Quote Originally Posted by Didz View Post
No they were armed with the Martini-Henry Rifle. Which was notorious for jamming when it was fired too rapidly and became hot.

Whilst the writer of the following article dismisses this claim battlefield archeologists did find a significant number of discarded rifles on the battlefield of islandwana with cartridges jammed in their breechblocks.
http://www.martinihenry.com/zulu-wars.htm
The Martini-Henry rifle was a drop block design single shot design. Single shot rifles do not have feeding jams. At most the soft shell casing will expand against the chamber and not eject leaving you to dig it out with a knife. That is not a problem with the rifle design more a problem of the shells.

This can happen to revolvers also.