Thread: 303

Greetings again all,
Perhaps the most interesting thing about the P13/ P14 was the cartridge it was intended to fire, the .276 Enfield. The Boer war included a lot of longer range sniping for which the Brits were poorly trained. The actual performance of the .303 and it's 215 grain projectile was not much inferior to the 7x57 with it's 175 grain projectile but the tactics and training of the British was. After the war ended it was convenient to blame the equipment rather than the officers and more especially the Generals. So a new rifle and cartridge appeared. The .276 Enfield (or 7x60 Enfield if you prefer) was remarkably modern very roughly like a 7mm PRC but with more body taper and a less abrupt neck. It was similar in many respects to the .276 H&H that appeared about the same time and was the grandfather, perhaps father of the 7mm Rem Mag. In retrospect the brits got it right going with the .303 as the .276 would have fried machine gun barrels in short order and the extra recoil would have been hard on the troops. That said todays hunter would have been well served by it especially loaded with todays powder and projectiles.
Regards Grandpamac.