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Title:	RIFLE, MILITARY -  U.S. RIFLE MODEL 1865 TRAPDOOR .58
Maker/Manufacturer:	ALLIN, ERSKINE S.
Date of Manufacture:	1865-1866
Eminent Figure:
Catalog Number:	SPAR 1011
Measurements:	OL:142.2C 56" BL:101.6C 40" 37.7" (in-bore)

Object Description:

U.S. RIFLE MODEL 1865 TRAPDOOR .58
Manufactured by Springfield Armory, Springfield, Ma. in 1866 - Standard Model 1865 alteration of M1863 rifle-musket. Converted to breechloader by milling open the breech section of barrel and inserting a hinged bolt fastened to top of barrel. A thumb-operated cam latch at the rear of the breechblock held it shut when in closed position. The rack-type system extractor was withdrawn automatically as the breechblock was opened and snapped back at the end of its stroke. The firing pin is is housed within the breechblock. The hammer nose was flattened to accommodate the firing pin. The cartridge was a copper-cased rimfire cartridge, which had a 480-grain conical lead bullet and a 60-grain charge of black powder. Approximately 5,005 of these were converted at the Springfield Armory in 1866.

Markings:
Lock: 1865 behind hammer. Eagle. U.S./SPRINGFIELD forward of hammer.
Stock: SWP in triangle. ESA in oval. HD near triggerguard.
Barrel: (K40).
Bands: U.
Buttplate: F/US.
Triggerguard: A.
Receiver: Eaglehead. 64.

1909 Catalog #0192 - "Rifle. Sp'f'd Breech Loading Rifle. Cal. .58. Mod. 1865. No bayonet. Altered on Allin's plan."

Notes: "Springfield Armory was directed to study the problem of developing a simple and effective conversion of the hundreds of thousands of muzzle-loading .58 caliber rifles into single-shots breech-loading rifles. E.S. Allin, Master Armorer of Springfield Armory, developed experimental designs in the mid-1880's. A design was finally selected which finally utilized almost all of the existing components of the muzzle-loading riflees and fired a .58 caliber rimfire cartridge....A patent, No. 49,959, was issued to Allin on September 19, 1865, describing the design....The breech mechanisms was simply placed into an opening milled in the top of the existing .58 caliber muzzle-loading barrel. The barrel assembly was attached to the barrel with two screws at the forward end of the mechanism. The breech assembly consists of a pivoted breechblock which was hinged at the top in lie with the breech face and was locked into a recess in the breech tang, thus holding the back of the breech bolt down against the firing forces. A complicated ratchet arrangement was designed which moved an extractor to the rear as the breechblock was pivoted upward. A new hammer was fitted to the lock. The firing pin was located in the upper part of the bolt, and struck the rim of the cartridge case at the top.
Economy in the conversion was carried to an extreme degree. Even so, the model included 38 new pieces and modifications of five old parts of the muzzle-loader. The Commanding Officer of Springfield Armory wrote to the Chief of Ordnance in January 1866 commenting that 95 new milling fixtures were required and that he was employing 66 tool makers to perform the work as rapidly as possible.
A careful examination will show one of the major weaknesses of the Model 1865 action. The breech bolt was an extremely complicated component and the ratchet extractor mechanism incorporated many delicate small parts. The second limitation in the Model 1865 design was the utilization of a low velocity .58 caliber rimfire cartridge. The large copper cartridge case held a soft lead 500-grain bullet with no external grooves. The bullet was seated .330 of an inch into the copper case which was then crimped into a shallow groove in the bullet. By 1864 Frankford Arsenal had developed a centrifugal priming machine and these cartridges were probably primed in the same manner as that used for the Spencer cartridges with what was known as Sharps Mixture consisting of 6 parts by weight mealed powder, 3 parts of fulminate and 3 parts of ground glass. The powder charge consisted of 60/2 grains of black powder....
Another .58 caliber cartridge was designed for commercial conversions of the muzzle-loading Springfield rifles. This was the .58 musket cartridge. The .58 center-fire cartridges were quite popular, and were used in commercial conversions. They were not officially adopted. The .58 rimfire caThe .56/56 Spencer, and .58 Springfield Rimfire represented early cartridge designs with weak cases. In addition, the breech mechanism on the 1865 Springfield conversion was rather weak. For both reasons it was important to keep breech pressure low, and this limited the muzzle velocity of the bullet.
Ballistics tests of some early cartridges are available, and analysis of the known data allows quite close predictions of other similar cartridges. The technique is to calculate the 'efficiency,' or the foot-pounds of the muzzle energy of the bullet, divided by the powder charge in grains. Most of the rimfire cartridges of the 1860's averaged between 19 - and 21-foot pounds of 20 foot-pounds per grain of propellant, we arrive at the muzzle energy of 1000 foot-pounds and a muzzle velocity of only 950 feet per second for the .58 rimfire cartridge. This was about the same velocity as the Frankford Arsenal .56/.56 Spencer cartridge, and gave a poor trajectory." - David F. Butler

"Advertisements were circulated in 1864 in an attempt to find an effectual means of converting existing rifle-muskets. The Chief of Ordnance, General Dyer, asked Erskine Allin - then Master Armorer at the Springfield Armory - to develop a gun on behalf of the federal government.
Trails completed by April 1865 recommended the Spencer repeater and the single-shot Peabody, but the end of the Civil War removed the need to act quickly. However, the prototype Allin rifle performed will enough in the summer of 1865 to be ordered in quantity for field trials. About 5000 58-caliber rimfire rifles were made in the Springfield factory in 1865-6 from 1863-pattern caplock rifle-muskets and new breechblocks. The block could be swung up to reveal the chamber, but the alteration was much too complicated. The ratchet-pattern extractor was weak and the cartridge performed poorly.
The experimental 1865-pattern Allin was soon replaced by a gun with its barrel-lined down from .58-50 caliber. The extractor was greatly simplified, and many detail changes were made. Trials still favored the Berdan as the best conversion system (the Peabody remained the best new rifle), but the .50-caliber Allin was controversially selected for production.
Allin-pattern guns remained regulation U.S. Army firearms until the introduction of the Krag-Jorgensen in the early 1890s. They were then gradually withdrawn, serving the National Guard about 1905. Those that remained on the official inventory after World War I were stored for the use of state militiamen until the early 1920s." - Walter

"The Civil War was drawing to a close, but far from over, when the War Department requested that the Ordnance Department develop a breech loading rifle for the military. To fulfill this request, the Ordnance Department sent requests for prototype arms to all the major arms manufacturers in the world and to anyone who would like to submit a test gun for trial. A number of private and commercial arms were received along with several submitted by Springfield armorers.
After a considerable amount of prototype testing, the breechloader submitted by Erskine S. Allin, Master Armorer at Springfield, was selected for its simplicity. Also, it could be inexpensively assembled using many parts from CW muskets. At this time, and for many years after the War, getting funds for new ordnance projects was a major problem.
5,000 of Mr. Allin's rifles were made and given the nickname 'First Allin.' The gun design was based on using Model 1861 muskets for its construction. Only the stocks and barrels had to be modified. The breech of the barrel was opened and fitted with a breech block which hinged forward, thus the name 'trapdoor.' The stock had to be cut to accept the ejector and extractor mechanisms. This process left only a very thin portion of wood covering the mechanism on the lockplate side of the stock. If a rifle had been used in service, this piece of wood is usuallIt soon became apparent that many of the small working parts in the breech system were not going to have a long service life, and the action was too complicated for normal service use. Therefore, before the M65 production order was completed, the less complex M66 rifle, 'Second Allin,' was already being tested.
The Model 1865 rifle quickly became obsolete and most of them were sold in the 1870s to several American arms dealers. At the time, there was a large demand in the U.S., for shorter cadet style rifles. To satisfy this need, these dealers cut the barrels and stocks to make short rifles with 33" and 36" barrel lengths. Likewise, the stock wrists were often thinned for cadet use. These altered guns have marginal value and have caused the remaining few unaltered rifles to rapidly climb in value." - http://www.trapdoorcollector.com/m65.html

Issued for field trial, reports indicated that the extraction process was too complex, and the caliber was unsatisfactory.

References:
Butler, David F. UNITED STATES FIREARMS: THE FIRST CENTURY 1776-1875. Winchester Press. N.Y., N.Y. 1971.
Clark, David C. ARMS FOR THE NATION. Scott A. Duff. Export, Pa. 1992.
Frasca, Albert J. & Robert H. Hill. 1909 CATALOG OF THE SPRINGFIELD ARMORY MUSEUM ARMS & ACCOUTERMENTS. Revised. Springfield Publishing Co. Carson City, Nv. 1995.
Frasca, Albert & Robert Hill. THE .45-70 SPRINGFIELD. Springfield Publishing Co. Northridge, Ca. 1980.
Frasca, Albert J. THE .45-70 SPRINGFIELD BOOK II. 1865-1893. Frasca Publishing Co. Springfield, Oh. 1997.
Gluckman, Arcadi. IDENTIFYING OLD U.S. MUSKETS, RIFLES & CARBINES. Stackpole Books. Harrisburg, Pa. 1965.
Walter, John. RIFLES OF THE WORLD. 2nd Ed. Krause Publications. Iola, Wi. 1998.
Walter, John. THE GUNS THAT WON THE WEST: FIREARMS ON THE AMERICAN FRONTIER, 1848-1898. Stackpole Books. Mechanicsburg, Pa. 1999.