Springfield Model 1879 Trapdoor Rifle

About the Springfield Model 1879 Trapdoor Rifle

The Springfield Model 1879 is a single-shot, breech-loading service rifle in the U.S. Army's 'trapdoor' Springfield family, chambered in the .45-70 Government cartridge. It refines the earlier Model 1873 with a thicker receiver and breechblock, an improved buckhorn rear sight offering the first Springfield windage adjustment, a swivel-cover buttplate over a three-hole butt receptacle for the jointed steel cleaning rod, and a revised three-notch safety-notch lock. Despite the changes, the arm continued to be stamped 'Model 1873' by the Ordnance Department. It armed U.S. infantry through the closing campaigns of the Indian Wars.

By 1879 the single-shot trapdoor was already outdated beside European bolt-action repeaters, yet the U.S. Army chose to keep refining Erskine Allin's breech design rather than re-tool. The 1879 buckhorn sight gave American soldiers their first windage-adjustable rear sight, and the swivel-covered butt trap that held the jointed cleaning rod is the detail that cemented the enduring 'Trapdoor Springfield' nickname.

Springfield Model 1879 Trapdoor Rifle specifications

Although widely called the 'Model 1879,' the government never officially renamed the arm and continued marking breechblocks '1873.' Deep '3' stampings later led some collectors to misread a nonexistent 'Model 1878.' The rifle retains the full-length ~32.6-inch barrel of the 1873 rifle; a matching carbine with a 22-inch barrel was made concurrently.