By Mike Nesbitt | Contributing Editor
It’s rather nice when the manufacturers of replica arms include some of the very rare versions of the guns they are making.
It gives us the chance to try shooting some of those guns, which were made in often very limited numbers. The example I’m leading up to is the copy of the Winchester Model 1873 “Trapper’s carbine” which was sometimes referred to as the “baby carbine.”
According to George Madis, the Winchester historian in his The Winchester Handbook, Winchester made only a total of 450 Model 1873 carbines with barrels shorter than the standard length. That is very few, indeed.
While talking about Winchesters, those Trapper carbines were basically just carbines with shorter than standard barrel lengths. The standard barrel length for a Model 1873 Winchester carbine was (and still is) 20 inches. Why the imported Uberti versions of that carbine have a 19-inch barrel is something I don’t understand but being just one inch shorter does not put them into the “Trapper” category. The original “Trapper” versions of the Model 1873 often had 14 or 15-inch barrels and now the replicas of those guns, being made to be acceptable by today’s laws, have 16-inch barrels. With the 16-inch barrels, the new “Trappers” are certainly shorter, in both look and feel, than the standard-length carbines.
Currently the Model 1873 Trapper is offered by Cimarron Fire Arms Company, made by Uberti with the 16-inch barrel, available in .44-40 or .45 Colt calibers (and I’ve seen similar guns advertised in .38 Special/.357 Magnum caliber). Those are fine looking guns. Even so, they have one characteristic which I do not favor and this is merely a personal thing, something I have to live with. On the recently-made carbines from Cimarron (and other importers) the front sight is mounted to the top of the forward barrel and magazine band. That is authentic, copying the way it was done on the first models of the 1873. Even though I like to portray the buffalo hunters from the 1870s, I don’t appreciate that nearly as much as the slightly later versions of the ’73 carbines which had the front sight mounted to the top of the barrel just behind that forward barrel/magazine band. With that feature in mind, I told myself how if I ever found an Uberti “Trapper” in .44-40 with the front sight mounted to the barrel, it would somehow become mine.
Eventually I did find one, a .44-40 like I wanted, or would you believe it found me. This one was imported quite a while ago by Navy Arms Company. And although this isn’t a new rifle, it’s in fine condition. The front sight is just what I was looking for and the rear sight was the Uberti copy of the old Winchester carbine sight. With the 16-inch barrel, this short carbine has an overall length of just 35 ½ inches along with an empty weight of 6 pounds and 14 ounces. That’s a handy sized little rifle, for sure.
Shortly after I got it, I took it to Allen Cunniff to have one of the new Lyman 1A tang sights mounted. To do that, Allen had to drill and tap the forward hole in the rifle’s tang, a job he was well prepared to do. He actually did the job while I waited. Then the sight was shimmed to give it the correct windage, and we used the carbine’s rear sight on the barrel for alignment before it was removed. That gave me a rear sight I could use much better than the open sight.
The only other tiny modification that was made to the sights was to take a flat file and cut the back of the front sight at a 45-degree angle for a little bit just at the top. That gives me a small shiny “bead” at the top of the black (or blued) sight, something that can be seen by these old eyes, even in the dark shadows of the woods. With that, this ‘trapper’ was ready for action.
Then the gun was ready to be tried on a paper target, shooting from a bench-rest. Black powder loads were used, firing my favorite 205-grain cast bullet with 35 grains of GOEX’s Olde Eynsford 2F powder with ignition provided by Federal’s standard large pistol primers. (GOEX is supposed to be back in production this summer.) This isn’t a long-range gun so a target was posted at just 25 yards. The weather was very chilly then after a fresh fallen snow. That didn’t interfere with the shooting at all and soon the Trapper was putting its shots in the black.
More recently the Trapper was used again, both on paper and for “clanging” the hanging gongs on our trail-walk. That’s where this short carbine will probably be used the most and one of our matches on that trail-walk is the “Meat Hunt” at Buffalo Camp. The rifle I have favored for carrying on the Meat Hunt is my ’73 rifle with the 30-inch barrel, also in .44-40, but this little Trapper might still get the chance. We’ll have to see ‘bout that…
The paper target that was shot most recently was again posted at just 25 yards and the Trapper was fired from the bench. A pistol target received the bullets in style, keeping them all in the X-ring except for one “flier” which crept out into the 10-ring at 10 o’clock. With the gun hitting like that, I won’t complain at all, at least not yet. Let me get to know this gun just a little bit better and I might try some fine tuning of the sights, maybe at 50 yards. While I guess I don’t need to say anything about the accuracy of this trapper carbine with those black powder loads, it pleases me quite nicely.
After doing my first shooting with this little carbine, which was done a few months ago, it was taken back home to be cleaned. Even though it was purchased as a used gun, I believe I’m the first to use it with black powder loads. This is because it needed three patches, nicely moistened with Three Rivers Black Powder Solvent (The Gun Works) to come clean. Now that this carbine has more experience with black powder loads, more specifically with bullets lubed with black powder lube, such as Accurate Molds’ #43-205C which carries a lot of bullet lube, the cleaning is much easier.
Which .44-40 rifle I use on the Meat Hunt, coming in just two months, will depend highly on my whims at the time. One thing is for sure, this little gun will be in camp, ready to go, and I would not be insulted at all if someone else would like to try it. I’ll be using it again, that’s for sure.
One accessory that I enjoy using while shooting this Trapper carbine on the trail, or with another of my black powder lever actions, is the shooting pouch with the bandolier shoulder strap which was made by “Tommymaker Custom Leather out of Oberlin, Kansas. Tommy makes some very interesting and useful goods including cartridge belts, belt slides, and hangers, plus leather notebooks (for keeping sight data) and the pouches with the bandolier straps that I’m going to tell you more about.
This bandolier with the pouch is perfect for such doin’s and mine gets used with the .44/40 ammunition rather regular. The adjustable 2” wide web strap has loops for 50 cartridges, enough to hold a whole box of the .44 ammo. Smaller calibers, such as the .38 Special, might have more loops, you’ll have to ask about that. This pouch could be used with muzzleloaders.
And the top of the flap on the pouch has a hole in it for receiving your empty cases, one at a time. This means you don’t have to open the pouch to drop an empty case in. That’s another handy convenience which keeps those fired cases out of your pockets.
These are very well-made leather pouches with the web shoulder strap bandolier and the most recent price I have for one of these is $70.00 postpaid. For more information or placing an order, contact “Tommymaker” Tommy Ewing, 966 CCS Ln, Oberlin, Kansas 67749. His email address is tommymaker@yahoo.com and his telephone number is 785-475-3268.
