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I own a Mosin Nagant M91/30. It has a sight on it that is graduated up to 2000 meters. By my quick math, that's 6600 feet. A little more math makes that 1.25 miles. My question, considering how people talk about the "accuracy" of the MN, is this: is the point to the large number on the sight "volley fire"? That is, would a unit of troops armed with Mosins (or any other rifles of that era with a long-range graduated sight), be directed to raise their sights to the max or whatever other long range number, to hit a body of enemy troops by all firing toward them at once, hoping to score at least a few hits? If that ISN'T the reason, then I just cannot figure out what they would want the sight to be marked out to such a long range for...any history buffs or infantrymen care to agree and expand, or to correct me if I'm wrong? Thanks.

You are correct. They were intended for the volley fire. The rifle was designed before 1900 when waves of soldiers were bearing down on each other across open fields. I think there was movie that showed the concept well. I think it was the charge of the light brigade. The Turks? Set their sights for long distance then when the cavalry got closer they forgot to reset the sights and fired over them.

If you want to read into a debate far more divisive than Glock vs 1911 or AR vs AK....

Try to find some of the old literature regarding "massed fire" (including volley fire) versus "individual marksmanship" when it came to US Army policy.

Its quite fascinating to read about.

Here is an account of the US Army's tests of shooting .45-70 Government and similar rounds at long distances (2000 to 3000 yards), to see if it would be feasible.

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I don't know if the Russians had something similar in mind, but massed fire against another large formation 2000 yards away seems the only plausible reason --- other than sheer wishfulness.

As for the Turks firing over the British cavalrymen's heads...and the formation of the NRA by post-civil war generals to improve marksmanship...and the whole debate about marksmanship in combat, individual fire versus massed and all that...If you haven't read Lt Col Dave Grossman's book On Killing, you should do so. He has an interesting conclusion in there -- that the main reason for seemingly poor accuracy in combat is because of the average soldier's seemingly basic revulsion at actually killing another human being, even in combat, and especially the closer the combatants -- until the time (for the US) of the Vietnam war. He cites a number of examples where there seemingly should have been far greater casualties, given the distances and weapons used, but somehow the rates stayed relatively low...until one side or the other broke and ran. This included picking up hundreds of abandoned rifles on Civil War battlefields and finding them not only loaded, but double, triple, and multiply loaded -- as if the bearer had repeatedly loaded and never fired.

Fun (related) fact:
Early machineguns were treated more like artillery than small arms. Look at the carriages used on some. Crews were trained in indirect (over the hill) fire as well as direct fire.

The Machine Gun was what killed massed rifle fire. The 1903 Springfield Rifle has a magazine cut off to keep the soldier from "wasting" ammo. Army doctrine of the day had soldiers firing aimed volleys single loaded on command into advancing troop formations then, when they got within a specified distance "fire at will" was ordered and the magazine was turned on.

Now what I want to know is how do you know who Will is out of all those attacking troops.

Enfield doctrine also called for a volley fire setting on the iron sights. I suspect that most 19th century bolt action battle rifles had such a sight elevation setting at one time or another in the history of their use, which were as much an indicator of prevailing military theories at the time as anything else.

I am currently on a mission to range fire an 1870 Navy springfield Rolling Block (50-70 Govt) that my Dad brought home back in the early 60's. The rear sight on it was graduated out to 2000 yards as well. I would guess that a 450 grain bullet with a mv of 1250 fps and 1560 fpe might still have a thump at 2000 yards (if it made it), but the sights would be rather optomistic

ELB wrote:He has an interesting conclusion in there -- that the main reason for seemingly poor accuracy in combat is because of the average soldier's seemingly basic revulsion at actually killing another human being, even in combat, and especially the closer the combatants -- until the time (for the US) of the Vietnam war. He cites a number of examples where there seemingly should have been far greater casualties, given the distances and weapons used, but somehow the rates stayed relatively low...until one side or the other broke and ran. This included picking up hundreds of abandoned rifles on Civil War battlefields and finding them not only loaded, but double, triple, and multiply loaded -- as if the bearer had repeatedly loaded and never fired.

I'm pretty sure this has been debunked several times. In a firefight, most soldiers know (instinctively or otherwise) that the other side wants you dead. It is possibly true that conscripted troops in the civil war were firing just to make the other side stop trying to kill you, but I'd daresay that's as "passive" as you'd find most troops. Finding rifles in the civil war that had many stacked loads in it wasn't unusual though. Aside from sheer terror, the ensuing noise from firing on a picket line en masse was enough to make you not know if your rifle fired or not. A bad cap (or worse, forgetting to cap) was just as likely to leave your rifle unfired as the act of not pulling the trigger properly (or a broken leaf spring). My understanding is that the incidence of this happened much more often later in the war, when less time was given to live fire drills for the troops (shortages of powder), as well as the likelihood of a troop being unable to clear a "dead charge" in the middle of a fight. Remember, too, that failure to load/shoot/fight was considered cowardice on the line, and was punishable in several ways, including an angry saber strike from an officer, so even if you DID know your rounds weren't firing, you'd go through the motions with the rest of your line.

And here I was thinking the long range sights were there for the same reason that some car's speedometers went up to 120 or higher when there was little to no chance of that car ever being able to go that fast. The reason, IDK, to make it more appealing to someone?

OldCannon wrote:I'm pretty sure this has been debunked several times.

You should read the book before you debunk it. He has solid US Army data for every war since the Civil War and can show the differences in effective firing rates for different wars and how it was affected by training methods. This stuff is taught at West Point.