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Canadian Ross Rifle MKIII -Rifle

The Ross rifle was a straight-pull bolt action .303 inch-calibre rifle produced in Canada from 1903 until 1918.[1]

The Ross Mk.II (or "model 1905") rifle was highly successful in target shooting before World War I, but the close chamber tolerances, lack of primary extraction and overall length made the Mk.III (or "1910") Ross rifle unsuitable for the conditions of trench warfare and the often poor quality ammunition issued.[2]

By 1916, the rifle had been withdrawn from front line service, but continued to be used by many snipers of the Canadian Expeditionary Force until the end of the war due to its exceptional accuracy.[3]

The Ross Rifle Co. made sporting rifles from early in its production, most notably chambered in .280 Ross, introduced in 1907. This cartridge is recorded as the first to achieve over 3000 feet per second velocity, and the cartridge acquired a very considerable international reputation among target shooters and hunters
During the Second Boer War, a minor diplomatic fight broke out between Canada and the United Kingdom, after the latter refused to license the Lee–Enfield SMLE design for production in Canada. Sir Charles Ross offered to finance the construction of a factory in Canada to produce his newly designed straight-pull rifle for Canadian service. This offer was accepted by the Liberal government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Ross was awarded his first contract in 1903 for 12,000 Mark I Ross rifles.[1]

It is generally accepted that Ross' design was inspired by the straight-pull Austrian Mannlicher M1895 Rifle introduced into Austro-Hungarian service in the 1890s and used throughout World War I, and as secondary weapons into World War II. Ross' earliest rifles unmistakably borrowed a number of mechanical details directly from the Mannlicher which was a relatively new design at the time Ross was producing his first rifles in the late 1890s.[1]

The operating principle of the straight pull bolt action comprises a bolt "sleeve" to which the bolt lever or handle is attached. The sleeve is hollow and has spiral grooves or "teeth" cut into its inner surface in which slide corresponding projections or "teeth" on the outside of the bolt head or "body". As the bolt lever and sleeve are moved, the bolt head is forced to rotate through about 90°, locking or unlocking it in the receiver of the rifle. The bolt handle and sleeve thus need only be pushed backwards or forwards to open or close the action of the rifle.

In conventional bolt-action rifles such as the Mauser, Mosin–Nagant or Lee–Enfield, the bolt is unlocked or locked by the raising or lowering of the bolt handle, before the bolt is drawn back and after it is pushed forward. The single motion required to open or close the bolt of a straight pull action rifle is theoretically faster and easier for soldiers to learn, thus perhaps offering a higher rate of fire. In addition, unlike the Lee–Enfield, the bolt Ross rifle could be disassembled more quickly without special tools, although this was not necessarily an advantage as it encouraged unauthorized disassembly by soldiers.[1]
The first 1,000 rifles were given to the Royal Northwest Mounted Police (RNWMP) for testing. Routine inspection before operational testing found 113 defects bad enough to warrant rejection. One of these was a poorly designed bolt lock that enabled the bolt to fall right out of the rifle. Another was poorly tempered component springs that were described as being as "soft as copper". In 1906, the RNWMP reverted to their Model 1894 Winchesters and Lee–Metfords.The Ross rifle was modified to correct these faults and became the Mark II Ross (Model 05 (1905)). In 1907, the Mk II was modified to handle the higher pressure of newly designed .280 Ross, this variant was called Mk II**. The Model 10 (1910) was a completely new design, made to correct the shortcomings of the 1905. None of the major parts are interchangeable between the 1905 and the 1910 models. Although the British were now encouraging standardization across the Empire on the Lee–Enfield, Canada stayed with the Ross. The Model 10 was the standard infantry weapon of the First Canadian Contingent of the Canadian Expeditionary Force when it first arrived in France in February 1915.

The shortcomings of the rifle were made apparent before the Second Battle of Ypres in April 1915. Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry was the first unit to voice its objections about the rifle, the regiment replaced the Ross rifle with the more familiar and rugged Lee-Enfield and later persuaded the 3rd Division to switch to the Lee-Enfield.[citation needed] The rifle showed poor tolerance of dirt when used in field conditions, particularly the screw threads operating the bolt lugs, jamming the weapon open or closed. Another part of the jamming problem came from the bolt's outer face hitting the bolt stop, then deforming the thread shape. The bolt could also be disassembled for routine cleaning and inadvertently reassembled in a manner that would fail to lock but still allow a round to be fired, leading to serious injury or death of the operator as the bolt flew back into his face.[4] "Thankfully such incidents were minor."[5] Another well-known deficiency was the tendency for the bayonet to fall off the rifle when the weapon was fired.[5] Many Canadians of the First Contingent (now renamed the 1st Canadian Division) at Ypres retrieved Lee–Enfields from British casualties to replace their Ross rifles.[6] Lieutenant Chris Scriven of the 10th Battalion, CEF, commented that it sometimes took five men just to keep one rifle firing.[7] Major T.V. Scudamore of the British Columbia Regiment, who was captured at Ypres after being wounded, wrote of the "contemptible Ross rifle," that "Those in the front line with that rifle will never forget...what it is like to be charged by the flower of the German army...and be unable to fire a shot in return."[8]

Complaints rapidly reached the rifle's chief sponsor, the Canadian Minister of Militia and Defence Sam Hughes. He nevertheless continued to believe in its strengths despite the professional opinion of Sir Edwin Alderson, the British Army officer who was commander of the First Canadian Division.[9] The rifle became an element in political issues within Canada and between Canada and the British. Hughes responded to Alderson's criticism by accusing Alderson of ignorance and copied the letter to many officers in the corps. The effect was to undermine confidence in Alderson and the rifle. Hughes also made accusations that Canadian officers were induced to produce adverse reports on the rifle. After the reports on the rifle were published through the Ottawa Citizen, and it became clear that his claims in the Commons that all faults had been cured were false, Hughes' defence of the rifle could no longer be supported by the Prime Minister.[10]

In particular, the Ross was more accurate at long range than the SMLE, and this potentially overcame the serious problem British and Canadian troops had faced during the Boer War, with the accurate long-range fire from the 7×57mm Mauser.

In all, approximately 420,000 Ross service rifles were produced, 342,040 of which were purchased by the British.
Canadians retained the Ross even as additional contingents arrived in France. By the time of the Somme battles of July 1916, Sir Douglas Haig, the new Commander-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary Force, had ordered the replacement of all Ross rifles in the three Canadian Divisions by the Lee–Enfield, which was finally available in quantity. Hughes refused to accept that there were problems with the Ross, and it took the intervention of many influential people to persuade him otherwise. In November 1916, Hughes resigned after Sir Robert Borden's decision to appoint a Minister of Overseas Forces... (etc.)
-Wikipedia