What if James Buccanann shipped the rifles held in both Northern and Southern armies west to Minnesota due to grumbling among the Suoix. This causes people to demand war against the Suoix in 1860. There is a short war with the Suoix (about 3 months) when they are put down. When SC secedes 3/4 of the rifles in the Federal Armories are in Minn so the Southern states are able to sieze only a quarter of the rifles of OTL. How much does this shorten the war?
Rifles shipped to Minnesota in 1860
- Thread starter Johnrankins
- Start date
Another thought is does this stop the South even from seceding? After all there aren't many rifles for the people to grab while US forces have even more of the rifles than OTL in Minn.
How many people were in minnesota at that point? My guess would be if they did that every minnesotan would have five guns apiece, possibly including women and babies....
MN Population
Minnesota had a resident population 172,023 in the 1860 Census.
http://www.census.gov/dmd/www/resapport/states/minnesota.pdf
Minnesota had a resident population 172,023 in the 1860 Census.
http://www.census.gov/dmd/www/resapport/states/minnesota.pdf
Well, the Dakota conflict would have been put down in short order , but since most of the Firearms would doubtlessly have been sent to Ft. Snelling it would have been very easy to ship them back down the Mississippi. This would have been of great assistance to the Federal Troops at Jefferson Barracks in St. Louis and the Conflict in the West might have mopped up very quickly.
And how many guns? I could be wrong, but a million seems about right, which would make my first post not an exageration at all.
I like a quicker northern victory in the Civil War as much as the next guy, and a POD involving Minnesota, but not at the expense of the Sioux.
It occurs to me that a quicker Civil War might mean no Emancipation Proclamation. These million Minnesota guns are proving to be pretty dangerous.
It occurs to me that a quicker Civil War might mean no Emancipation Proclamation. These million Minnesota guns are proving to be pretty dangerous.
A million is a great exageration there were around 20,000 men total in the US Army in 1860 IIRC. That would be around 50 rifles per soldier!
I had to figure out some excuse to ship them west and the Souix did uprise during the ACW.
According to the Wiki article on the Springfield Armory, there were a million guns stored there, alone, in 1843 when Longfellow visited and then wrote an antiwar poem.
Yeah, that sounds awfully high and Wiki isn't the best source in the world. As I said there were only about 20K men in the entire army. So many rifles for such a puny force would be extremely wasteful.
RamscoopRaider
Donor
Not really, properly preserved rifles can last for a long time, and well building so many keeps the capability at the arsenals intact in case you do need a lot of rifles
I also think they could be used to equip the militia as well as the regulars
I've seen sources, can't remember where, that suggest wiki is right
a million rifles? That doesn't seem likely. After all, when the war started, both sides had to scramble to find enough firearms for their troops, and bought piles of them from the UK and France. IIRC, it took a year or two for the north to get geared up and producing enough firearms for themselves. If there had been a million rifles (and probably not actually rifles, more likely plain old smoothbore muskets), the need wouldn't have been so dire...
RamscoopRaider
Donor
Well there were 60,000 M1855, 275,000 M1842, 30,000 M1840, 675,000 M1816 made, so between 1816 and 1860 the US made over a million muskets, plus 30,000 older M1812 and 150,000 older M1795
While many were later rifled, some were not
So Springfield may have had a million long arms in storage when Longfellow visited but a lot of them would have been old smoothbores, and in the 1850's many old weapons were dispersed to the militia
As for 1860 and Minnesota, I'd have to do some serious research, which I do not want to, but a half million would be a more likely number of what the US has floating around in total
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IIRC, the military periodically sold chunks of it's firearms to civilians too, when they wanted to upgrade. I still doubt that the armory had a million firearms in it at any given time; that would mean that the armory kept almost every weapon manufactured from 1816 to 1860. With normal wear and tear, destruction (accidentally or in combat), lots sold off to civilians, and the like, turnover in the armory had to be constant. I'd think Longfellow was exaggerating to make a point...
Greatly exaggerating. There is no reason for the army to have that many more rifles than soldiers. The last thing the army would want is to have to upkeep hundreds of thousands of obsolete muskets. It would be much better for them to have tens of thousands of more modern muskets. I think 60,000 would be about the most it would have in the armory. It would allow it literally triple its size with just the weapons on hand. Considering it takes time to train men you might have enough weapons to quadruple it by the time they are done training.
RamscoopRaider
Donor
It was more than 60,000, Harpers Ferry alone was recorded to have over 100,000 weapons stored at it when John Brown raided the place, Springfield would have the same or more
Remember these weren't just for the army, the weapons would be available for the Militia as well, and Springfield and Harpers Ferry could only produce 1,000 weapons per day, in the Civil War the army expanded faster than that so there was a need for such a stockpile
Edit: Also the National Historic Site says that Springfield had the Provisions to store up to a million Long arms, it does no state whether it contained any
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