The morning call., 1894-05-19
National Guardsmen Are
Dissatisfied.
UNRELIABLE CARTRIDGES.
Reasons for Poor Scores in State
Matches.
CARTRIDGES.
UNRELIABLE
METHODS IN RIFLE PRACTICE.
The Companies Must Have Money or
Be Satisfied With the State
Ammunition.

1neFe is PROBABLY Oelnglmore said in y a.
! tional Guard circles to-day about the
abominabe quality of what is known as
| State" ammunition than ever before.
| Certain it is that the better class of mill
tia rilemen are supremacy disguised with
! the regulations which demand of them a
! wholly unreasonable sacrifice Of honors to
which their proficiency ntites them. OF
| late the military writers of Eastern news
/ papers and periodicals have INDUCED
| themselves in comment upon California
craftsmanship which is little calculated to
please the guardsmen of the State or to
| insure the permanency of their reputation.
Attention has more than once been d.
rected to the fact that the marksmen of
/ California exhibit a superb ability in rifle
| firing on occasions of practice or in CON-
! petitions IN which the State authorities
! have no control, but that when official
matches are held these same soldier shots
! show themselves surprisingly deficient In
accuracy. The assertion seems 10 have
| been made in particular reference to the
contests Of gold-bar men. and it must be
! admitted that the records viii not disprove
the charge. The fact cannot be denied that
! the mlHtiamen of California are fine
marksmen in their own way. but in what
might be called the States way they are
inferior in every respect to those of the
volunteer service in other States.
Ii is here that the matter of ammunition
inserts itself. The National Guard system,
| 10 peculiar in many ways, is especially so
! in its rife practice department. The law
! requires that there shall be two grades of
| the various organizations In the division
! every year for the purpose of practice in
| craftsmanship. TO this end an amount
! Of NM lS nv
mento Office sufficient to supply each man
! 10 the service with twenty cartridges or
/ rounds" Half of these are fired at the
! parade in June and the remaining ten in
| September. The combined results of the
June and September shooting determine
! the mum Der of marksmen entitled to gold
/ decorations. These few men are after
| ward allowed TO FIRE an additional ten
rounds in order that it may be ascertained
/ which of them is the champion of the
State. This much California does gratuit-
| oGSly every year In promotion of rifle
/ practice. If any company or regiment
would hazard few additional shots dur
! ing the twelve months on the theory that
| practice has been known to make marks
men perfect, the price OF powder and ball
i must come from the company or regi-
mental Golfers.
I Quite a number of companies in the
/ State military force are enabled to eXpend
considerable money for weekly aud
monthly visits to the range. These are
/ . he crack shooting ORGANIZATIONS and il
! costs them q neat little sum TO maintain
their proficiency, 1.-THE other comp anIes,
! with perhaps as much desire but less
! money. are obliged 10 await the coming of
! tue June and September matches for their
| trials at the targets The result has been
| that indifference to rife practice is The
| rule among too many guardsmen, and
| there are more organizations than could
be counted from memory that visit
the range twice year simply because il is
| compulsory.
Quite as discOurasiDg to the citizen SOL
diers as the scarcity of tile ammunition is
the poor quality of it. Away back in the
years when Kellogg was new at soldering
and Lu Townsend was not corporal
some body SOLD lot of ammunition to Cali
fornia1 probably in the dearih of any other
purchaser.
He must have ridded himself of an ex-
traordiDary quantity OF il, for it has
served ever since 10 foul the rifles and en-
largo the vOcabularies of soldier marks
I men,: No attention seems to have ever
been paid to the fact that ammunition be-
comes defective with age.
For years it has been issued with pro-
yoking regularity and bullseyes have been
| as regularly missed, and targets TOO. Com
plants have been made against it, but they
| have ,availed nothing. Finally every one
settled down with the conviction that the
| State had paid for it and the Slate meant
to use it.
The ammunition about which the obiec-
| ti0nS are made IS what is known as the
'45,70-405, Government" Interpreted
this. would mean that the caliber is 40, that
20 grains of powder are in the she'll and
that The leaden bullet weighs 400 grains. 1t
is not manufactured by the Government
1 nor by the State, ont comes from a Massa-
chusetts establishment
4 The National Guardsmen do not claim
that it was always defective. In fact
some of 1t is quite reliable even now, hut
for this very Teas Oh it is undesirable The
quality of The cartridge can only be deter
mined in the firing, and when great honors
are at stake marksmen do not care to
take chances on the action of their am-
I mnnitiOD.
In many instances guardsmen, given ten
cartridges at State shoot, have fired two
or three of them with accuracy. The
rife was in. excellent condition, the sights
properly adjusted, the atmospheric con-
ditons favorable. and Notwithstanding.
the very next bullet has fallen far below
the bulseye. This has not been the fault
OF the marksman nor of his rife. The
old cartridge in which the powder had
suffered the influences of different atmos-
pherlc conditions year after year was
mainly II not entirely responsible for the
poor shot.
AT the Safe shoot last September. Cor
poral Chris Mayer of G Of the First, a
crack marksman and thoroughly versed in
the science of Tihe-fTing. examined a car
. fridge OF State issue at Shell Mound. The
brass she'll had lost its luster and the pro-
trudlng lead showed unmTstakabe signs
OF age. The bullet was carefully ex-
tFacted and from all appearances it had
never even been fabricated. The powder
fesem bled a heavy grade of lampblack.
Ii was no: in the grain but seemed TO
nave been completely crushed to dense
powder. Other. cartridges were opened:
put were foundto be of better compost
ton. SILL, the maTksman VINO might nave
fired that defective cartridge would have
missed the target and probably never
known the reason.
The affair at Sacramento recently in
which the gold-bar men contested has
served TO renew the discussion among
National .Guardsmen about the Injustice o +
the regulation which obliged them to use
ANN unition different from that 10 which
they bad been accustomed. 1t is true that
the cartridges used at the shoot were of
better manufacture than those generally
issued for State competitions, but still they
were far from being satisfactory, In tho
June and Sepem Der competitions the men
had used their own reloaded ammunition.
This Teloading the Adjutant- General per-
mlts with certain specifications regarding
weights, and as many Guardsmen as have
the enthusiasm and The money usnallv'
uTeDarA their own carfridUac In 81.