My Government Protects Me

This trackable is a Travel Bug® tag attached to an inert .45-70 Government rifle cartridge.  Its goal is to travel the world and bring with it a little history and information about this cartridge that tamed the Wild West.  If you can legally post pictures of you with your Cowboy Gun please include them when you log this trackable.  If you can place it into caches at military history locations or caches that referance the Wild West please try to do so.  

Warning: This trackable is an exact replica of a .45-70 Government rifle cartridge, certian localities may have misguided laws against the possession or transportation of this item, even though it can not be fired.  Please do not take it to any of those places.

I guess I watched too many cowboy movies and TV programs when I was a kid, so as a result I have always wanted to own a nice lever action rifle like all the cowboys carried.  Luckily I live in the United States, so I recently bought one and decided to get one which fires the classic .45-70 Government bullet for its combination of superior range and power.

The .45-70, also known as the .45-70 Government, .45-70 Springfield, and .45-21⁄10" Sharps, is a .45 caliber rifle cartridge originally holding 70 grains of black powder that was developed at the U.S. Army's Springfield Armory for use in the Springfield Model 1873. It was a replacement for the stop-gap .50-70 Government cartridge, which had been adopted in 1866, one year after the end of the American Civil War, and is known by collectors as the "Trapdoor Springfield". 

Adopted in 1866 this round is still in limited use by the military.  However it has been a staple of Hollywood movies since motion pictures were invented.  Lever action rifles firing this cartridge were very popular in the Wild West they were state of the art technology at the time.  They fired fast and accurate and most importantly they had the stopping power to hunt big game and gave you the ability to protect your family from any threat, whether it was a mountain lion or a gang of desparados.  Recently when Hollywood was looking for a gun that would stop a velocoraptor in the Jurassic World movie they armed the hero with a tricked out Marlin 1895 lever action rifle.  Today you have the best of both worlds, you can buy modern looking state of the art rifles that shoot this cartridge that have red dot sights and lasers or weapon lights bolted to it's picatinny rails or you can get one like I did, a classic, that would not look out of place 150 years ago.

Soon after it was invented the Gattling gun was chambered to fire .45-70 government cartridge, the superior range and power resulted in most Gattling guns firing this cartridge.

Dirty Harry proclaimed his model 29 .44 magnum the "most powerful hangun in the world", almost as soon as he said that, it wasn't anymore.  Since the 1980s you can even buy a pistol chambered for 45-70 government called a BFR (big frame revolver) shooting a bigger bullet with almost twice as much power as Dirty Harry's pistol had.

The owner of this trackable shoots .45-70 Government from this beautiful Henry Brass Side Gate Lever action rifle.

Over the years I have released several bullets out into the world as geocaching trackables, here is a listing of them sorted by caliber if you would like to try and find them all.

Most Popular Rifle in the USA
Swiss Accuracy
Just Right 308
Grandpa's Gun
Long Distance Dedication
Pacem
Browning’s Masterpiece
My Government Protects Me
Ma Duece
Very Versitle Weapon
Big Vulcan Cannon