Telescopic sights during the American Revolution

[4v50 Gary]

I know of at least one rifle made in Boston for an American militia lieutenant. It took a while before he could hit a sheet of paper at 100 yards. However, there is no mention that he actually used it in combat and I think that him being an officer, it is unlikely that he would have.

Here's a statement from G. W. P. Swenson's Pictorial History of the Rifle:

"Telescopic sights are reputed to have been used in the American Revolution by both sides..."

Oh really? Has anyone heard of a telescopic sight being used by either side and can they point me out to the documentation?

 

[EvilGenius]

I am also interested in this.

Even if it isn't true I'd like to hear about the history of early sights.

 

[robhof]

I've seen a few examples of scopes in the 1800's but none earlier. Seen a few examples in museums and they were true works of art, real ornate, for the wealthy of the time only. I would also be very interested in any history of the scope!

 

[4v50 Gary]

I can find no example of the British use of telescope equipped rifles.

First, only officers could afford them. Enlisted personnel were too impoverished to buy a scope yet alone convince an officer to allow him to carry a rifle. Second, an officer's primary duty was to lead, not to fight. Certainly officers did fight, but to use a rifle meant a great distraction from leading. Yes, Patrick Ferguson did carry his rifle and could have shot a hussar (perhaps George Washington), but that was rare among officers.

BTW, the American militia officer was Charles Wilson Peale, the famed portrait painter and the founder of the Peale family of painters. During WW II, a liberty ship was named after him. It's recorded in his diary (which was published by a university press).

 

[Crawdad1]

Daniel Morgan's riflemen made some pretty amazing shots but not one reference to scopes in any book I've read on the American Revolution.

But, Europeans in general and British officers in particular were more than impressed with the quality of our rifles and expressed their admiration in journals and letters home BUT not one recorded anything about a scope mounted rifle that I've read.

 

[Milamber]

The earliest documentated use of telescopic sights I can recall was during the Civil War. The 1st and 2nd Union Sharpshooter Regiments used a 3 times magnification scope that ran the length of the barrel of their rifles. The rifles weighed 30lbs and was built by gunsmith Morgan James.

Scopes have been around since 1640 but were fragile and not battle hardened. During the Revolutionary war it was the rifle that was the big step forward in accurate fire.


"One went high, one went low, who the hell knows were one went".

 

[4v50 Gary]

Concur that early scopes were fragile or even if they were sturdy enough, that their mounting systems were not. They were around, they just weren't practical until about the 1840s.

 

[Curator]

While small personal telescopes were around in the 1770s, they generally lacked the optical quality and focusing ability to use as a telescopic sight. They were simple 'Galilean" configurations using a spherical convex objective and a concave ocular. Focusing required adjusting the length of the tube and the user's eye needed to be right against the eyepiece. Lens grinding techniques and special glass "alloys" that allowed for achromatic lens, erector mechanisms, and longer eye relief ocular lens were developed around 1830-1840 resulting in the first really practical telescopic sights.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Peale did write that it bruised him and that Rittenhouse had to install a spring to fix the problem.

 

[GAF]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telescopic_sight

http://www.berdansharpshooter.org/target_scopes.htm

 

[Loyalist Dave]

I read somewhere that prior to the Wiki reference an experiment was done, perhaps in the 1830's with mounting a telescope on a rifle by an officer in India..., but the reference might not have been to a sight but simpy an easier way for a shooter to bring optics to bear in the bush where there are dangerous beasts, for scouting not sighting.

It wouldn't be too uncommon for an author to make the mistake of thinking a reference to a tube sight, iron sights within a tube to aid sighting, was a telescopic sight. This may be what the earlier American "reference" was about.

LD

 

[Crawdad1]

The way we were picking off British officers and the like from distances that were unheard of back then they probably thought we were using telescopic sights.

I'm waiting for the next revelation by some European author as in, "The Americans were using guided missiles during the Revolution."

 

[JohnD13]

I would seriously doubt the existence of a telescopic site in the Revolutionary war. There were certainly ground lenses, eyeglasses were around for a long time by then, as were telescopes. It would be interesting if there were any documentation of a scope sight in use then.

 

[Milamber]

As an Englishman living in the USA I can attest to the fact that the War of Independence or the Revolutionary war is taught slightly differently over in England. My education of it was much less colored with the glory of victory and dug deeper into the facts. Whereas my children who were taught here had a different teaching. Much less detail and fact. The various mutinies by the Pennsylvania regiments was never touched upon for example.

The war certainly changed the atmosphere of war for the officer class with the cry "aim for the epaulets".

 

[Crawdad1]

And the remains of some of the most gallant of regiments, Haslet's Delaware's and Smallwood's Marylanders, and probably some Pennsylvania men lie under about a foot of concrete somewhere in Brooklyn. The last I heard neither State has done anything to retrieve the remains of these men.

But, back on topic.