The British Army did actually use armoured traction engines during the Boer War, and the traction engine was an 1860's innovation, so it might be possible to have them during the American Civil War I suppose.
Not sure how "full fledged" it might be but if the royalists had lost the Second Baron's War and parliament wanted to prevent them trying again that's a possible PoD I suppose.
Lord Protector Simon de Montfort of the Republic of England. ;)
It's actually one of the grievances listed in the Declaration of Independence, to wit:
"He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us"
This does render the earlier phrase in the document "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their...
They knew full-well about the SMLE OTL, and that it had a considerably better rate-of-fire that their Gewehr 1898, but didn't think that mattered for much so the issue wasn't given much attention. I suspect the same would be true of the F-H.
If that sounds daft think of it this way. The last...
According to Modern Firearms.net the Farquhar-Hill measured 1042mm versus 1132mm for the SMLE Mark III so the F-H is actually shorter.
The F-H does have a longer barrel though, 686mm versus 640mm.
Kaiser Bill is feeling ill
The Crown Prince he's gone barmy
We don't give a fuck for old von Kluck
And all his bleedin' army
British Expeditionary Force marching song, August 1914 (sung to the tune of The Girl I left Behind Me)
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Nimy Village, Belgium – Saturday August 22nd 1914...
Beyond the Schlieffen Plan issue Zuber apparently has a bit of reputation for overestimating the proficiency of the Germans in WWI and underestimating their opponents. It's the sort of thing that leads to sources being selectively used or dismissed.
First hand accounts from the British side do...
That comes from the testimony of the Fusiliers actually there. I would caution you to not necessarily accept everything Zuber has to say incidentally, just look at all the historians that have major issues with his rather controversial arguments regarding WWI.
The actual numbers of casualties are certainly disputed, however given that the Germans initially arrived in close-order formation straight into the teeth of machine-guns and rapid-fire rifles it's highly unlikely they didn't take considerable losses at the start of the battle. The Fusiliers at...
The thing is I don't want a "perfect" semi-auto rifle, I think it would stretch the scenario too far to give the BEF effectively a ten-shot Garand (minus "Garand Thumb") at the start of the Great War. A modified version of a largely existing, albeit imperfect and flawed design that isn't the...
The idea that occurred to me was merging the military and civilian models, since the latter already had a fixed internal box magazine.
Why not have a detachable "fixed" ten round magazine assembly that simply slots into the rifle exactly like the drum does. One that can be reloaded from above...