Harry Melville Pope (August 15, 1861 – October 11, 1950) was an American

gunsmith A gunsmith is a person who repairs, modifies, designs, or builds guns. The occupation differs from an armorer, who usually replaces only worn parts in standard firearms. Gunsmiths do modifications and changes to a firearm that may require a very ...

remembered for manufacturing precision rifle

barrels A barrel or cask is a hollow cylindrical container with a bulging center, longer than it is wide. They are traditionally made of wooden staves and bound by wooden or metal hoops. The word vat is often used for large containers for liquids ...

Early life

Pope was born in 1861 at

Walpole, New Hampshire Walpole is a town in Cheshire County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 3,633 at the 2020 census. The town's central village, where 573 people resided at the 2020 census, is defined as the Walpole census-designated place (CDP) a ...

. His family moved to

Worcester, Massachusetts Worcester ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Massachusetts, second-most populous city in the U.S. state of Massachusetts and the list of United States cities by population, 113th most populous city in the United States. Named after Worcester ...

, in 1862 where his mother died in 1867 and his father died in 1868. He was raised in

Newton, Massachusetts Newton is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is located roughly west of Downtown Boston, and comprises a patchwork of thirteen villages. The city borders Boston to the northeast and southeast (via the neighborhoods of ...

, by his extended family including his aunts, Drs. Emily and C. Augusta Pope who were among the first women physicians in the United States. Harry learned mechanical skills working in the shop where his Uncle Albert Pope manufactured bicycles. At age 12 he used the bicycle shop tools to rifle a brass barrel for an air-powered dart gun. He graduated from the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

in 1881 with a mechanical engineering degree, and worked for his Uncle at the Pope Manufacturing Company until 1904. During that time he acted as plant manager and also helped build the original Pope Electric Carriage

Gunsmith

Pope won a shooting match in 1887 using a rifle barrel he had crafted. He spent the remainder of his life attempting to make the best possible rifle barrels. He competed in offhand shooting matches, but used

bench rest Benchrest shooting is a shooting sport discipline in which high-precision rifles are rested on a table or benchrather than being carried in the shooter's handswhile shooting at paper or steel targets, hence the name "benchrest". Both the forea ...

s when testing his barrel designs. His preferred design was 8-groove

rifling Rifling is the term for helical grooves machined into the internal surface of a firearms's barrel for imparting a spin to a projectile to improve its aerodynamic stability and accuracy. It is also the term (as a verb) for creating such groov ...

with narrow lands and a groove depth of . Pope minimized deformation of the base of bullets by loading cartridges into the breech while loading bullets through a removable muzzle extension. After leaving his position as superintendent of the Pope Manufacturing Company in

Hartford, Connecticut Hartford is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. The city, located in Hartford County, Connecticut, Hartford County, had a population of 121,054 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 ce ...

, to focus on building gun barrels, he opened a gun shop in San Francisco, California. When his gun shop was destroyed by the

1906 San Francisco earthquake At 05:12 AM Pacific Time Zone, Pacific Standard Time on Wednesday, April 18, 1906, the coast of Northern California was struck by a major earthquake with an estimated Moment magnitude scale, moment magnitude of 7.9 and a maximum Mercalli inte ...

, Pope moved to

Jersey City, New Jersey Jersey City is the List of municipalities in New Jersey, second-most populous

, where he hand-crafted up to fifty barrels per year beginning in 1907. His rifle barrels were used by noted riflemen including Franklin Ware Mann, Townsend Whelen, and Ned Roberts.

References

1861 births 1950 deaths Firearm designers People from Walpole, New Hampshire People from Jersey City, New Jersey Col Albert Pope and his American Dream Machines (2000)
Respectfully yours, H.M. Pope by Geraldo O. Kelver, Robinson Press, Ft Collins CO, 1976{{cite book , url=https://www.amazon.com/Respectfully-Yours-H-M-Pope/dp/B000TN7LPK , title=Respectfully Yours H M Pope , date=January 1976 , publisher=Robinson Press, 1976.