Big Risk, Big Loss

In 1857 the next Secretary of War John G. Floyd was interested in purchasing carbines for the army. If they passed testing, then the government would buy $90,000 worth of Burnside carbines. The Burnside passed the first round of testing, so inventor Ambrose Burnside began creating the order.  With the economy taking a downturn and his already existing financial problems, his carbine manufacturing took him further and further into debt. Then the government pushed the order back to do a second round of testing, severely straining the already financially strapped company. Although the Burnside Carbine successfully completed the second test, Floyd refused the large contract with Burnside in early 1858. The government would buy only a small portion of the original order, and the large contract went to a political ally of Floyd’s.  That loss of contract marked the end of Burnside’s career as an industrialist.  He was so deeply in debt that he assigned everything to the company’s investors (rather than formally declaring bankruptcy), including his patent.1a​

The Burnside Carbine