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Old Rifle Cartridge Question

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TimH

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I found an old cartridge casing, in a washout, while fencing. I would still be out fencing but it started raining AGAIN, but that is another story!!
Anyway, this cartridge is a rimmed bottleneck,center-fire, the brand name(Dominion) is stamped on the head as well as "43 M".
It is about 1/4 inch longer than a 30-30 casing and fatter. It could have easily held a 45 cal or larger bullet, hard to measure because the brass is cracked and flattened.
Anybody have an idea what "43 M" means??? :???: Magnum??? Maybe Mauser(not likely)??? :???: :???:
 
TimH said:
I found an old cartridge casing, in a washout, while fencing. I would still be out fencing but it started raining AGAIN, but that is another story!!
Anyway, this cartridge is a rimmed bottleneck,center-fire, the brand name(Dominion) is stamped on the head as well as "43 M".
It is about 1/4 inch longer than a 30-30 casing and fatter. It could have easily held a 45 cal or larger bullet, hard to measure because the brass is cracked and flattened.
Anybody have an idea what "43 M" means??? :???: Magnum??? Maybe Mauser(not likely)??? :???: :???:
Click to expand...

Possibly a 43 Egyptian-- Its the only 43 caliber metallic cartridge I can think of.......Used back in the late 1800's early 1900's...
 
"I don't know a lot about this company myself. What I can tell you is that it was a Monteal-based ammunition company. It started in 1886 and carried on business as Dominion Cartridge until 1947. As I understand it, new ownership came in at that time, though they continued to use the Dominion Cartridge name. From 1955 to 1966, Dominion was a subsidiary of Canadian Industries Ltd, still headquartered in Montreal. This company also, I believe, owned and sold under the CIL company brand. As far as I can discern, the Dominion Cartridge Company ceased operations in 1966." unknown author

I suspect the "43" is the year and "M" might be mauser or military. Never heard of a 43 caliber but have seen a number designate the length of the brass in millimeters - like "6X47" is a 6mm bullet in a 47mm brass.
If it is a rimmed cartridge it is probably pretty old. I will look around some more.
Mike
 
Mike, It isn't the Dominion part that has me baffled, it is the 43 M. I remember buying severall million rounds of Dominion .22 shells when I was a kid.
When I saw that cartridge laying there I thought it was a 45-70 at first. But it is a bottleneck(I believe 45-70's are straight) plus the 43 M stamped on it.
You are right about CIL and Dominion etc. Any idea about the "43 M"???? :???: :???: :???:
 
Go to the below website- you got me curious so I found a picture of a 43 Egyptian-- many old Remington rolling blocks made for the Egyptian army ended up in France and then North America....

http://www.auctionarms.com/search/displayitem.cfm?itemnum=6513990
 
http://www.militaryrifles.com/Romania/RomPeab45Cart.htm

More pics of a 43 Egyptian.

I'll be damned ! I never heard of it before. Learn something everyday!

Sure is good to have some "Oldtimers" around. I guess they don't get to be "OLD" by being dumb.
 
Thanks for the picture, Oldtimer. It is hard to say if that is it or not with no reference for the length. But judging by the bullet size(.43) in relation to the length of the cartridge in the picture, I would have to say that the one I found is longer than the one in the picture. But that could be it. :D
 
TimH said:
Thanks for the picture, Oldtimer. It is hard to say if that is it or not with no reference for the length. But judging by the bullet size(.43) in relation to the length of the cartridge in the picture, I would have to say that the one I found is longer than the one in the picture. But that could be it. :D
Click to expand...

Tim, 44 Caliber bullets are .4295 inches/diameter.
 
Mike- "Tim, 44 Caliber bullets are .4295 inches/diameter."

Ya, ya ,ya, I realize that!!! And most 30 cal are .308 diameter!!! :lol: :lol: You can use 38 specials in a 357 mag, etc. etc.!!!! :lol: :lol: :lol:

What I was trying to say was, That without any reference for length,other than a rough idea of the bullet diameter as a reference, my cartridge would appear to be longer!!!!! :lol: Shoot me for 10 thousndth's of an inch!! :D
I'm gonna get wet but, I'm gonna run that cartridge out to the shop and see if i can get it round enough to get a micrometer on it and get a semi-accurate measurement on the bullet size. Gimme ten minutes!! :lol: :lol:
 
My best small micrometer is metric, and it tells me 11 mm. That translates to .433 inches...but give or take because the brass is cracked and mis-shapen.
I think Oldtimer is probably right. It appears to be a .43 Egyptian. Something I had not heard of until today!!!
I still wonder what the "M" stands for??? Probably military.

This kind of reminds me of another odd thing that was found around here.
A local woman,about 30 years ago, found a medallion that, as it turned out, had been awarded to some Russian special soldiers that had killed some sort of political opponent of the Czar or whatever way back in the 17 or 1800's.
Strange stuff!!! :D
 
TimH said:
My best small micrometer is metric, and it tells me 11 mm. That translates to .433 inches...but give or take because the brass is cracked and mis-shapen.
I think Oldtimer is probably right. It appears to be a .43 Egyptian. Something I had not heard of until today!!!
I still wonder what the "M" stands for??? Probably military.

This kind of reminds me of another odd thing that was found around here.
A local woman,about 30 years ago, found a medallion that, as it turned out, had been awarded to some Russian special soldiers that had killed some sort of political opponent of the Czar or whatever way back in the 17 or 1800's.
Strange stuff!!! :D
Click to expand...

I do my share of plowing ,its amazing what you can find in some of these fields.I guess the most interesting,besides arrow points ,would be a couple cannon balls and a old piece off a flint lock rifle,I dont know what you call it but its the part the holds the flint.............good luck
 
One time my dad had about a dozen cowboys come out to help us wean. We sorted the cows away from the calves horseback, and left the calves out on a fresh meadow. It took quite a few riders to ki-yi the cows to the home corrals where they were locked up and fed hay for three days until they quit missing their babies. My uncle put his horse in a corral while we went in to eat dinner. Later, when he went to load up to go home, it was discovered that the horse had rolled with the saddle on and the quick-change Blevins buckle had fallen off. We looked hard but could not find the buckle.

The next day my uncle brought out a metal detector. Besides finding the missing buckle, he also discovered a humongous clevis. The clevis was probable two feet in diameter, made out of three-inch steel. We figure it was used in the early 1900's when ditches were dug to turn Sandhills lakes into hay meadows. This was all done with the aid of many draft horses. A ditching machine was pulled through the meadow with a form of winch. This winch was powered by the horses going around and around circling a "capstan", which is an upright spool-shaped apparatus forming the hub of the winch. Anyway, the old-time clevis is a pretty impressive bit of craftmanship for the time period in which it was made.
 
TimH- You might check and see if the mounties ever used 43 Egyptian ammo- I think for a while they were armed with Remington rolling blocks, but I don't know what caliber.....Some of the rounds found at Custer battlefield were 43 Egyptian-- as both some of Custers officers and the Indians probably had them- Custer had a Remington rolling block 50-110. They must have been quite plentiful as I used to see quite a few at the gunshows (don't follow them as much anymore) and the black powder cartridge is still made commercially....

I used to have an old Winchester 45-90- but you almost needed a gunbearer to help pack it around....The favorite in my collection now is a Springfield Armory 58 caliber muzzle loader that one of my grandmothers uncles packed in the civil war- I have never shot it, but my dad said they used to load it up with a buck and ball load and shoot coyotes.....

I really enjoy the old rifles and used to shoot a lot- harder now to use the iron sights with the bifocals ......
 
OT and Mike, I've done a little "googling" and I think that what I have is a 43 Mauser. Sometimes called 43 Bell Mauser and even refered to as 11mm Mauser. The Egyptian 43 is often called 433 Egyptian on some of the sites I have looked at. I'd never heard of either before! :lol: Bullet diameter is .446" from what I can tell.

I'll post a link to a website with lots of pictures of old cartridges.

http://members.shaw.ca/cartridge-corner/idpics2.htm
 
TimH said:
OT and Mike, I've done a little "googling" and I think that what I have is a 43 Mauser. Sometimes called 43 Bell Mauser and even refered to as 11mm Mauser. The Egyptian 43 is often called 433 Egyptian on some of the sites I have looked at. I'd never heard of either before! :lol: Bullet diameter is .446" from what I can tell.

I'll post a link to a website with lots of pictures of old cartridges.

http://members.shaw.ca/cartridge-corner/idpics2.htm
Click to expand...

That's an interesting site! Thanks. It's amazing how cartridge case shape has transformed over the years with the use of smokeless powder. The trend lately has gone to the "shorter-fatter more efficient" cartridges such as the 6BR and 6PPC along with the short magnums. It's a game the gun manufacturers play to sell more guns, I suppose.
 
Hey Mike, Do you know of any other Mauser loads that are designated in inches?? Any that I know of(until this) are in Millimeters. Just goes to show you how a pre-conceived notion can throw you off the trail!!! :D
Would this qualify as outsmarting one's-self??? :lol: :lol:
 
TimH said:
Hey Mike, Do you know of any other Mauser loads that are designated in inches?? Any that I know of(until this) are in Millimeters. Just goes to show you how a pre-conceived notion can throw you off the trail!!! :D
Would this qualify as outsmarting one's-self??? :lol: :lol:
Click to expand...

When you outsmart yourself you could look at is as outsmarting the BEST!

I'm sure there must be other Mausers that use the inch/decimal system because they were notorious for making custom guns/actions for other proprietary companies.

I bought a Mauser action a few years ago that only has a serial number, no name or stamp anywhere. It's for custom gun builders to put their own name on it. I screwed a chambered .223 barrel on it and call it "Mike's .223"!
:wink:
 
Tim you should be here shooting gophers. I sat in one spot and shoot 55 rounds and could have used more. Not that I hit with every round but lots of gophers. sat a old school desk out back but it's a little small for me. Kinda like grade 8.. Not enough tme in the day to do enough shooting.
 
Big Muddy, I might have to head out your way if I want to shoot gophers...I think all of my gophers might have drowned!!!! :lol:

I like your school desk idea!! :lol: I wonder if a cold "beverage" would fit in the ink well on those old desks..???? :lol:
 
Both you guys would love to shoot armadillos. Not quite as many as there once was but still can shoot 10-20 on a good afternoon. I like to use an extra high velocity caliber because they have the same effect as shooting a watermelon!
The sod farms here love for us to show up and shoot them because they dig the sod. There's one guy down by the river that even furnishes the "cold beverages".
 

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