The link below is the "History of the Twelfth Engineers, US Army". It reads that "arms and equipment issued were the old type , used in the Spanish-American War, including the Krag-Jorgensen rifle."  Click on the Page 8 >> in blue and the entire book will show up.

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'Knute' - Thanks for posting.

This 12th Engineers' History gives a good description of events, in London, on 8/15/1917.

We have pondered attached photo for years.

Pages 14-20, in this 'History', describe the 'Review' in London and the British Public's reaction to seeing American troops joining the Conflict.

(note "12th U.S." on canteen cover).

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Another copy at Archive.org

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Great stuff!  Thanks for posting.  I know that my Krag is a WW1 veteran too!

psteinmayer wrote on Jun 19^th, 2019 at 10:39am:

...  I know that my Krag is a WW1 veteran too!

Yeah?  Well my Krag can beat up your Krag!

Culpeper wrote on Jun 19^th, 2019 at 3:00pm:

psteinmayer wrote on Jun 19th, 2019 at 10:39am: ...  I know that my Krag is a WW1 veteran too! Yeah?  Well my Krag can beat up your Krag!

Well... you'll have to come to Perry to find out, Bub!

Pretty stacks of rifles and accoutrements. Looks like another U.S. uniform that would work with my Krag. A winter uniform. Neat.

Can you imagine being the first foreign army to march through London in centuries? Mostly women and children looking on as a lot of able bodied men from England were in the war or had already paid the ultimate sacrifice. Old women crying at the sight and thinking of their husbands and sons in war. Young women along the way starving for male attention as these fine young men from another country paraded before them, instructed to look duty-bound, representing the US. It was said that they were "Solemn Looking Bloaks". I think that was meant in a most endearing way.

FWIW - When I look at this photograph of the 12th Engineers, it appears to me that some of the men appear to be Black-Americans.

I am likely very wrong. The U.S. Army was segregated until the Korean War.

During WW1, U.S. Black Troops fought under French Command, (with Adrian helmets and Berthier rifles), in order to get into combat.

If the 12th Engineers had some integration of races, that would indeed be remarkable for the times.

I thought the same thing, also. But it was more likely that African-Americans would be in the military during the Spanish-American war than during WWI. This is due to President Wilson's policies where the military took some steps backwards in regards to this. But it is still possible and would indeed be remarkable if there were African-Americans in the 12th.

Here is an account of African-American troops in the Spanish-American war starting on page 226.

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FWIW - From what I've read, Black units, "Immunes", were heavily utilized in combat, during the SAW and Philippine Insurrection campaigns, under the false belief that Black men would be less susceptible to Tropical Diseases than White Troops.

Some of the transport ships, going to Cuba, had 'color lines' painted on the Decks to segregate the Races. This was irksome to some (Regular) White and Black Regiments with a history of serving together on friendly terms.

During WW1, there was an apparent policy to deny Black Units a combat role and the intention to relegate Black Soldiers to transport and support roles.

To improve the record, the 14th and 16th Engineers were apparently issued Krag Jorgensens in WWI along with the 12th. Below is a link to the history of the 14th. On page 10 the rifle was referred to as "the old .303 used in the Spanish war". It does not appear that it describes the Krag properly, but what else would it be? Some of the pictures appear to be the same as used in the history of the 12th.

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The book on the history of the 16th was written in 1939 and falls under copyright. But here is a snippet view. It appears that they didn't have their Krags for long.

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Knute1, if I might beg a favor? You seem to be deeply into document research. I have searched long and hard for any "nitty-gritty" info on the 100 BoOF 26" rifles, and have found VERY little, beyond simply that they were assembled and tested in June 1902. I'm assuming there are detailed testing reports somewhere to support the annual summary report of the BoOF.

As noted here previously, I am fortunate enough to have two of the rifles. One, 389182, which has the correct (1901 x 2100) sights, had the stock whacked which I still need to stretch. The other, 388786, resides in a very lightly worn carbine stock without cartouches, and has a 1902C sight.

My theory is that, during the testing at Plattsburgh, someone said "Hey, let's see how this thing would look/handle with a carbine stock." They could easily have 'phoned SA and gotten the parts. Needless to say, I would REALLY like to find that verified in the testing logs, if such still exist.

So, IF you ever trip over anything like that, I'd surely like to know about it. Many thanks in advance, and also, thank you for all of which you have dug up already!

As to how it handles in a short stock, the answer is, wonderfully, at least for sporting purposes. It'd be a tad long for the woods, but seems just right for open country.

Dick, I am assuming you are talking about the 100 rifles that show up in the 1902 Ordnance Report, page 34. They don't say much more in this report, but I'll look some more. Also, is BoOF short for something?

See item 128 on page 34:

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Knute,

Your link is all that I have ever found. There must have been more, but it may not have survived.

BoOF = Board of Ordnance & Fortifications (sorry, I thought it was obvious)

Reports on this subject are proving hard to find. The 1903 Chief of Ordnance Report only mentions that several rifle trials took place, but concentrated on the early 1903 Springfield design.

Here is another writing from the Plattsburgh Barracks that discussed trials being performed, but only talks of the early 1903  Springfield design and shooting similar loads in the Krag. It comes from the 1903 January issue of "Recreation".  I'll still be looking and trying different word searches.

GOVERNMENT EXPERIMENTS
The crack shots of the 23d infantry have just returned from Sea Girt with a store of information on rifles and ammunition. A number of experiments were made there by the Government. The new Springfield rifle was tested and found the most powerful military arm on earth. The new cartridge contains about 44 grains of smokeless powder and a 220 grain bullet. Its muzzle velocity is about 2,250 feet. The shell is a little over 2-1/2 inches long and much heavier than the old shell. It has a grooved head like the Mauser shell. Several Krag Jorgensen rifles were chambered for testing this cartridge but the gun action was too weak for such a powerful load. Breech bolts were broken so often that it was unsafe to experiment with the old army rifle.  A so called rifle without rifling was also tested and gave good results. If the new cartridge is ever taken up by sportsmen, gunmakers will have to design a new rifle. I am sure none of the old model rifles could handle this load.
A. J. Hubbard, Color Sergt. 23d Inf., Plattsburgh Barracks N.Y.

From Knute's last post:

"A so called rifle without rifling was also tested and gave good results".

FWIW - This is likely a reference to "Cole Rifling".

Dr. W. F. Cole, of Waco, Texas, applied 'Lancaster Oval-Bore Rifling' to small-bore barrels for metal-jacketed bullets.

A test of Cole rifling was conducted at Springfield Armory in July, 1902. Four model 1898 rifles were fitted with Cole barrels with one turn in 10" rate of twist.

They gave slightly better accuracy than service barrels at ranges up to 500 yards. A twist rate of one turn in 8" was also tested.

Apparently, accuracy improvement was not significant enough to merit adoption.

Dick, I now feel your pain. I've tried many things, but have not come up with anything. I have run into some of your posts on other forums on this subject during my search, so I know you have been trying to figure this out for quite a while.

What I am going to say you probably already know. The 1903 ordnance report dwells on the "experimental Springfield rifle" with barrel lengths of 24", 26", and 30", pitting them against the 1898 Magazine rifle (30"). They soon after settled on the 24". The 26" Krag likely became a mute point and not worthy of reporting the trial results as the trials were probably close together during the same fiscal year. There had to be a report somewhere, but possibly not where it can be found on the internet. Likely in some stuffy folder in a file long forgotten if not thrown out like you are suspecting.

I do many searches to pass time and find stuff I'm not looking for all the time, but still of some interest. So perhaps in my unorthodox methods I may bump into a reference to your subject of interest and will post it.

I went back to pull up the link for the history of the 12th, but it wouldn't bring the whole book up. This link will:

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