Ross Rifle
Too heavy, too long, too unreliable, a failure.
The made-in-Canada Ross Rifle was meant to be a champion homegrown achievement. In 1902 the government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier contracted with Sir Charles Ross for a Canadian service arm that would match the famed British rifle, the Lee-Enfield. A manufacturing facility was established in Quebec City, orders were placed, and when Col. Sam Hughes became minister of militia and defence in October 1911, in the government of Sir Robert Borden, the rifle had found its most ardent advocate.
Despite modifications, including a crucial reboring of the gun chamber to allow for the improved “play” of the ammunition, the Ross Rifle was a disaster in the field, quickly gaining a reputation for jamming and clogging. Sgt. James Murray, arriving home in Toronto after 22 months at the front, gave a firsthand account to the Toronto Daily Star.
“I think I should know something about the weapon. I used the rifle at Ypres, and I want to tell you that it failed absolutely at one of the most critical times in the history of the French line. It jammed on us repeatedly, and I have seen men crying with rage when the gun failed them just when they needed it most.”
The scavenging of Lee-Enfields from fallen comrades on the battlefield became a tragic commonplace.
As late as March, 7, 1916, Col. Hughes, by then Sir Sam Hughes, continued to vociferously defend the Ross Rifle. “With good ammunition the Ross Rifle has never been known to jam,” he wrote in a sniping letter to one of his fiercest critics, Lt.-Gen. Edwin Alderson.
The Star had already condemned the weapon in its pages, calling it a “scandal surpassing anything in the country’s history” that the Ross Rifle had seen continued use in the war long after its proved fallibility and with a certain cost of lives. Soldiers had been sent to war “with a weapon that would place them at a fatal disadvantage.”
At the end of March, Prime Minister Borden did an end run around Hughes by having Sir George Perley, the country’s newly appointed minister of overseas military forces, commence the rearming of Canadian forces with Lee-Enfields. Despite orders to discard the Ross, a $2.6-million contract for 80,000 more rifles was placed in February 1917, with the Ross Rifle Co. relying on the small print to argue that proper notice of a contract cancellation had not been given. Hughes, who was out of a job the previous November, even mused about moving the manufacturing facility to his hometown of Lindsay, Ont. That didn’t happen. On July 23, 1917, a single-sentence story ran on the front page of the Star. “Orders have been given by the Canadian command that all Ross rifles be returned immediately to the nearest ordnance depot of overseas forces.”
The Ross Rifle Co. was no more.