The Martini-Henry was almost indisputably the greatest standard-issue single-shot breechloading military rifle. Operation was refined to be almost as simple as possible while still being a single-shot. Other projects like the Trapdoor Springfield conversion involved multiple manual actions which the M-H accomplished in one or two moves. If yours truly were transplanted back to 1880 North America and able to set up a little fiefdom in the American West, the Martini-Henry chambered in the American .45-70 would be the standard for my little paramilitary outfit. (I'd also blackmail Colt into permitting carbines chambered in .45 Colt, but that's another matter.)
The apparatus featured here was far from practical from either a tactical or economic perspective, and it was obsolete before it arose, as the video will show. Nonetheless, it is exemplary of how some Canadian ingenuity--our cousins to the north absorb some of ours by osmosis--can seek to make the most of what is extant in terms of arms.
TDF INDEX: Cats, Guns, and National Security: THE DAILY FUDD index. https://catsgunsandnationalsecurity.blogspot.com/2021/03/the-daily-fudd-index.html
