Cosmopolitan and Gwyn & Campbell Carbines in the Civil War is a definitive illustrated history of two rare and unusual Civil War cavalry carbines, their development, sales to the government, use in the field by specifically known regiments, capture and use by Southern troops, surplus sales after the war, survival rates, and their present scarcity in the collectors' market. Included are complete descriptions and illustrations of each make, type, and model, including the mass produced types, transitional variations, as well as illustrations of rare rifles and early carbines.
This is more than a gun identification book. It contains many illustrations, text, anecdotes, historical references, footnotes, and commentary about the actual use of these carbines in several exciting and pivotal campaigns, including western Virginia in 1861, Grierson's Raid and Morgan's Raid. There are three never-before-published photographs of cavalry troopers,including the only one known with a Cosmopolitan Carbine.
The Cosmopolitan and Gwyn & Campbell are often called the only contract arms made in the Midwest, and a section of this book revisits that perspective. Another section describes modern-day shooting of a Gwyn & Campbell and the results of the experiment.The author has studied these guns over more than four decades, and has examined the lion's share of extant specimens, adding the knowledge gleaned from these studies to the surviving records and the research of others to create an encompassing and compelling microcosm of arms and cavalry troops in the Civil War.
Cosmopolitan and Gwyn & Campbell Carbines in the Civil War will prove to be interesting reading for arms collectors and students, whatever type of Civil War arm is favored; and it will interest those with a general curiosity of that war because of the inclusion of descriptions of soldiering, the cavalry trooper's horse and equipment, several 1860s photographs of cavalrymen, general and obscure facts about the war, and the volume of detail about these specific carbines and the many other types also used during that great conflict.
