Military firearms in colonial Western Australia 
numeral punches. At least one specimen (Figure 
14), has been noted as being marked with different 
style "W" and "A" punches. The practice of using 
individual letter punches ended with the colonial 
period. All subsequent marking, beginning around 
1903-04, employed multi-letter die punches and 
included the circular Commonwealth die stamp. 
The W.A. Cadet Force mark "W A C F", found 
marked on the butts of Francotte Martinis is quite 
regular and uniform in the spacing of the letters, 
suggesting the possibility of a large die stamp, 
possibly in two parts, "W A" and "C F". 
It can be seen from the foregoing discussion that 
a potentially serious anomaly arises in the marking 
of W.A. arms. It is apparent that as each "type" 
group of arms arrived from England they were 
marked with the appropriate letters and then 
marked with stand numbers beginning with one 
upwards. This practice was mentioned quite early 
by the regulations of 1862 and by Lt. Col. Harvest 
in his 1877 letter, where he recommended the 
numbering of the new Metropolitan Rifle Volunteer 
Sniders from "1 throughout". At times the 
volunteers were armed simultaneously with 
Volunteer and E.P.F. marked Enfields and Sniders, 
each lot respectively marked from one upwards. 
The result was pairs of Enfields, with each pair 
marked respectively, one, two, three etc, etc, and 
pairs of Sniders, each marked one, two, three and 
so on. It is not known with certainty how the early 
quartermasters maintained their issue records in 
the face of the potential problems this duplication 
presented but it is thought that each type of mark 
was recorded in separate registers and in the case 
of the Sniders the letter "P" found on the butt was 
possibly used to identify those arms issued to the 
Perth company of the W.A. Volunteers from those 
issued to any other volunteer company such as the 
Albany Rifle Volunteers or the Fremantle Naval 
Artillery Volunteers, who also had Sniders, it may 
also mean "Purchase". It must be borne in mind 
also, that by the time the volunteers were fully 
issued with Sniders, the Enfields were being 
withdrawn from service thus reducing the chance 
of duplication, hr the case of those Sniders bearing 
the Enrolled Pensioner Force marks "W.A.E.F" it is 
thought that they were probably recorded as such 
when issued to the volunteers, thus avoiding 
confusion. By ensuring that no corps was issued 
with two lots of arms bearing the same numbers 
the potential for confusion would have been 
further reduced. In fact it has been noted that over 
the years particular care was taken to differentiate 
between different lots of arms, even to the extent 
of noting in the records of certain corps that they 
were issued with "converted Enfields" (ie. Snider - 
Enfields), rather than "Sniders". The Volunteers 
are known from records to have only purchased 
Snider Mark III rifles (Appendix 1), an entirely 
109 
new-made arm, while the E.P.F. is known from 
surviving specimens to have only had Snider- 
Enfield Mark IP* conversions. The careful noting 
of these different types indicates that the 
"converted Enfields" were the former E.P.F. arms 
on loan from the Imperial government while the 
Sniders were the Colonial government purchased 
arms. It is also highly probable that this precise 
"type" recording of arms extended to their 
numbers as well. An example of this is the number 
on Private Elsegood's "lost or mislaid" Enfield of 
1872. Elsegood's corps, the disbanded Metropolitan 
Volunteer Rifles had about 100 members armed 
with 100 Enfield rifles received per the Bride in 
1862. These rifles were marked "V over W A 1 - 
100", yet ten years later Elsegood's rifle is reported 
to bear number "234". The probable reason for this 
is that the corps numbers had risen above 100 by 
1872 and E.P.F. Enfields had been issued to make 
up the difference. The E.P.F. Enfields became 
available in 1870 when the E.P.F. received their 
new Snider Enfields. 
The Martini-Henrys are known to have been 
marked to a variety of individual corps, and to the 
W.A.D.F. itself. With so few known to have 
survived it is difficult to be certain about their 
marks and numbers, but it appears that , like tire 
Enfields and Sniders, they also had parallel sets of 
stand numbers, all beginning at one. The potential 
problems arising from this practise of stand 
number duplication within a single "type" of arm 
are self evident, and must have required constant 
vigilance on the part of the ordnance storekeeper 
during the re-allocation af arms between corps, as 
occurred with some frequency between 1885 - 
1895. 
In later years, as each shipment of the different 
types of .303 inch arms arrived they were marked 
"W A over 1 upwards, throughout the number of 
their particular lot. Thus by 1900 W.A. had 
separate lots of .303 inch Martini-Metfords, 
Martini-Enfields and Magazine Lee-Speeds, with 
each lot marked respectively "W A over 1, 2, 3 etc. 
throughout. Marking arms by "type" in lots could 
again potentially lead to administrative confusion 
as in the case of the earlier arms as having three 
.303 inch calibre rifles marked "WA over 1", three 
"WA over 2", three "WA over 3" etc., makes it 
difficult to control the issue or recall of arms. 
Again, the careful notations in the Returns over the 
years showing that the various corps were issued 
with named lots of arms, either Martini-Henrys, 
Martini-Metfords, Martini-Enfields or Lee-Speeds 
indicates separate "type" recording in either 
separate registers, or separate sections of a larger 
register. 
One last volunteer arm, residing in the W.A. 
Museum collection (AMD 150), which must be 
described, is a Pattern 1853 Enfield long rifle, third 
