THE GENESIS OF THE METALLIC CARTRIDGES. 



139 



Iticrjjuiruj fromModet X/t V.SJ'cUcnJ. 'Office 



GWTtforse 



Cartrvdqe 



.Patented. Ocl^SJSSb 



JTiy J. ^Fupl. 



cart- 



unsatisfactory results. The metallic 

 ridge overcomes this difficulty. * * 

 So important an element is it that it may be 

 said that with a perfect cartridge the most 

 indifferent breech arrangements can be used 

 with safety and efficiency." 



Under Act of Congress, June 12, 1858, and 

 Ordnance Board, August 3, 1858, Geo. W. 

 Morse licensed the Government to alter 

 2,000 muskets or rifles and 1,000 carbines ac- 

 cording to a pattern furnished by him to the 

 Government. This license included all of 

 his patent privileges. 



Mr. Morse subsequently accepted an ap- 

 pointment from Bishop Polk in the Tennessee 

 State Armory ; his step-son, formerly a cadet 

 in the U. S. Military Academy, West Point, 

 N. Y., entered the military service of the so- 

 called Southern Confederacy and was ap- 

 pointed Aide-de-Camp to General Polk 

 during the period of our civil war. 



In 1870, Morse was refused an extension of 

 his patent of 1856, by Mr. Duncan, Acting 

 Patent Commissioner. Between September 

 13, 1858, and February 11, i860, the U. S. Ord- 

 nance Department paid him $18,000 for his 

 royalties and patents. On November 9, 1873, 

 the Examiner-in-Chief, U. S. Patent Office, 

 recommended a refusal of his application for 

 an extension. Report No. 1, House of Rep- 

 resentatives, 45th Congress, 3d Sessiou, De- 

 cember 5, 1878, is a report from Mr. Pollard 

 from the Committee on Patents recommend- 

 ing the passage of House Bill No. 5,332 based 

 on the memorial of George W. Morse, origi- 

 nal inventor of the modern metallic-cart- 

 ridge breech-loading system of fire-arms and 



ammunition adapted to their use. It was 

 partly based on the testimony of V. D Stock - 

 bridge. On March 1, 1879, » n the U. S. Sen- 

 ate, Mr. Wadleigh, from the Committee on 

 Patents, reported adversely on bill 1,434 to 

 pay Morse $25,000. with a contingent in- 

 fringement suit for $891,000. 



In George W. Morse's patent No. 15,996, 

 dated October 28, 1856, Washington, 1"). C, 

 I find the following : — " When the gun is 

 fired, the back part T (back end of the 

 cartridge case) swells out and seals the 

 breech joint ; the part 'b,' the head, resists 

 the hammer blow ; the disk ' c ' or ' k ' (per- 

 cussion primer), together with the after 

 part of the cartridge case, is driven back 

 against the breech-piece, and being broader 

 than the percussion pin, or the aperture for 

 the passage of the pin through the sliding 

 breech-piece, seals around it, so that the 

 more forcibly the cartridge recoils, the more 

 securely is the vent sealed. 



"Finally, the part 'b' (cartridge head), 

 remains unchanged and allows the cartridge 

 case to be automatically withdrawn from the 

 gun. If a primer fails to fire, another can 

 readily replace the one failing." 



The Frankford Arsenal service cartridge 

 case and all others made since October 28, 

 1856, no matter how primed, have operated 

 in the gun substantially as above mentioned 

 by Mr. Morse, whether it be in a machine 

 gun, magazine, or repeating fire-arm, or a 

 military rifle. 



This invention of Morse's is the basis of his 

 claim to the paternity of the primed metallic 

 cartridge system of breech-loading fire-arms. 

 It was used by Major W. H. Bell.Ord. Dept., 

 U. S. A., at the Washington Arsenal in 

 March, 1857. The Morse metallic cartridge 

 was then a short cartridge case suitable for 

 the large calibre military guns then in use. 



In 1855, Morse filed in the United States 

 Patent Office papers descriptive of a tube to 

 resize the cartridge cases after Bring. I >n 

 June 9, 1885, Morse addressed a communi- 

 cation to the Chief of Ordnance, I . S. A., 

 describing his inventions and his claims. 



Some of Morse's metallic cartridj 

 loaded in i860 at the National Armory al 

 Springfield, Mass., having their rear ends 

 closed by perforated rubber wads M< 

 patent No. 20, 727, dated June 23, 1858- were 

 fired in i885-'6 and proved to be in as good 

 condition as when first stored away. In the 

 language of the inventor: "No limit of the 

 life of a main shell of the cartridge has \< • 

 been found." 



George W. Morse was a native of Ma 

 chusetts. He married and settled in Louisi- 

 ana long before the war of 1861. In [856 

 and 1858 he procured patents in the United 

 States for improvements in breech-load- 

 ing fire-arms and cartridges. John B. Floyd, 

 then Secretary of War, interested himself in 

 his behalf, and in 1858 a bill was passed by 

 Congress appropriating $25,000 to provide 

 for the manufacture of arms under said pat- 

 ents. Of that sum $m,ooo was paid to Morse 

 for the right to manufacture a certain num- 



