Now that's a bayonet

[hpbear101]

I load mine similar to you. I roll paper on a mandrel and glue a bottom on it. I have a big piece of round stock the tight length with a hole the correct diameter. It supports the paper so I can tap down the powder and filler. It’s important to get the OAL length right with filler. I use cream of wheat. How do you install the primer? The normal direction? I put mine in reversed so the needle strikes the anvil.
Unfortunately, I only have a fifty meter range available and with the sights set to the closest distance, I’m 1 meter over my point of aim.

I partially fill the musket cap with 4f then glue it to a card stock disk, then push it into the tube "backwards." I also set up a set of aluminum round stock bored out for a tight fit on the paper/mandrel to support it while giving the powder some compression.

[Rapier]

In US history, the bayonet has played a major roll, the very first hint that the Union Army got that Thomas Jackson was present at the battle of Manasas was the gleaming of his Brigade's bayonetes in the sun rise. Their bright bayonets were sticking up above the knoll that his troops were hidden behind. He had marched and run his troops all night to move 40 miles over mountains to get in a position to surprise the Union Army at sunrise. And suprise them he did.

The Banzi charge in the Pacific is actually a bayonet charge. The Marines on Saipan got a taste of the Imperial Marines, the 6' tall Japanese, in close combat, for the first time, on Saipan with bayonets. Had it not been for Naval gunfire from the ships at sea, the US Marines on Saipan would have been whipped for fair according to most factual historical documents. The Marines that served on Saipan, that I have talked too over the years, said the Imperial Marines were very, very good with the 99 and the 2ft long bayonet it mounted.

[JoeJames]

Several times over the years I have noticed comments about the semi-cruciform shape of many early bayonets. It was often commented that the shape caused the wound to be much harder to heal than one from a knife shaped bayonet, and I assume that was intentional.

[Baltimoreed]

I have shot my trenchgun and an 1866 musket with fixed bayonets and it’s a hoot.

[Wayne Smith]

Thanks, Adam. I too have read history for years as a hobby (my doctorate is in psychology) and was waiting for someone to mention that calvary was still active at the time. A horse will not advance into bright, sharp steel. The times a square was broken was frequently because a horse was injured and fell into the square, usually with the rider dead. The square could not stand that impact.

[Tripplebeards]

Man that thing is long. Pretty cool, Looks like it’s well used. It looks like a slithering snake. lol. Bet it has a few stories to tell.

[Adam Helmer]

I collect military arms and bayonets for each rifle. Several rifles shoot better groups and to the sights with their bayonet affixed. I am on my 15th notebook documenting such things as well as reload performance. It is a fun quest.

Adam

[wilecoyote]

Several times over the years I have noticed comments about the semi-cruciform shape of many early bayonets. It was often commented that the shape caused the wound to be much harder to heal than one from a knife shaped bayonet, and I assume that was intentional.

right. this dates back to final solutions typical of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, when war surgery applied the efficiency of roasting spits to close combat. in Italy there was a particular type of dagger, called misericordia (mercy), specifically designed according to these parameters to finish off the opponent, better if he had fallen from a horse and wearing a bulky armour_
100% intentional and efficient, even in the civil sphere she found an excellent welcome_
the cruciform/triangular bayonets were the last official gesture to legalize this conduct, which generally did not find the same favor among the counterparts, as was being found in possession of explosive ammo or in any case custom ammunition modified to increase its harmfulness. (reverse fmj ball, lead butt exposed, to name one according to the Italian poor man's genius)_
right or wrong, afaik any sharpened/modified bayo was not welcome, as well as against war conventions, and notoriously the pioneer versions, factory sawtooth blade to facilitate field carpentry work, could spell big trouble for the owner, once captured_ I suspect that their high value on the collector's market derives from the fact that a limited number were distributed, and even smaller was the number of those who appreciated the prospect of being taken prisoner and found in possession of such a tool_

[45workhorse]

Trained to use the bayonets, in boot camp.
Only two times I have seen it used, both where training.
One recruit made a comment about another recruits mother! Horizonal but stroke to the head. Instructor looked at the injured recruit, and said, "I guess you learned a valuable lesson today!" Nothing else was said.

The other time Mob training, how the Marine with a M-60 wound up on the front line I don't know, but Marine agitator made a comment and before I could reach him, the buttstock of the M-60 was planted in his chest.

Did not mean to hijack the thread!

[Baltimoreed]

A military shotgun or rifle without a correct bayonet [and sling] is like a day without sunshine.

[challenger_i]

The ultimate "Social Distance" device...

[Sasquatch-1]

I just re-watch "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly," last night. In the scene where the Yanks and the Rebs are fighting over the bridge, I was surprised at how many of the soldiers were carrying fixed sword bayonets. They were actually more prevalent than the spike bayonet.

[Adam Helmer]

In my Civil War reenactment company (42nd U.S. Volunteers, The Bucktails,) all the Springfield M1855 and M1861 rifled muskets take a sword bayonet and the M1853 British Enfields take a spike bayonet. The Rebs adopted the .577 caliber of the Enfield as their standard caliber arm. Both sides in the CW used many Enfields.

Be well.

Adam

[MOC031]

I collect military arms and bayonets for each rifle. Several rifles shoot better groups and to the sights with their bayonet affixed. I am on my 15th notebook documenting such things as well as reload performance.

As a point of interest, the military pams published in the later half of WWII for the Lee Enfield No.4 Mk1 specify that the rifle is to be zeroed for both adjustable and fixed rear sights at 300 yards with the bayonet fixed. Or at least, the British and Canadian pams specify that; I have not seen an Australian pam for the rifle at any time.

Sidebar: While the British and Canadian pams specify zeroing the exact same rifle with the exact same ammunition using the same 300 yard aperture, the value they give for high above point of aim the point of impact should be at different shorter ranges differs greatly. Going on memory, it is a difference of several inches at 100 yards. I have never seen anyone else mention this discrepancy, which leads me to regularly confirm the discrepancy to ensure I didn't make a mistake in what I noticed.

As Larry Gibson pointed out, 300 yards is not a distance where the troops are likely to have already been given the order "Fix bayonets". I primary have used my Long Branch in Service Rifle competition, so I have never bothered seeing what it groups like while comparing bayonet fixed versus no bayonet - I can't imagine being welcomed to join your relay while fixing bayonets.

Historically, the career infantryman and senior NCO remaining in me is intrigued by the question: What was the military thinking behind specifying the rifles would be zeroed at 300 yards with the bayonet fixed? I don't believe that was so with the previous version of the Lee Enfield during WWI. By that time of WWII, those susceptible to the siren whisperings of The Good Idea Fairy would have probably been weeded out by the reality of three years of war with both the Germans and then Japan.

About the only thing I can think of to offer as an explanation is that the military visualized troops defending from fixed defensive positions, engaging an attacking force from 300 yards in. Where, should the attack not be stopped, the last defense would be man to man bayonet fighting in the defensive positions. A desperate ongoing battle that would not leave time for platoon commanders to give the order to fix bayonets at the time when the attacking infantry were now so close that what had been a shooting battle was now going to be bayonets and buttstrokes.

As far as the bayonet being a thing of the past, it is still very much a part of basic infantry training in at least some NATO countries, although certainly not as much as in the aftermath of WWII. The Brits at the very least have on numerous recent occasions put their bayonets to very good use against the hajjis in Afghanistan:

https://www.military.com/history/bri...et-charge.html

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...h-bayonet.html

Having never participated in anything like that overseas on deployment, will say that a couple of times while tasked to act as the OPFOR, watching troops storming towards me as the designated enemy machine gun position, watching a screaming trooper with his war face on closing with me with his bayonet levelled at my face was pretty unnerving, despite the fact I knew it was just another battle in the War With The Fantasians. I remember thinking "I hope this guy remembers that this is just training while I sit here behind this light machine gun loaded with blanks while he practices clearing the enemy fighting positions".

[wilecoyote]

...Historically, the career infantryman and senior NCO remaining in me is intrigued by the question: What was the military thinking behind specifying the rifles would be zeroed at 300 yards with the bayonet fixed? I don't believe that was so with the previous version of the Lee Enfield during WWI. By that time of WWII, those susceptible to the siren whisperings of The Good Idea Fairy would have probably been weeded out by the reality of three years of war with both the Germans and then Japan.
About the only thing I can think of to offer as an explanation is that the military visualized troops defending from fixed defensive positions, engaging an attacking force from 300 yards in. Where, should the attack not be stopped, the last defense would be man to man bayonet fighting in the defensive positions. A desperate ongoing battle that would not leave time for platoon commanders to give the order to fix bayonets at the time when the attacking infantry were now so close that what had been a shooting battle was now going to be bayonets and buttstrokes...

...it would be charitable to remember that every officer who graduated from a war academy was forced to learn from books (!) the ways and tactics of his predecessors.
nor was it obviously worthwhile to question them.
so it happened that in the 1WW there was still a reference to when muzzle loaders and black powder were used, and therefore the bayonet found significant use and utility_ subsequently the mentality of the strategists did not update much with respect to technological progress, with all the nonsense that came with it resulted, together with the waste of human life, and the 1WW was the most tangible testimony of this, even if completely silly things continued to be imposed afterwards, at least here, by us_
​

[MOC031]

...it would be charitable to remember that every officer who graduated from a war academy was forced to learn from books (!) the ways and tactics of his predecessors.​

It would be equally charitable to remember that in the trench war of WWI that you mention, the bayonet was quite useful when those who went over the top ended up clearing the enemy trenches once they got there. Bayonets were also a real thing in WWII, particularly in the Pacific in the close quarters fighting with the Japanese.

As for the Brits mentioned above who used their bayonets affixed to their SA80 rifles to great affect over in the sandbox a few years ago; it is a difficult stretch of the imagination to think the officers of their day responsible for training and equipping them with bayonets were focused on books from their predecessors from the age of muzzle loaders and black powder.

More than a few things in the infantryman's arsenal are hardly ever used - but we carry them anyways, because when you need them, you need them. I never once used a hand grenade in a TIC on a deployment, and yet for years I walked around with two of those steel weights in my battle rattle; I never would have left the FOB without them. Or my bayonet.

I also know from personal experience being assigned to the SARP, the highest ranking officer in the trials that were conducted was a colonel - a very young one. If there was any focus on previous wars, it was that the rifle suitable for WWII and the Cold War that followed was no longer the best rifle. The military was not locked into the past war; it recognized that the ways and tactics of war were already changing by the end of WWII.

Incomprehensible military decisions are a reality. It is also incomprehensible that we should draw from that a conclusion that anything that doesn't make sense to us today can't possibly have been for good reason back when that decision was made.

[Larry Gibson]

"it recognized that the ways and tactics of war were already changing by the end of WWII."

That is the general thinking. However, when it comes down to that most elite club, the last 100 yards of the battlefield, not very much has changed. That is especially true when it gets down to CQB. Contrary to movies ans tv magazines do go empty, usually at the worst of times. At CQB distances you may not have time for a magazine change and must "sort out the problem" with what is at hand. Best to have a bayonet affixed on your rifle.......

As I've said many times over the years to young soldiers and, particularly, to officers; "those who needed a bayonet and didn't have one aren't here to tell us of that need. Yet those who never needed a bayonet abound in their dismay at said weapon....."

[TNsailorman]

"it recognized that the ways and tactics of war were already changing by the end of WWII."

That is the general thinking. However, when it comes down to that most elite club, the last 100 yards of the battlefield, not very much has changed. That is especially true when it gets down to CQB. Contrary to movies ans tv magazines do go empty, usually at the worst of times. At CQB distances you may not have time for a magazine change and must "sort out the problem" with what is at hand. Best to have a bayonet affixed on your rifle.......

As I've said many times over the years to young soldiers and, particularly, to officers; "those who needed a bayonet and didn't have one aren't here to tell us of that need. Yet those who never needed a bayonet abound in their dismay at said weapon....."

"Only people who have been there an done that" will understand your statement fully. james

[challenger_i]

The last two posts are proof of why we need the "Like" button...

[wilecoyote]

my referring to bayos, and related considerations, goes back to WWI here, when old infantry charges against new MGs deployement tactics were commanded
_ long story short, more than one commanding officer ended badly by hand of his soldiers; the most (in)famous was Gen. Cadorna: a carcano's hole is recognizable even today in his museum-conserved hat _
the official version it's quite different, but the hole for sure isn't a 8mm. ...

CQB or cleaning trenches was another matter, o.c._