting.

From what I understand, York's entire division was issued Enfields.

[BryanP]

Yeah, I've always heard that in popular culture it was a Springfield but in reality he carried an Eddystone Enfield.

FWIW, I found this in the Wikipedia entry on the M1917:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M1917_Enfield

An M1917 Enfield rifle was used by Sergeant Alvin York on October 8, 1918, during the event that would see him awarded the Medal of Honor.[5] According to his diary, Sergeant York also used a .45 Colt automatic pistol on that day.[6][7] (The film Sergeant York starring Gary Cooper in the title role, had York using an M1903 Springfield rifle and a German Luger pistol.)

[Perd Hapley]

I just picked up a used copy of this, and flipped to the 1911 chapter. On the very first page, he calls it a revolver.

As to the rifle debate, I gather that it's a bit like the debate over Jim Bowie's knife. No one knows exactly what it was, but theories abound. I think he did say that he really liked the 03, but didn't like the aperture sights on the Enfield.

[230RN]

I believe that back in those days, a lot of the time all handguns were loosely called revolvers.  You can still hear it in some of the old movies, when someone's clearly holding a pistol, although that can be just a mixup between the script and the property people --who knows?

It's like "clips" and "bullets." You still hear that from old timers, out of habit... me, too, sometimes.  It's good to have modern-day correct terminology, but it wasn't even that long ago ( 3-4 years?) that I saw an ad from a regular commercial gunmaker referring to a detachable magazine as a clip.

And who can forget the backwards-cartridge-in-the-magazine advertising brochure?

Hey !  The bullets go in the clip easier that way, no?   

Terry

REF (ETA for folks who've never seen that brochure):
http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2013/05/08/hk-bullets-real-story/

[Perd Hapley]

I believe that back in those days, a lot of the time all handguns were loosely called revolvers.

This book was written three years ago.

It was the late Chris Kyle that called it a revolver, in the book. He wasn't quoting anyone, as far as I could tell.

[Unisaw]

If I recall correctly, American Gun was incomplete When Kyle was murdered and his family completed and published it after his death.  This may have played a role in any errors that ended up in the final product.

[Perd Hapley]

If I recall correctly, American Gun was incomplete When Kyle was murdered and his family completed and published it after his death.  This may have played a role in any errors that ended up in the final product.

Oh, I didn't realize that. Good to know.

[230RN]

York's revolver could also have been an M1917 or a Webley for a while, I suppose.

Movies sometimes generate long-term mess-ups.  

Gee, who knew?

As it happens, I just read a short article in the May 2015 issue of the American Rifleman (p. 38) on "The rifle that wasn't there."  It goes into the fact that in the movie "The Longest Day," the rifle used by  the character Simon Fraser was not used by the real-life Fraser, Lord Lovat.  Fraser (played by Peter Lawford) was a heroic figure in the capture of "Pegasus Bridge."  The movie apparently depicts him using his personal Mannlicher-Schoenauer carbine instead of a Lee-Enfield.

But according to his own diary, he used a U.S. M1 Carbine during that operation.

Go figure.

Amusing side note:  Churchill himself called Fraser "the mildest-mannered man that ever scuttled a ship or cut a throat."

Terry


Edited for spelling

[Hawkmoon]

I believe that back in those days, a lot of the time all handguns were loosely called revolvers.  You can still hear it in some of the old movies, when someone's clearly holding a pistol, although that can be just a mixup between the script and the property people --who knows?

And today there are many who absolutely maintain that a "pistol" can only be a semi-automatic handgun, and that revolvers are not "pistols." And yet the NRA Basic Pistol course materials classify both revolvers and semi-autos as "pistols." Terminology remains the same, but what the terms mean seems to be subject to change.

[230RN]

Kinda the same as the old "This is my rifle, this is my gun...this is for shootin', this is for fun."

Drilled in just to instill discipline, I guess.  I didn't know my boy part was a gun, and I didn't know my AR wasn't a gun.

I'm not objecting to using technically accurate descriptions, but it should be recognized that the language changes, and that sometimes what's accurate at one time may not be accurate only a generation later, as Hawkmoon noted.

Like the spelling for "gonne."

I still forget whether the preferred term for the big guns on battleships are supposed to be called "guns" or "naval rifles."

Or "cannons."

And the swing-out cylinders on DA revolvers?  Don't they fit the definition for a non-detachable magazine?

I guess this is a clip, too... right?  I think it fits the definition, no?



 

Terry

Pic credit in Properties