David Bradshaw Photos - Vol. XXX

[Lee Martin]

Another unique piece from David....
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Roper percussion revolving "Four Shooting Shot Gun," patents 1866 & 1868



Roper revolving shotgun: spool cylinder rotates on cocking. Bolt linked to hammer.





Percussion 12 ga. shells. Pulling trigger slams bolt into battery, chambers & fires shell.







Note pewter furniture. Spencer (1833-1922) manufactured Roper in Hartford 1869-1876.



Hammer held after trigger pull, showing bolt midway to firing.



Port cover open to show shell positioned to initiate "slam fire" (when trigger is pulled).



Manufactured in famed Christopher Spencer factory, Hartford, Connecticut.



Sylvester Roper is credited with invention of removable choke, automatic screw machine, steam automobile, and steam motorcycle. Killed in boston in 1890's during competition against runner who claimed he was the fastest man in the world. Roper died when he suffered a heart attack on his steam motorcycle and crashed.





-Lee
www.singleactions.com
"Building carpal tunnel one round at a time"

[paulg]

Thanks for putting these up! What a cool rig! The ingenuity of the folks from that era always amazes me.

[alukban]

Is it a semiauto?

That thing is awesome!

[bradshaw]

Four shot revolving shotgun shown me by a friend. Invention of Sylvester H. Roper, with patents 1866 1n3 1868. Cylindrical receiver holds a spool, into which four steel "shotshells" are dropped. The steel hulls are charged with black powder and shot. The base of the hull is countersunk , with a nipple which takes a percussion cap. There is no cylinder/barrel gap. To fire, the hammer is cocked and the trigger pulled. The hammer, linked to a bolt, drives a steel shell into the chamber and ignites the percussion cap.

Cocking the hammer rotates the spool clockwise to align the next shell for firing. A flip-up top cover keeps the shell in aline with the chamber from falling out. Cocking the hammer extracts a shell from the chamber. Fired (or unfired) shells are manually removed. Every aspect of action cycling is smooth and precise.

12 gauge barrel 28", with removable choke. Length of pull 14-1/4", Overall length 48-1/4". I did not weigh the Roper shotgun, but it seems to handle and point well, and doesn't feel heavy.

Christopher Minot Spencer, famed for taking his seven shot lever action repeating rifle to meet President Lincoln, and Spencer and/or Lincoln firing the rifle at a cedar shake on the White House lawn, manufactured the Roper shotgun at the Spencer factory in Hartford from 1869 to 1876. Perhaps this Roper shotgun influenced Savage in designing his 1899 lever action rifle with spool magazine. And then there is the Mannlicher-Schoenauer bolt rifle with spool magazine. In turn, I would not be surprised if William Ruger, who considered the Savage Model 99 an ingenious design, studied the Savage spool before designing the magazine for his own brilliant Model 10/22 rifle.

Sylvester Roper built the first automatic screw machine in 1873, a year notable for the Winchester 1873 .44-40, the Colt Single Action Army .45 Colt, and the Springfield Armory Model 1873 Trapdoor .45-70.
David Bradshaw

[cable]

the roper has long interested and tempted me. has he ever loaded these up and fired it?

i have a spencer and an evans and a lot of the early guns and enjoy making them work again, mostly just to experience what they were like in the day of their use. the roper is a fascinating design and i wonder how it was to use one.

[bradshaw]

alukban.... the Roper is manually operated, not semi-auto. It fires from an open bolt. A look at the cocked hammer shows a flat at the top which strikes the firing pin as the bolt closes. The Roper locks up similar to the Remington Rolling Block, in which the hammer locks the breechblock, or bolt, at the moment of fire.
David Bradshaw

[steve1701]

I think that Louis L'amour mentioned this shotgun in one or more of his novels. Cool to finally see pictures of one.