Danish 1848-65 Snider rifle

[Fabian23]

I found a nice Danish snider rifle recently, for which I have also found special cases to allow me to fire it using .22 blanks.  I have found pictures of the original 17.5x29R rimfire cartridge but the bullet profile is not clear since the case extends over a considerable portion of the bullet.  Does anyone have a drawing of just the bullet?

[J-K]

Hello Fabian,
This is the only loading information I have been able to find. But I will keep looking. http://www.municion.org/Snider/Danes.htm
And if you have any extra cases to sell please let me know. I can't find anyone to make them here in the US.

Good luck, John

[Fabian23]

The source I have is in Denmark, they only have 1 or 2 left (one of which is on its way to me with the rifle).  They say they will have some more in the new year.

[Øyvind F.]

Fabian,

You may want to drop Morten Jepsen a line at morten@jepsen.no. He's the man behind the Virtual Museum of Danish Arms and Armour and I've seen him shoot those things. Here is their entry on the M-1865 17,5 mm cartridge.

[Fabian23]

Thanks for the email, I'll definately drop him a line!

[tommy303]

That is certainly an impressive round.  I have always had a fondness for these early cartridges used in conversions from muzzle loading to breech loading.  What powder charge did it use?

[Fabian23]

I don't know yet, although I also have a French Tabatière rifle in the slightly larger 18x35R which had a load of 70gr.  The Danish round load will probably be slightly lower.

The Dane and Tabby are my very own shoulder mounted howitzers :-D

[tommy303]

Shoulder howitzer is right.  Now you need to upgrade to a 4-bore Paradox.

[Fabian23]

I finally have the rifle (pictures will follow I promise) :-D

I have noticed that the top of the barrel has two plugged holes about 15cm in from the muzzle and chamber.  I have contacted the Danish dealer and he tells me all the conversions they have seen have these plugged holes, but they don't know why.  They are in the wrong place for a deactivation (and too small to be effective) so it must be assumed that they were made and plugged as part of the conversion process from percussion to breechloader.

Could anyone offer any explanation?

The only one I can think of was that they needed to fix something the barrel so that they could accurately cut the slot in the breech for the Snider 'door' absolutely horizontal, using some sort of cutting guide rig they screwed directly on the barrel to ensure consistency (the process is used today for bone surgery).

[J-K]

Fabian
I have the M.1853-66 and I do not see any holes.

Happy Holidays, John

[Fabian23]

Interesting, he was refering to the rifle only and not the shorter Jäger model you have, which I note has slightly different fittings for the Snider hinge mechanism.  I only noticed because the barrel is finished very bright so I noticed the very slight colour difference between the barrel and plug metal.

The first plug is about an inch forward of the rear sight.   If there was just an open hole, there would be nothing stopping the rifle from being fired, you'd just have a ported barrel.....

[J-K]

Could they be holes from the original sight?

[Fabian23]

Nope, the sights were not moved in the conversion.  I have shot off a few emails to the Danish arms museum on the subject but have had no response.

[Fabian23]

I am still waiting on some Danish snider cases but in the meantime here is a pic of the 18x35R cartridge for my French Tabatière with a 6mm Flobert as a comparison.  It shoots quite softly, no doubt well compensated by the weight of the rifle, 10 rounds and my shoulder was still perfectly fine :-D

[tommy303]

Impressive.  Did you ever find out what those odd holes were in the barrel?

[Fabian23]

Nope but I did find out that they are tapped so are safe.

[jbw]

Side from a booklet given by the danish army (AMA)

[Fabian23]

I have seen the Jäger version of the Danish Snider, is there also a short rifle version like the British 2-band Snider?