Henry Rifle - History

History

The original Henry rifle was a .44 caliber rimfire, lever-action, breech-loading rifle designed by Benjamin Tyler Henry in 1860. The Henry was an improved version of the earlier Volcanic Repeating rifle. The Henry used copper (later brass) rimfire cartridges with a 216 grain (14 g) bullet over 25 grains (1.6 g) of gunpowder. Nine hundred were manufactured between summer and October 1862; by 1864, production had peaked at 290 per month. By the time production ended in 1866, approximately 14,000 units had been manufactured.

For a Civil War soldier, owning a Henry rifle was a point of pride. Although it was never officially adopted for service by the Union Army, many soldiers purchased Henrys with their own funds. The brass framed rifles could fire at a rate of 28 rounds per minute when used correctly, so soldiers who saved their pay to buy one often believed it would help them survive. They were frequently used by scouts, skirmishers, flank guards, and raiding parties, rather than in regular infantry formations. To the amazed muzzleloader-armed Confederates who had to face this deadly "sixteen shooter", it was called "that damned Yankee rifle that they load on Sunday and shoot all week!" Very few captured Henry rifles were used by Confederate troops. Since those few Confederate troops who came into possession of one of these rifles had little way to resupply the special ammunition used by the weapon, its widespread use by Confederate forces was very impractical. The rifle was, however, known to have been used at least in part by some fifteen different Confederate units. These units included cavalry units in Louisiana, Texas, and Virginia, as well as the personal bodyguards of Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

While never issued on a large scale, the Henry rifle demonstrated its advantages of rapid fire at close range several times in the Civil War and later during the wars against the Plains Indians. Examples include the successes of two Henry-armed Union regiments at the Battle of Franklin against large Confederate attacks, and the successful defense by small U.S. Army detachments against overwhelming Sioux forces at the Wagon Box Fight and Hayfield Fight during Red Cloud's War—as well as the Henry-armed Sioux and Cheyenne's destruction of the 7th Cavalry at Little Big Horn.

Manufactured by the New Haven Arms Company, the Henry rifle evolved into the famous Winchester Model 1866 lever-action rifle. With the introduction of the new Model 1866, the New Haven Arms Company was renamed the Winchester Repeating Arms Company.