For two hundred years the great wilderness of the American West was being opened up and slowly destroyed by settlers from the east. Their prime tool was the gun, and the longarm and pistol have achieved legendary status in the folklore of the Wild West. Firearms of the American West tells the story of the guns used in the West during this period, which included the Indian Wars, the Civil War and the Gold Rushes. Copiously illustrated, no Western fan or gun enthusiast will want to be without this book.

In 1803 Lewis and Clark set out on their epic expedition across the American wilderness west of the Mississippi, armed with the typical weapon of their day, the single-shot muzzle-loading rifle. By 1865, a variety of breech-loading and repeating arms had been invented there were both easier to use and more accurate. This encyclopaedic study, part one of a two-part book, traces the development and uses of firearms on the frontier during that period, drawing on primary sources such as correspondence and diaries, newspaper accounts, government reports, and patent materials. Then, as now, most of the advances in weaponry were made in response to the military's needs, becoming available somewhat later to civilians, and then to Indians. The authors thoroughly cover the refinements and adaptations of weapons for employ by these three groups and by explorers and trappers, describing in detail each gun, its modifications, operations, and uses. In many ways the history of firearms on the frontier parallels the history of the development of the West.

This is the second volume of a two-part encyclopedic reference to firearms in the 19th-century American West, offering both technical information and historical narrative. Covering the period from the close of the Civil War to the modern period, it draws on advertisements from newspapers, catalogues, and other primary sources to discuss the military and civilian firearms used in the settling of the West, including rifles, shotguns, and handguns, as well as the guns used by the Native Americans. Illustrated with some 500 photographs of the weapons and of the people who used them. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

"Here is a book for the historian, the student, the gun collector or aficionado. . . . It approaches understatement to call Guns on the Early Frontiers an outstanding contribution to firearms literature. It sets its own standard."--New York Times. "A Glossary of Gun Terms, ample footnotes most skillfully arranged and illustrations beyond the dreams of avarice complement the text, which achieves the miracle of scholarship without tedium."--W.H. Hutchinson, San Francisco Chronicle. "Not the least interesting portions of the book are the notes and glossary and the excellent bibliography. Here [is] a book designed primarily for the serious collector or gun historian, but whose readable style should appeal even to the casual amateur. The collecting of old guns, whether privately or by a public institution, involves a certain responsibility. These guns, whose history is inextricably linked with the history of settlement, require something more than careful preservations. They require--and the present volume goes far to supply--accurate documentation."--Canadian Historical Review. Carl P. Russell, a leading authority on firearms of the American frontier, was coordinator of planning for the science and history museums and other interpretive facilities of the National Park Service in the Western United States.

Explores the development of the weapons used by the pioneers of the American West.

On t.p.: The handguns, longarms and shotguns of the Gold Rush, the American Civil War, the Wild West and the Armed Forces.