Winchester 1886

by William W. Johnstone

  Oliver Winchester, of course, hoped for an Army contract, but Army purchasers were stingy sorts. Those repeating rifles shot fast. Too fast. What’s more, a rifle could hold fifteen rounds and a carbine twelve. The U.S. Army felt a lot better keeping their soldiers with single-shot Springfields. It would save ammunition, and, therefore, save money.

  Maybe not lives, though. George Custer and his 7th Cavalry boys proved that at the Little Big Horn when they found themselves overmatched by Indian warriors, many of whom carried Winchester repeaters.

  The original ’73s came in various models—Sporting Rifle, carbine, and even musket. Round or octagonal barrels were available, and specialties could be ordered from the factory—five dollars for nickel plating, extra trimmings in nickel for three dollars, silver for five dollars, or gold for ten dollars. A pair of set triggers would cost four dollars. A fancy walnut stock, or even checking butt stock and forearm was an option. Case-hardening, swivels and sling straps, fancy wood, cases, boxes, even heavier barrels could be ordered. And engraving? That could run the buyer anywhere from five dollars to one hundred dollars.

  A typical Winchester ran from twenty-four to twenty-seven dollars.

  “They test every sporting rifle,” Jimmy explained as he set an empty airtight atop a corral post. “Barrels considered of ‘extra merit’ they turn into special rifles. Called them ‘One of a Thousand,’ and sold them for a hundred bucks. Other good-shooting barrels considered ‘One of a Hundred,’ had another twenty bucks tacked on to the price.”

  “What one did you get, Uncle Jimmy?” Jacob called out.

  Jimmy’s long legs carried him from the corral. “Just a run-of-the-mill carbine. Nothing fancy. But it shoots true.” He started to toss the Winchester to James, thought better of it, and kept walking until he handed the weapon to his nephew, while calling out to Jacob.

  “Jake. You’d do me a favor if you’d grab the reins to your pa’s horse and lead him over this way.”

  Kris couldn’t help herself. “That’s right. James is likely to kill Pa’s horse.”

  “That ain’t it at all,” Uncle Jimmy said.

  James just stared at the weapon he had been offered. He took it, feeling his throat turn dry, and brought it close to his chest. He felt his body tremble.

  “Should I fetch your horse, Uncle Jimmy?” Kris called out, pointing at that wiry, rangy, but tough brown mustang.

  “No. Old Buck, he’s used to shots. But Millard’s sorrel, she ain’t been trained proper.”

  Standing in the wide doorway, Millard watched, coffee cup in his hand.

  Jimmy Mann was thirty-five years old, tall, lean, his face leathery, his Stetson stained and battered. A lot like that Winchester. He dressed not as a lawman, but as some thirty-a-month cowboy, with worn, scuffed boots and spurs. Leather chaps the color of adobe protected his pants and a pair of deerskin gloves stuck out of one pocket. He wore a shell belt across his waist, a large knife sheathed on his left hip, and a long-barreled Colt holstered on his right. The cuffs on his red and white-checked collarless shirt looked frayed, but not as badly as the ragged bandanna of faded blue calico hanging around his neck. The pockets of his brown vest held the makings for a smoke, a silver watch, and a pencil and small notebook. Most people would probably have dismissed him as a saddle tramp, unless they saw that six-pointed badge pinned to the lapel of his vest.

  Or his eyes. A pale, cold blue.

  James remembered a conversation he had overheard between his father and a railroad executive.

  “Your brother’s eyes,” the railroad man had said and then shook his head. “They have the look of a vicious man-killer.”

  “That’s what Jimmy is,” his father had said.

  “All right,” Jimmy said softly. He stood to James’s right. “Go ahead. Bring the carbine up.”

  The Winchester felt heavier than James had expected, though not as heavy or as cumbersome as his father’s shotgun and single-shot carbine.

  Near the trigger, the saddle ring affixed on the metal just before the walnut stock began to flip and he almost dropped the weapon. He thought his uncle would laugh or maybe take the carbine from his hands.

  But Uncle Jimmy said softly, “Don’t worry about a thing, James. Keep your finger off the trigger till you’re ready. You’ll be fine.”

  He started to work the lever, but his uncle’s head shook. “All you have to do is bring the hammer back. There’s already a round in the chamber.”

  James studied his uncle. “Isn’t that dangerous?”

  “Can be. Can also save a lawman’s life.”

  James slipped three fingers inside the lever, his trigger finger resting against the guard, his thumb on the hammer. The rear sight could be adjusted, and he thought about asking his uncle about that, but decided against it. The corral stood only thirty yards away, and the sight seemed to be at the lowest level.

  His thumb pulled the hammer back slowly, clicking once, again. The trigger moved forward, then back. The stock settled against his shoulder. He looked down the barrel, then at his uncle. “Do I close one eye or leave both open? I’ve heard . . . well, I’ve read that . . . well . . .”

  “Whatever comes natural.”

  That was easy. He couldn’t see the front sight with both eyes open, so he closed his left one and sighted down on the old can of peaches. It was harder than he thought it would be. That can was tiny. He almost couldn’t find it in the sights. And the Winchester would not keep still. Round and round it circled. The wind began blowing harder.

  How do you allow for the wind? he wondered. Does it matter at this distance?

  The carbine spoke, slamming him back, and smoke burned his eyes. James stepped away, lowering the Winchester, trying to find the airtight of peaches. His ears were ringing, but he could manage to hear his father’s sorrel, snorting, dancing around nervously. He could also hear Jacob and Kris . . . sniggering.

  Jacob sang out, “He missed!”

  His father stepped out of the doorway to take the reins to the sorrel, began rubbing the horse’s neck, whispering something to calm down the mare.

  Sure enough, James could see the can, sitting undisturbed atop the fencepost. He sighed. His shoulder began to throb from the carbine’s kick.

  “You did fine, James,” his uncle said. “It takes some getting used to, but you didn’t miss by much. Next time, take a deep breath before you shoot, then release all that air, and squeeze the trigger. Gently. Real gently. Cock it again.”

  James jerked the lever forward, saw the metal atop the carbine slide backward as a brass bed appeared, skyrocketing a smoking casing that flipped up and over and landed near his feet. He saw the new cartridge, ready to be shoved into the chamber. He drew the lever back, leaning closer to the Winchester, now warm. It didn’t weave so much this time. He sucked in his breath, held it, slowly exhaled, and squeezed the trigger.

  “Missed!” Kris sang out.

  Jacob echoed, “Again. He’s lousy! Let me shoot it, Uncle Jimmy.”

  “Quiet.” It was his father who spoke. “He hit the post.”

  “Just an inch or two below the can,” Uncle Jimmy said. “Surprised it didn’t knock the can off its perch.”

  “Better than you did when you shot your first rifle,” Millard pointed out.

  Laughing, Jimmy took the carbine from James’s hands. “That’s because that flintlock Pa had was probably twice as tall as you or me both.” He immediately began fishing a cartridge from his belt, feeding it into the loading gate. He put a second .44-40 round into the rifle, then jacked the lever, sending the spent cartridge spinning skyward. Lowering the hammer, he pushed the metal slide up to cover the ejecting mechanism.

  He shook his head and walked to his horse, which had barely even noticed the two shots that had been fired. “That old Lancaster was likely as old as George Washington’s daddy.”

  The shooting exhibition over, all five Manns trooped back to the old boxcar. Jimmy again slid the Winchester onto the table, sat in
his chair, took another sip of coffee, and pulled the catalog toward him for closer inspection.

  Not knowing what else to do, James sat beside him. He couldn’t help himself. He massaged his shoulder. Come morning, he figured, there’d most likely be a bruise.

  “One thing you should know, James,” his uncle said, “is that this rifle”—he tapped the image on the page—“is gonna kick a whole lot harder than my carbine.”

  James immediately lowered his hand.

  “What caliber do you fancy?”

  “Uncle Jimmy . . . I was—”

  “I’d say the .45-70.”

  Millard sat down. “Jimmy, I think that’s too much gun. Besides, he’s—”

  “Come on, Mil,” Jimmy shot out, voice animated, though maybe not angry. “We were shooting when we were Jacob’s age. Besides, the railroad might be pushing through, but this country isn’t civilized yet. Not hardly.”

  “Is that why you come, Uncle Jimmy?” Kris asked from the doorway.

  Behind her, Jacob clapped his hands. “You chasing varmints? To fetch them back so they can swing?”

  Jimmy started to take in a deep breath, stopped, finished, and blew it out. Shaking his head, he laughed. “I came to visit my brother and his brood. Even Judge Parker and Marshal Carroll have been known to give a good deputy time off . . . on occasion.” He slid the catalog toward James and put his finger on the drawing of the rifle. “Round barrel or octagon?”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “Depends on who you ask. Some say one’s more accurate, others say it’s the other. Round’s harder to make, or used to be. But you saw mine. Octagon’s heavier. Doesn’t heat up as fast as a round bore. More metal makes it stiffer, too. So, some folks will argue that makes it shoot more accurately. But others disagree.” He sipped coffee again.

  “Here’s what you need to know, kid. It ain’t the rifle. It ain’t never the rifle. It’s the fella shooting it.”

  James let that sink in.

  “A .45-70’s a big slug. My carbine holds twelve rounds. This here ’86 will hold nine. And that’s a rifle. It’ll be”—he looked back at the page—“six inches longer and heavier than my carbine. This what you want?”

  “I guess so.” James was hesitant, but it was absolutely the rifle he longed to hold.

  Jimmy looked across the table at his brother. “I can get one of these when I get back to Arkansas. Might not be brand-spanking new, but it’ll be cheaper than what Montgomery Ward sells them for. But I don’t want to do nothing that’ll go against your and Libbie’s wishes. So is it all right for me to get James here a rifle?” He winked. “In case y’all get attacked by a herd of dragons?”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Denison

  Often, Danny Waco made himself laugh, but this joke . . . how glorious. He put the shotgun on the table, almost doubled over, and eventually had to wipe the tears from his eyes with the ends of his bandanna. Still sniffing, he stood, rounded the table, and looked down at the body of Mr. Percy Frick.

  “Y-y-you’re . . . c-c-crazy,” Frick whined.

  “Me? Crazy?” Waco leaned his head back and laughed harder. “No, Mr. Frick. I’m a calm businessman. But I can show you crazy.”

  Immediately the humor vanished and Waco’s eyes turned cold.

  “Up, Frick. That barrel was empty, but the other one ain’t, and if you don’t get up and stop actin’ like a snivelin’ coward, you’ll get what that deputy over yonder got. Only you won’t be as pretty as he is. Not from this range.” Waco thumbed back one hammer while bringing the stock tight against his right shoulder.

  The railroad clerk screamed, and covered his face with his hands as if that could protect him from double-ought buck.

  “Up, Frick!”

  “D-d-don’t . . . sh-sh-shoot. P-p-please.”

  “Don’t . . . shoot . . . please,” Waco mocked the clerk. “Up, Frick, or I pull this trigger and you don’t ever get up.” His voice cracked. Blood rushed to his brain, flushing his face. “Ever!”

  Folks from the Mexican border towns and all the way up to the Dakotas—those who knew him, or knew of him, or had seen him when he got riled—all agreed that Danny Waco was not the kind of person anyone wanted to anger. His fuse was short, and his temper explosive. He could be funny, witty, sometimes even charming, but underneath all of that laughter, the pranks, and the smart-aleck comments lay a raw, violent edge.

  Others put it differently. “Danny Waco,” they would say, “is mad as a hatter.”

  Of course, no one ever said that to his face.

  His first name wasn’t Danny, or Daniel, and his last name wasn’t Waco. His father had named him Lyman. Another reason, he figured, to put four .45 slugs into his old man. His last name he never shared with anyone, but a good newspaper reporter could figure that out easy enough. Go to Fort Worth. Look at the old newspapers from about ten years back. Find the articles in all the city’s papers that mentioned the discovery of the body of Fort Worth’s favorite gunsmith. Actually, some would not limit Cahal De Baróid’s talents to the city limits, or even Tarrant County, or even the Lone Star State. The poor old man was found in his shop, his shirt still smoldering from the muzzle blasts from a Colt .45 held at point-blank range.

  The coroner’s inquest ruled that Cahal De Baróid of Fort Worth by way of Savannah, Georgia, and County Mayo, Ireland, met his death from four .45 bullets fired with murderous intent by person or persons unknown. But everyone, especially the newspaper reporters, knew the killer was De Baróid’s no-account son, Lyman.

  Lyman. Stupid name, Waco thought. Not even Irish. He had been saddled with his mother’s maiden name, Leimann, which the Americans had corrupted into Lyman.

  German immigrants, the Leimanns-Lymans had taught Cahal De Baróid everything they knew about making firearms. Danny’s mother had died of diphtheria, which had almost called Danny to glory, too, but Danny was too tough to die. Too wild.

  He had left Fort Worth with all the money he could find on his father’s body and in the gun shop’s till, and plenty of powder, pistols, and rifles. He had given himself a new name, a name to be feared. Danny Waco.

  Funny thing was, Danny had never set foot in Waco.

  “Last chance, Frick. We’re already short on time, thanks to that dead dog lying yonder. The town law won’t stay locked in his office forever, so we need to talk, and you need to light a shuck back home. If the marshal questions you as a witness to this act of violence, your name gets in the newspapers, bosses get telegrams, and your bosses with the Katy start to wonder just why you came all the way to Denison to do your drinking. Up. Get up now or make this hayseed town’s undertaker mighty happy for the extra business Danny Waco gave him today.”

  Mr. Percy Frick, clerk for the Katy, scrambled to his feet, found his chair, made himself sit into it, and tried not to shake his way back onto the dirty floor.

  “That’s better.” Waco returned to his chair and his Old Overholt. “Now, have another drink, Mr. Frick, and let’s get down to particulars.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Parsons, Kansas

  Autumn 1894

  It was not a .45-70.

  It was even bigger.

  Deputy Marshal Jimmy Mann took the rifle his brother, Borden, handed him at the depot. Over the years, Jimmy had held a Sharps Big Fifty a few times, even shot one of those old buffalo guns a time or two, but never had he seen anything like this. He looked at the caliber stamped on the top of the barrel just behind the sight.

  50-100

  450

  Jimmy couldn’t help himself. Shaking his head, he laughed.

  “What’s so funny?” Borden asked.

  Lowering the rifle, Jimmy said, “Well, I’m just thinking how much I’d love to see Millard’s face when our nephew shoots this baby for the first time. Millard thinks a .45-70 is too much for James.”

  “Millard’s right.”

  Jimmy looked into his brother’s eyes. “You underestimate that boy. You and Millar
d both.”

  Borden Mann shrugged. He was dressed in the silly cap with the brass insignia and silly tan uniform his bosses required of their express agents, along with worn boots. A shiny gun belt with a revolver holstered, butt forward, was high on his left hip. “Is it what you want?” Jimmy Mann studied the weapon. Once again, he grinned.

  His name was Moses, and he led the Winchester Repeating Arms Company out of the wilderness.

  Back in 1876, to celebrate the American Centennial, Oliver Winchester and his company, still enjoying the success and profits from their 1866 and 1873 models, decided to bring out a new repeating rifle. They tried to do something no other gun maker had ever imagined—create and mass-produce a repeating rifle chambered for full-powdered center-fire cartridges. The Winchester Model 1876, commonly called the Centennial, fired the company’s new 350-grain, .45-75 cartridge, basically a replicated .45-70 Government but in a shorter brass case.

  Oliver Winchester had heard the complaints about the ’66 and ’73 models. Not enough firepower. Didn’t shoot true at long range. Hit a buffalo with that caliber, and the big shaggy would likely think he’d been bitten by a mosquito. So he and his designers and gun makers came up with the Centennial. It looked like the ’73, only heavier, with a frame an inch and a half longer, and a shot cartridge that was eleven-sixteenths of an inch longer than Winchester’s .44-40.

  A rifle like that could help buffalo hunters slaughter those massive herds on the Western plains. A carbine, with a twenty-two-inch barrel, would chamber nine cartridges and weigh eight and a quarter pounds—before it was loaded. No repeating rifle had ever dared fire such a heavy, powerful round.