# What was the first mass shooting? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 18, 2016, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662 "2016-06-18T03:37:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/1 "2016-06-18T03:37:25Z")
After every mass shooting the point is made that guns from the time of the 2nd Amendment would not have been capable of carrying out mass shootings. So when did they become capable of doing so? Given [the definition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_shooting) “four or more people selected indiscriminately, not including the perpetrator, are killed” (and excluding acts of war). When was the first mass shooting? ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/2 "2016-06-18T03:44:49Z")
This one, from 1949, wouldn’t have been the first, but it’s the earliest one of its type that I know of. Incredibly, the perp died in 2009. :eek: > **[Howard Unruh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Unruh)** > > Howard Barton Unruh (January 21, 1921 – October 19, 2009) was an American mass murderer\[note 1\] who shot and killed thirteen people during a twelve-minute walk through his neighborhood in Camden, New Jersey, on September 6, 1949 in an incident that became known as the Walk of Death. Unruh was found to be criminally insane and died in 2009 after a lengthy illness at the age of 88 following 60 years of confinement. > His shooting spree is the deadliest mass shooting by a lone perpetrator in New Je... ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/3 "2016-06-18T03:47:32Z")
This site lists shootings from other countries. The earliest one I saw (and I didn’t look at the whole list) was from 1912. > **[List of rampage killers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers)** > > This list of rampage killers contains, for each category, the first fifteen cases with at least one of the following features: > The separate articles for the different categories have more extensive lists. > Only the first 15 entries are shown here. For the entire list see: List of rampage killers in Africa ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/4 "2016-06-18T04:32:06Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > So when did they become capable of doing so? Pepperbox pistols were around in the late 1700s, so they were available when the 2nd Amendment was ratified. If you don’t know what a pepperbox pistol is, imagine a flintlock pistol, but instead of having just one barrel, it has a cluster of barrels. You shoot it, rotate the barrel cluster, shoot it again, etc. Pepperbox pistols were kinda scary in that they would occasionally chain fire (firing more than one barrel at once due to powder residue catching fire or errant flint sparks igniting other barrels) and they would also sometimes just basically blow up in your hand. But you could shoot many people in a short amount of time with a pepperbox. Here’s an 18 barrel pepperbox, which is a rather scary weapon when you think about it (kinda scary for the guy shooting it as well). This one is percussion cap, which dates it to the 1830/1840 or later time frame. [![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Mariette_Pepperbox_Pistol_18_barrels_.32.jpg) ](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Mariette_Pepperbox_Pistol_18_barrels_.32.jpg) Pepperboxes were used up through the Civil War. Cap and ball type revolvers appeared in the 1830s. It was pretty common for people to carry two of them so that they could fire off quite a few shots without needing to reload. Reloading a cap and ball revolver is a lot slower and more involved than reloading a modern cartridge style revolver. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/5 "2016-06-18T04:45:34Z")
And there’s the [Girandoni Air Rifle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girandoni_air_rifle) that was used by the Austrian army, and later by the Lewis & Clark expedition. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/6 "2016-06-18T05:04:56Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > This site lists shootings from other countries. The earliest one I saw (and I didn’t look at the whole list) was from 1912. I looked through the subpages and the earliest I could find was [1878 in Hyderabad, India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers_(Asia)). There were much earlier ones with without firearms. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/7 "2016-06-18T12:18:12Z")
Mass shootings are overly specific in my opinion. The goal is the deaths involved and not the tool used to do it. Modern mass shootings still rank fairly low on the body count scale compared to some much older analogous killings than used adjunct methods. Guy Fawkes wasn’t successful at blowing up the English Parliament because of technical difficulties but he and his co-conspirators came really close in 1605 with massive quantities of gunpowder. Unlike other terrorists, he even has a holiday named after him to this day. > **[Gunpowder Plot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpowder_Plot)** > > The Gunpowder Plot of 1605, in earlier centuries often called the Gunpowder Treason Plot or the Jesuit Treason, was a failed assassination attempt against King James I by a group of English Catholics led by Robert Catesby who sought to restore the Catholic monarchy to England after decades of persecution against Catholics. > The plan was to blow up the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament on 5 November 1605,\[a\] as the prelude to a popular revolt in the Midlands during which King J... You may think that school terrorism plots are a rather new thing. They are not. The modern ones are a pale imitation of the [Bath School disaster in Michigan in 1927](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster) (38 kids dead, 6 adults and 58 injured). That was caused by an elaborate plot by one man that decided to kill his wife, blow up his own property and then the nearby school with carefully planted dynamite. He used a rifle for some of his killing spree as well so that one may count. ---
**Author:** ![rbroome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/838e76/32.png) [@rbroome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rbroome)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/8 "2016-06-18T13:16:11Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > After every mass shooting the point is made that guns from the time of the 2nd Amendment would not have been capable of carrying out mass shootings. So when did they become capable of doing so? > > Given [the definition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_shooting) “four or more people selected indiscriminately, not including the perpetrator, are killed” (and excluding acts of war). When was the first mass shooting? that definition does not exclude deaths from other weapons besides guns. Given that a club is a lethal weapon in some cases, the first mass “shooting” would be in pre-history. Is the OP limiting the time-frame to after the development of firearms or after the development of semi-automatic firearms? ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/9 "2016-06-18T19:38:11Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > Pepperbox pistols were around in the late 1700s, so they were available when the 2nd Amendment was ratified. > > If you don’t know what a pepperbox pistol is, imagine a flintlock pistol, but instead of having just one barrel, it has a cluster of barrels. You shoot it, rotate the barrel cluster, shoot it again, etc. Pepperbox pistols were kinda scary in that they would occasionally chain fire (firing more than one barrel at once due to powder residue catching fire or errant flint sparks igniting other barrels) and they would also sometimes just basically blow up in your hand. But you could shoot many people in a short amount of time with a pepperbox. > > Here’s an 18 barrel pepperbox, which is a rather scary weapon when you think about it (kinda scary for the guy shooting it as well). This one is percussion cap, which dates it to the 1830/1840 or later time frame. > [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Mariette\_Pepperbox\_Pistol\_18\_barrels\_.32.jpg](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Mariette_Pepperbox_Pistol_18_barrels_.32.jpg) > > Pepperboxes were used up through the Civil War. I’d say the fact that these were never (as a far I can find out) actually used in a mass shooting shows that these practical restrictions meant they were not as capable of easily killing lots of people as a modern firearm. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/10 "2016-06-18T19:45:31Z")
> [@rbroome](#): > > that definition does not exclude deaths from other weapons besides guns. Given that a club is a lethal weapon in some cases, the first mass “shooting” would be in pre-history. Is the OP limiting the time-frame to after the development of firearms or after the development of semi-automatic firearms? Guns (specifically modern firearms) are make it uniquely easy to kill lots of people. Yes you can kill people (sometime lots of them) other ways, but it is not as easy. e.g. the gunpowder plot mentioned above required an extensive conspiracy, it wasn’t just a loner deciding to kill a bunch of people (and it was that extensive conspiracy that ultimately led to it’s failure). Hence to OP, its clear the weapons of the 18th century were not individually capable of easily killing large numbers of people with, but when did that change? Was it with the development of reliable mass produced semi-automatic weapons? Or were there earlier example of mass shootings? The examples above were seem to be well into the era of semi-automatic weapons. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/11 "2016-06-18T20:00:15Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > I looked through the subpages and the earliest I could find was [1878 in Hyderabad, India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers_(Asia)). There were much earlier ones with without firearms. I think that probably stands as the earliest example: > [@](#): > > n June 1878 a Baloch sepoy killed six people and seriosuly wounded four others in Hyderabad, Sindh, British Raj. Early in the morning the soldier shot his mistress, whom he believed unfaithful, and then took 100 rounds of ammuntions and left the barracks. Out in the street he shot at anyone who crossed his path, until he himself was killed by one of his officers > **[Hyderabad amok case](https://amok.fandom.com/wiki/Hyderabad_amok_case)** > > In June 1878 a Baloch sepoy killed six people and seriosuly wounded four others in Hyderabad, Sindh, British Raj. Early in the morning the soldier shot his mistress, whom he believed unfaithful, and then took 100 rounds of ammuntion and left the... In 1870s India he would have had something like a [Martini Henry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_military_rifles#Martini.E2.80.93Henry_Rifles). Not a modern semi-automatic weapon (though arguably closer to it than a 18th Century musket) ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/12 "2016-06-18T20:09:30Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Guns (specifically modern firearms) are make it uniquely easy to kill lots of people. Yes you can kill people (sometime lots of them) other ways, but it is not as easy. e.g. the gunpowder plot mentioned above required an extensive conspiracy, it wasn’t just a loner deciding to kill a bunch of people (and it was that extensive conspiracy that ultimately led to it’s failure). > > Hence to OP, its clear the weapons of the 18th century were not individually capable of easily killing large numbers of people with, but when did that change? Was it with the development of reliable mass produced semi-automatic weapons? Or were there earlier example of mass shootings? The examples above were seem to be well into the era of semi-automatic weapons. I don’t know if I agree with this. A few years ago a couple of people in China killed over a hundred people with only only some knives, so I don’t think it was impossible or even that hard for people to go nuts and kill many individuals in a single event (which I assume is what the OP is asking)…merely that it wasn’t something that was done before the advent of mass media and copy cat killings. Another factor might just be modern population density, though there were certainly cities before semi-automatic weapons were invented with high population density. Mainly, you’d need to look at what would motivate someone back then to go out and just randomly kill a bunch of people, or whether that ages crazy people would have been motivated to do different crazy shit. My guess is that they simply did different things or had different targets for their craziness. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/13 "2016-06-18T20:14:39Z")
> [@XT](#): > > I don’t know if I agree with this. A few years ago a couple of people in China killed over a hundred people with only only some knives, so I don’t think it was impossible or even that hard for people to go nuts and kill many individuals in a single event (which I assume is what the OP is asking)…merely that it wasn’t something that was done before the advent of mass media and copy cat killings. Another factor might just be modern population density, though there were certainly cities before semi-automatic weapons were invented with high population density. Mainly, you’d need to look at what would motivate someone back then to go out and just randomly kill a bunch of people, or whether that ages crazy people would have been motivated to do different crazy shit. My guess is that they simply did different things or had different targets for their craziness. That was a well planned attack by a group of 8 separatist terrorists (and unless there was another one I am missing only [33 people](http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/01/world/asia/china-railway-attack/) were killed). Obviously humans have been killing other humans since the dawn of time without the need for guns. But guns have made it possible for a single disaffected individual to kill large numbers of people without much in the way of planning or military skill. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/14 "2016-06-18T20:31:24Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > That was a well planned attack by a group of 8 separatist terrorists (and unless there was another one I am missing only [33 people](http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/01/world/asia/china-railway-attack/) were killed). > > Obviously humans have been killing other humans since the dawn of time without the need for guns. But guns have made it possible for a single disaffected individual to kill large numbers of people without much in the way of planning or military skill. That’s the one…I was mis-remembering, it was 130 wounded, 33 killed. All done with knives, though. I get your point about preparation and planning, but some of the mass shootings have had preparation and planning by the killers…they aren’t all just someone grabbing a gun and going nuts. Guns certainly make it easier (I suppose the way to think about it is industrialization and mass production…where once it would take 100 or even 1000 guys 1 guy can do the job now), but I think the real reason we see this sort of mass killing today is more a change in attitude and mindset than just because guns make it easier. YMMV, but I think it has more to do with mass media and modern society and culture than it does with guns, per se. If it was just a matter of having access to tools that could kill a large number of random people then we’d have seen more of this sort of thing once people figured out they could blow up markets or whatever with gun powder, if nothing else… ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/15 "2016-06-18T21:05:43Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Guns (specifically modern firearms) are make it uniquely easy to kill lots of people. Yes you can kill people (sometime lots of them) other ways, but it is not as easy. e.g. the gunpowder plot mentioned above required an extensive conspiracy, it wasn’t just a loner deciding to kill a bunch of people (and it was that extensive conspiracy that ultimately led to it’s failure). > > Hence to OP, its clear the weapons of the 18th century were not individually capable of easily killing large numbers of people with, but when did that change? Was it with the development of reliable mass produced semi-automatic weapons? Or were there earlier example of mass shootings? The examples above were seem to be well into the era of semi-automatic weapons. Four words “A whiff of grapeshot”. 300 dead. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/16 "2016-06-18T21:07:06Z")
> **[Mass Shootings Have Long History](https://www.seeker.com/mass-shootings-have-long-history-1766324673.html)** > > Killing or trying to kill a mass of people is neither a modern nor a uniquely American phenomenon ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/17 "2016-06-18T21:28:00Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Four words “A whiff of grapeshot”. 300 dead. A battle between 5000 and 25000 troops (where one side happened to have more cannon, or used them more effectively, than the other). No different to countless battles before or since (the first use of artillery against infantry, rather than as a siege weapon, was in the 100 years war centuries before that), and not an example of a mass shooting by any means. I guess a side question would be has a rogue individual ever gone crazy with an artillery piece, I can’t imagine so (as artillery pieces generally take a highly trained team to use). I would say the whole of Napoleon’s career was testament to how ineffective sidearms in that era. His military philosophy was based on the ability of massed infantry to over run ranks of musketeers in a frontal attack. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2016, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/18 "2016-06-18T21:28:09Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Four words “A whiff of grapeshot”. 300 dead. That was 5000 men and 40 cannons, though, which seems to be beyond the question of what a single person alone would be able to do. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/19 "2016-06-19T00:46:56Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > I looked through the subpages and the earliest I could find was [1878 in Hyderabad, India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rampage_killers_(Asia)). There were much earlier ones with without firearms. As there is a reliable contemporary source listed (an Australian newspaper) actually added a wiki page for this: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyderabad\_amok\_case](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyderabad_amok_case) Seems like the first documented instance of a mass shooting should have its own wiki page. ---
**Author:** ![Martini\_Enfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/martini_enfield/32/11123_2.png) [@Martini\_Enfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martini_Enfield)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/20 "2016-06-19T02:39:30Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > I think that probably stands as the earliest example: > [Hyderabad amok case | Amok Wiki | Fandom](http://amok.wikia.com/wiki/Hyderabad_amok_case) > > In 1870s India he would have had something like a [Martini Henry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_military_rifles#Martini.E2.80.93Henry_Rifles). Not a modern semi-automatic weapon (though arguably closer to it than a 18th Century musket) It’s unlikely he had a Martini-Henry; as a result of the Indian Mutiny (1857-1858) the Native troops were deliberately kept one technological level behind their British counterparts (in case they ever got ideas again, basically). I’d suggest he was more likely to have had a [Snider-Enfield](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snider%E2%80%93Enfield), which was basically a converted Pattern 1853 musket capable of firing metallic cartridges - they were in service in India for a very long time after everyone else would have considered them obsolete. The Snider-Enfield is even slower to fire than the Martini-Henry, incidentally - faster than a muzzeloader but nowhere near the speed of a bolt-action rifle. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662.md?page=2)