Bolt Action Rifles. Wayne Zwoll

years I’ve found push-feed mechanisms as reliable as controlled-round designs, if not as smooth. There’s no accuracy advantage to a Mauser bolt. In fact, the smallest groups come from rifles with puny extractors and recessed bolt faces. A Mauser magazine and extractor simply cost more.

      About as many Model 700 Remingtons as Model 70 Winchesters fill my rack now. It is also peppered with Savage, Ruger and Weatherby rifles and a couple of Mark X Mausers. I used to have some custom-built 98s, which I foolishly sold. One of them, a 300 H&H, collected my first bull elk. A 270 kept me in venison during college. Another 270 reached across a deep canyon to down a bighorn ram. I don’t miss these rifles so much for their fine accuracy or handsome lines or smooth function as for their character. They showed a genius that perhaps only John Browning among gun designers has matched and in modern rifles hides beneath many refinements—only some of which qualify as improvements.

      Paul Mauser got a good thing going.

      Big Three: Top to bottom, Winchester M70, Remington M700, Ruger M77.

An American to Match Mauser: The Charles Newton Story WvZ

      You may have seen this proverb: Things turn out best for people who make the best of the way things turn out. One of the most gifted gun and cartridge designers of the 20th century put that notion to the test.

      His name was Charles Newton. Born in Delavan, New York on January 8, 1870, he worked on his father’s farm until finishing school at age 16. He taught school for two years, and then applied his quick mind to studying law. He was admitted to the state bar at age 26, but his heart was not in the courtroom or library. After a 6-year stint in the New York National Guard, Newton devoted his spare time to firearms, and to high-performance cartridges using the then-new smokeless powders. His early association with Fred Adolph may have prompted Newton to abandon law for the uncertain fortunes he faced as an inventor and entrepreneur.

      Adolph was an accomplished German riflesmith who immigrated to the U.S. in 1908. Six years later, he issued a catalog from a shop he’d established in Genoa, New York. It listed a wide range of sporting rifles, shotguns and combination guns. Some Adolph probably imported; but others he built. The rifles were chambered for a variety of potent cartridges, among them at least 10 designed by Charles Newton. The best known of these included the 22 High Power, fashioned in 1905 from the 25-35 case. Kicking a 70-grain, .228-inch bullet out at 2800 fps, the "Imp" earned a bigger-than-life reputation on game as formidable as tigers.

      In 1912 the talented Newton became perhaps the first man to experiment seriously with the 25-06. He called it the 25 Newton Special. Another of his cartridges, the 7mm Special, foreshadowed the 280 Remington by half a century—as did the 7x64 Brenneke developed across the Atlantic at roughly the same time. Also in 1912, Newton developed for Savage a short rimless 25. It followed the 22 High Power as a new offering for the Model 99 lever-action rifle. Newton’s stubby 25 became known as the 250-3000, because Savage pointed out in ads that it launched an 87-grain bullet at 3000 fps—a rocket in those days. Legend has it that for big game, Newton himself preferred a 100-grain bullet in the 250 at a more modest 2800 fps.

      The prolific designer came up with a 22 Long Range pistol cartridge by shortening and necking down the 28-30 Stevens. The bullet was the same .228-inch jacketed spitzer loaded in the 22 High Power. He fashioned his 22 Newton from the 7x57 case, driving a 90-grain bullet at 3100 fps from a barrel with 1-in-8 twist. The 22 Special, formed from 30-40 Krag brass, launched a 68-grain bullet at nearly 3300 fps.

      Charles Newton had a passion for single-shot rifles. He experimented with big-rimmed cases like the 405 Winchester, necking it down to 7mm and even 25 caliber. He designed 30, 8mm and 35 Express cartridges from the 3 ¼-inch Sharps hull, a 40 Express from the 40-110 3 ¼-inch Winchester and a 45 Express from the 45-125 3 ¼-inch Winchester. With Fred Adolph, Newton formed the 30 Adolph Express using a rimless case with the capacity of the 404 Jeffery. This round performed like a modern short magnum; it was also called the 30 Newton. Less well known are the 35 Newton and various other rimless and rebated cartridges inspired by the 404 case, which appeared around 1910. The parent case for some later Newton rounds was the 11.2x72 Schuler, a cartridge that postdated World War I.

      Experimental Newton cartridges included a rimless 280 and 33, neither of which got past token production. The 276 and 400 Newton are even less common. The 276, fashioned after the experimental military cartridge Britain abandoned just before World War I, apparently did not see commercial manufacture. Newton’s tool-room crew built a handful of rifles for the 400 Newton and probably made cases by necking up 35s.

      The most significant of Newton’s many cartridge designs at that time was arguably a 6.5mm-06. Despite its .264-inch bullets, it appeared as the 256 Newton. There were two reasons for pursuing an alternative to the 25-06. First, 25-06 chambers cut by gunsmiths of the day varied in dimension. Tight chambers boosted pressures, and not all rifles that accommodated the 30-06 case would bottle those pressures. Newton did not want to be linked to rifles that came apart. Secondly, though no commercial U.S. ammunition featured 6.5mm bullets then (and wouldn’t until the 264 Winchester Magnum appeared in 1959), Mauser routinely bored and rifled 6.5mm barrels. That was important because Charles Newton had bigger ambitions, in which Mauser would play a role.

      Early in his career as a cartridge designer, Newton dreamed of producing his own rifles. In 1914 he formed the Newton Arms Company in Buffalo, New York. While a factory was being built there, Newton traveled to Germany to contract for a supply of rifles from the likes of Mauser and J.P. Sauer &Sohn. His intent was to restock these rifles and rebarrel them to 256 Newton and 30 Adolph Express. In the August 27, 1914, issue of Arms And The Man magazine, Newton advertised high-quality Mauser rifles. A concurrent flier hawked 256 Newton barrels "of the best Krupp steel" with raised, matted ribs and sight slots—for $17. In March 1915, the first Newton rifles appeared in a company catalog. Built on 98 Mauser actions, they wore barrels chambered in 256, 30 and 35 Newton, plus graceful hunting-style stocks designed by Fred Adolph and noted California gunsmith Ludwig Wundhammer (namesake of the "Wundhammer swell" found on the grips of many European stocks even now). They came in three grades:

      Grade A: DWM Mauser in 30, 8mm or 35 Express for $42.50; or in 33 or 40 for $62.50.

      Grade B: DWM Mauser in 256, 30, 8mm or 35 Express for $55; or in 33 or 40 for $75 (double set trigger $2.50 extra).

      Grade C: Sauer Mauser with double set trigger, half-octagon barrel, matted rib in 30, 8mm or 35 Express for $60; or in 33 or 40 for $80.

      Some early catalog listings made no sense. For example, the only 8mm Newton in the literature was a huge rimmed round not suited to the 98 Mauser action. A Grade D rifle in 256 featured an antiquated Model 88 Mauser action and was priced at $37.50, a departure from the lettering sequence. There was also a Grade C with a full-length stock that has never been documented.

      Charles Newton’s biggest problem in this venture was the war. His timing could hardly have been worse! The first two dozen Mauser rifles were to arrive on August 15, 1914. Germany went to war August 14. Apparently one shipment of Mausers did arrive at the Buffalo plant before hostilities ended commerce. His enterprise at a standstill, Charles Newton turned to the Marlin Firearms Company for barrels chambered in 256 Newton and threaded for 1903 Springfields. He planned to sell them for $12.50 as replacements to hunters who wanted something other than a 30-06. He also contracted for Springfield sporting-style stocks, but these after-market items moved slowly at the time, mainly because Springfields weren’t commercially available during the war. Newton’s efforts to find a manufacturer of completed rifles failed because all plants capable of rifle production were up to their gizzards in lucrative government contracts. Charles Newton had to sit on his hands.

      He didn’t stop thinking, however. By 1916 he had incorporated desirable features of the Mauser and Springfield designs into a rifle whose only non-original part (claimed Newton) was the mainspring. He hired lengendary barrel-maker Harry Pope to oversee barrel production, and pointed out in the 14th Newton catalog that Pope had helped him develop the segmented rifling in Newton barrels. Segmented