In the early engagements of our Civil War, some militia units showed up dressed in uniforms not unlike yours, with smooth bore flintlock muskets. Many other militias had percussion smoothbores from the Mexican War era. So, buck and ball loads saw combat again, because the same problem presented itself again of each side firing blindly through its own cloud bank of smoke into the enemy’s cloud bank. During the first volley of the engagement, when the air was clear, I suspect most of the men on line were aiming at the center of the opposing line, whether by doctrine to split the line or just to ensure a hit.
Buck and ball remained with rear echelon units for the rest of the civil war, better guns were needed elsewhere and this loading was the best way to use smoothbore muskets.
For a good reference on the effectiveness of buck and ball try to find something written by a member of the Pennsylvania volunteer regiment that faced Picketts charge at Gettysburg these troops were still armed with Flint lock muskets from the Pennsylvania State armory firing buck and ball, and they managed to decimate Picketts line!
I gotta get a flint lock one of these days. :) From your little experiment, it seems like if you're not going to use musket balls that a straight buckshot load might be more effective than buck and ball when you're over 25 yards, although when you get out 100, in my mind, I'd have to question the effectiveness of buckshot, especially against a thick woolen uniform and much over that distance is just a wish and a prayer.
Thanks for dealing with the heat and humidity to produce a great video. I am a fan of Buck and Ball and think it is an asset to people that may not be the best riflemen. There were a lot of scared young men during these battles and their aim may not have always been on point. Also, it's easy to imagine a wall of lead being thrown at a formation of men that were relatively close together. UA-cam needs to realize that this is HISTORY and different than modern gun channels. Great job Mike. Best wishes.
Mike, this is genuine historical research, and it explains why buck and ball stayed in use for so long. This should be required viewing when studying the Revolutionary War. Well done! Thank you!
I appreciate the amount of time and effort that you put into setting this up and commend you for the detailed information. Thank you Sir. Excellent work!
Just caught this one Mike, and just so you know at the Battle of Gettysburg the 12th New Jersey armed with .69 caliber smoothbore muskets loaded with buck-and-ball cartridges stopped Pickett's Charge cold! Well OK, they DID have a little help from the rest of the Army Of The Potomac! Just a little. Spoken as a proud (former) NJ guy! 😉 By the way, the 12th NJ monument is topped with a buck-and-ball load!
Hey Mike! I have read of the Prussians firing at Company unit sized lengths of cloth so that they could see how many musket balls from their volleys actually were effective and how many were "fly aways"... either into the ground or into the air! I understand, that later, man sized outlines were painted on the sheets to account for the space between individuals. Interesting experiment and thanks for conducting it!
I did this in my shotgun with a lee 7/8 slug and 3 lee .33 buck and it actually worked lol, one big hole and almost concentric circle of three small holes
Great video, I agree that this would be highly effective in mass. I would love to see you try the double musket ball load that General Wolf ordered his men to do, at the battle of Quebec. The French ranks completely collapsed after the first volley.
Excellent observations! Not a great ammunition for individuals shooting at point targets, but for heavy infantry tactics and rapid volleys it would be devastating
Thanks Mike. Clears up a lot of speculation and answered many questions. Kudos for sticking this out in adverse heat and humidity! Much Respect. Rowan.
glad I live where I do...it's nice n cool with intermittent rainy days. cools things off nicely till the sun gets going again. then after 2 or 3 days... more rain ! love that kind of weather. heat i can do without lol Edit ** I'd say my only critic is that camera was consistently held low and i missed seeing the upper 1/4 of the targets maybe in the future you can try to hold higher with your camera. but we still got the idea mosty.
Glad you interjected, "As a rifleman", my feelings exactly. Occasionally a smoothbore with the right bore and one ball combination can be found to be rather accurate @25 -50 yds, but they were the exceptions. Kudos to you for your heat and humidity tolerance. At my age and with my Alpine and Scandinavian DNA I would have passed out. I can no longer tolerate temperatures over 80 F or humidity over 50%. Because of our mid-Atlantic climate, I rarely get to shoot in my club matches anymore. The fact that we go directly from Winter into Summer, and Summer into Winter does not help.
I'm grew up in Bucks County when it was still rural. In Philly, they say, "It ain't the heat, it's the stupidity." I'm down near Mayberry, NC and it really is no hotter or humid than SE OA.
Most interesting field test, thanks for bringing it to us. It looks like buck & ball is devastating at 50 yards…I certainly wouldn’t want to stand in front of it.
This is pretty much exactly what I expected. A load thats very useful for 18th century combat tactics, ie mass volley fire, but not great for much of anything else. Great content. Thanks!
Another reason why I think buck and ball would be a good load to use in a double barrel shotgun while hunting deer in the Eastern woodland it can be extremely thick cover with shots anywhere from 5 to 50 yards and half the time on the move so haveing the one large ball to cut through the brush and the three smaller ones to try to sneak their way through it you've got a much higher probability of you hitting your target
Many thanks for this video, Mike! Despite your reticence to perform this test, it proved to be a pretty interesting 'archaeological experiment', after all. Washington's wisdom in selecting buck and ball as a standard load would likely have served Continental troops very well, on the 18th Century battlefield.
Great job on these videos. Just a note: Pretty much everyone had to have 2 opposing teeth to chew and not starve to death. In the surviving recruiting instructions, officers were given pretty long lists of things to look for when inspecting recruits - none of them mention teeth at all.
Not only was the set up excellent but your analysis was also very good. From you other videos it appears to me that the accuracy of the musket ball was was compromised but was made up by the effectiveness of the buckshot to deliver hits, especally at the longer ranges. You're comments that it made sense in 18th century combat is really the point although as a rifleman myself, I can agree that for range or even hunting purposes it makes little sense. As an aside, I have a smooth bore Tower pistol reproduction that I experimented with using three OO buck shot over a 75 cal ball at 10 yards and less. As a weapon used in a ship boarding action in the same time period the result was equally impressive.
Thank you Mike , very interesting . Been experimenting with a Indian made Hawken style 12g single barrel musket shooting 3 x 00 buck and a Lyman slug 1 1/8 ounce . Only 25 yds and again not as accurate as single slug but hits a 2 1/2 foot gong . Shot a 6 inch thick pine plank and the slug went through ( 80 grains of fffg black powder ) . 00 buck penetrates to about 2 inches . I would not like to be hit by that load . It would spoil your day 😮
Mike. Thank you so much for the forethought to the shooting experiment. And reference to historical battles. You are the best presenter on this historical period of firearms and tactics.
I remember reading about a guy loading bird and ball...yes you read that correctly. He used this as a sort of do it all close/mid range foraging round.. His reasoning was that you would more than likely miss the quail/dove/pheasant with the ball, but hit with the bird shot, and if a dear presented itself, the ball would do the real work and the birdshot would only pepper him. Ever heard of such a thing?
Yet another fantastic video, Mike, thank you very much. I am actually somewhat surprised with what I learned here, because before watching this I thought buck and ball to be somewhat gimmicky (like you, I am a rifleman, and prize the rifleman's approach), but this video made it absolutely clear that Washington was right about this load. I am especially surprised at its effectiveness at 100 yards, as I really expected the bullets to fly all over the place with fewer hits than if you had just used a regular ball at that range.
Good video mike, can't help but comment on your comments about the weather. I live in central North Carolina, 92 and 100 percent humidity is a normal day in late spring and summer here. As a man who works outside, I would say a bandana is always a good thing to have.
There are some war of 1812 British Army reenactors in New Zealand with a UA-cam channel and they've done all sorts of tests with Brown Bess muskets and Baker rifles (duplicating stuff that's in the Sharpe's movies). One thing they did was set up a canvas tarp about 7 feet tall and 20 feet wide with silhouettes of ranked soldiers painted on the canvas with spray paint. They had 4 or 5 reenactors volley fire into the tarp from 100 yards multiple times to simulate a gun line and counted the the bullet holes. The videos I've seen make no mention of buck and ball. George Washington promoted buck and ball, saying it was the best load to use.
What a great history lesson. You truly earned a giant icy beverage! I have a flintlock I've never fired; perhaps I'll have to fire it up and try your test...
I've wondered about the effectiveness of buck n' ball since reading about Washington's orders in grad school. I can now see how it is useful with an Army of vastly differing skilled volunteers with differing quality of equipment. Thanks, that was more of a gnawing question than pressing question like how the Brits used or ignored their advantages in Georgia during the war.
Buck and Ball was used during the Civil War as well as the Revolution! My own Great Great Grandfather, a Captain in the 64th Illinois Infantry, was wounded by Buck and Ball at the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain on June 20th 1864.
I reckon if you have a bunch of troops that haven't been able to develop decent marksmanship, the buck and ball loads might be good. It's really cool that you're wearing what looks like period correct specticals to go with your outfit.
one point the buck and ball i think would do better in the sense that two or three rows together would have a larger chance of success. i too enjoy this
I can't really get excited about buck-N-ball myself, but this was a great video with great historic value. Thanks Mike for always sharing great content!!!
Watching this made me wonder why troops lined up shoulder to shoulder in battle, rather than having some interval between them to lessen the effectiveness of oposing force fire.
So we now understand the flintlock submachine gun. These guys weren't stupid or unobservant. With the smoke from black powder, it would seem that using something with multiple projectiles going down range would be the optimum solution. Thanks for the video. I do really enjoy this kind of experimental history.
I was always told that the sentries got buck and ball so that if they had to shoot at something approaching that didn't reply with the password they would have a better chance of hitting in a lower light condition. Thank you for sweating for the oldies.
Thanks for doing this firearms test with the Buck-and-Ball shots.......must have been a lot of work to get this all completed......I can only imagine, thanks for all your hard work.....
@@duelist1954 Bill Raby, another black powder gun build channel, just had all of his videos nuked for "community guidelines violations" today. The channel itself is still up.
B&B is the origin of 'Spray n Pray' I've done the same tests on 4x8 sheets of plywood (back when it was CHEAP) and came to pretty much the same conclusions as you..
Love it, thank you. Remember, units that used buck and ball in the Civil War, such as Stonewall Jackson and General Meagher, loved it for its close quarters capability, not its distance work.
The best test of the legendary buck & ball in use that I have ever seen. Your test clarifies the reasoning behind its use in the Continental Army. Well done sir. new sub!
I this video excellent shooting. I think that the buck and ball is verry accurate, and efectine.Like your videos.One of these I will have to get one of these muskets. David Back.
Thanks Mike, kinda curious how that smoke pole of yours would do shooting bird shot on the Sporting Clay Range. I gotta think after the War of Independence lots of settlers took captured/surrendered Brown Bessies out to settle the frontier
The musket was not that much different from the regular fowling pieces of the day, though most fowlers tended to be of smaller gauge than "Brown Bess". I have shot both the British Short Land Pattern and French muskets at sporting clays before and you don't realize how slow the lock time is on a flintlock until you are trying to follow through on a bird! It is, of course, doable as hunters have been taking birds on the wing since there were firearms.
One hint, if you have to use a public range, do your 5 minutes of blathering at HOME off of the range to minimize the time you have to share the range. Simple, talk at home, shoot at the range. You could find that range empty during busy hours but only for a few minutes ........
Theirs usually more then one tank of soldiers too so buck and or ball that misses could be hitting them. And the ball would generally go through one and possibly into another solider.
Thank you very much Mike! I am picking up my first Bess and excited about putting it thru it’s paces. Will be my first smoothbore. I am looking to possibly join a central PA club with a muzzle loading interest. I’m in Carlisle.Thanks again for all your educational info. Jeff
I like the use of the drums to lead in each set. Also, that’s dedication wearing that vest in that heat.
Excellent video Mike! I love your approach!
In the early engagements of our Civil War, some militia units showed up dressed in uniforms not unlike yours, with smooth bore flintlock muskets. Many other militias had percussion smoothbores from the Mexican War era. So, buck and ball loads saw combat again, because the same problem presented itself again of each side firing blindly through its own cloud bank of smoke into the enemy’s cloud bank. During the first volley of the engagement, when the air was clear, I suspect most of the men on line were aiming at the center of the opposing line, whether by doctrine to split the line or just to ensure a hit.
Buck and ball remained with rear echelon units for the rest of the civil war, better guns were needed elsewhere and this loading was the best way to use smoothbore muskets.
It’s interesting to me that at least one ammo company has recently marketed a 12 Gauge shotgun loading of buck and ball.
Good information. I can imagine the looks of the members who aren't familiar with your channel or written work.
Excellent video! Our forefather knew what they were doing. The more holes poked throughout the bag the faster blood pressure drops.
For a good reference on the effectiveness of buck and ball try to find something written by a member of the Pennsylvania volunteer regiment that faced Picketts charge at Gettysburg these troops were still armed with Flint lock muskets from the Pennsylvania State armory firing buck and ball, and they managed to decimate Picketts line!
All my respect to Your efforts bringing us so many interesting, technical and historical information.
Thanks a lot for sharing.
Hey, Don't stop.
What ever you do...
Mark from Oahu said that!
Them gosh darn red coats
Will stop com'in
I gotta get a flint lock one of these days. :)
From your little experiment, it seems like if you're not going to use musket balls that a straight buckshot load might be more effective than buck and ball when you're over 25 yards, although when you get out 100, in my mind, I'd have to question the effectiveness of buckshot, especially against a thick woolen uniform and much over that distance is just a wish and a prayer.
Thanks for dealing with the heat and humidity to produce a great video. I am a fan of Buck and Ball and think it is an asset to people that may not be the best riflemen. There were a lot of scared young men during these battles and their aim may not have always been on point. Also, it's easy to imagine a wall of lead being thrown at a formation of men that were relatively close together.
UA-cam needs to realize that this is HISTORY and different than modern gun channels. Great job Mike. Best wishes.
Very good video. I am told some Civil War monuments are topped with buck and ball.
Mike, this is genuine historical research, and it explains why buck and ball stayed in use for so long. This should be required viewing when studying the Revolutionary War. Well done! Thank you!
It was also cheap and easy to make
I appreciate the amount of time and effort that you put into setting this up and commend you for the detailed information. Thank you Sir. Excellent work!
Very informative. I always thought Buck and ball was ridiculous but now I see how effective it was. Definitely clicking thumbs up! Thanks Mike
I love the thump sound a ram rod makes when it's packing the ball in place. :)
Just caught this one Mike, and just so you know at the Battle of Gettysburg the 12th New Jersey armed with .69 caliber smoothbore muskets loaded with buck-and-ball cartridges stopped Pickett's Charge cold!
Well OK, they DID have a little help from the rest of the Army Of The Potomac! Just a little.
Spoken as a proud (former) NJ guy! 😉
By the way, the 12th NJ monument is topped with a buck-and-ball load!
Hey Mike! I have read of the Prussians firing at Company unit sized lengths of cloth so that they could see how many musket balls from their volleys actually were effective and how many were "fly aways"... either into the ground or into the air! I understand, that later, man sized outlines were painted on the sheets to account for the space between individuals. Interesting experiment and thanks for conducting it!
I did this in my shotgun with a lee 7/8 slug and 3 lee .33 buck and it actually worked lol, one big hole and almost concentric circle of three small holes
Great video, I agree that this would be highly effective in mass. I would love to see you try the double musket ball load that General Wolf ordered his men to do, at the battle of Quebec. The French ranks completely collapsed after the first volley.
Excellent observations! Not a great ammunition for individuals shooting at point targets, but for heavy infantry tactics and rapid volleys it would be devastating
Back in 1975 I got my first deer with a Belgium Charleville .69 with round ball w/ 3- .36 on top.
That was interesting to see the effectiveness of B & B on a range after using it on War Of Rights.
Buck and ball for soldiers of the line is the way to go . I would love to have seen 4 or five musket volleys on that target line 👍 thanks for download
Thanks Mike. Clears up a lot of speculation and answered many questions. Kudos for sticking this out in adverse heat and humidity! Much Respect. Rowan.
glad I live where I do...it's nice n cool with intermittent rainy days. cools things off nicely till the sun gets going again. then after 2 or 3 days... more rain ! love that kind of weather. heat i can do without lol
Edit ** I'd say my only critic is that camera was consistently held low and i missed seeing the upper 1/4 of the targets maybe in the future you can try to hold higher with your camera. but we still got the idea mosty.
A great, very informative job Mike! As always, many thanks for all your hard work! Bless you Sir and keep safe!👍🏻
Amazing Video as always. Brown Bess is One of my Favorites.
Glad you interjected, "As a rifleman", my feelings exactly. Occasionally a smoothbore with the right bore and one ball combination can be found to be rather accurate @25 -50 yds, but they were the exceptions. Kudos to you for your heat and humidity tolerance. At my age and with my Alpine and Scandinavian DNA I would have passed out. I can no longer tolerate temperatures over 80 F or humidity over 50%. Because of our mid-Atlantic climate, I rarely get to shoot in my club matches anymore. The fact that we go directly from Winter into Summer, and Summer into Winter does not help.
I'm grew up in Bucks County when it was still rural. In Philly, they say, "It ain't the heat, it's the stupidity." I'm down near Mayberry, NC and it really is no hotter or humid than SE OA.
Most interesting field test, thanks for bringing it to us. It looks like buck & ball is devastating at 50 yards…I certainly wouldn’t want to stand in front of it.
One thing is for sure I need to get me a flintlock one of these days. I shoot cap and ball revolvers but these just look really fun.
It is interesting seeing the trade offs for the different types of weapons and ammo in this era. Such an interesting era tactically
Been waiting for this video. Great job!
Mike i am in SC and the humidity gets nasty here. been here since birth in 1957, still ain't use to it,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
This is pretty much exactly what I expected. A load thats very useful for 18th century combat tactics, ie mass volley fire, but not great for much of anything else. Great content. Thanks!
Another reason why I think buck and ball would be a good load to use in a double barrel shotgun while hunting deer in the Eastern woodland it can be extremely thick cover with shots anywhere from 5 to 50 yards and half the time on the move so haveing the one large ball to cut through the brush and the three smaller ones to try to sneak their way through it you've got a much higher probability of you hitting your target
Many thanks for this video, Mike! Despite your reticence to perform this test, it proved to be a pretty interesting 'archaeological experiment', after all. Washington's wisdom in selecting buck and ball as a standard load would likely have served Continental troops very well, on the 18th Century battlefield.
Great series on buck and ball
Beautiful flintlock.
A great series on why buck and ball was used. Great teaching here regarding 18th century realities.
Screw UA-cam. I love your stuff!
Late seeing this video but it was just outstanding. Thank you Mike.
Great job on these videos. Just a note: Pretty much everyone had to have 2 opposing teeth to chew and not starve to death. In the surviving recruiting instructions, officers were given pretty long lists of things to look for when inspecting recruits - none of them mention teeth at all.
Thanks for the information. I was wondering about the reasoning behind the buck and ball loads.
Not only was the set up excellent but your analysis was also very good. From you other videos it appears to me that the accuracy of the musket ball was was compromised but was made up by the effectiveness of the buckshot to deliver hits, especally at the longer ranges. You're comments that it made sense in 18th century combat is really the point although as a rifleman myself, I can agree that for range or even hunting purposes it makes little sense. As an aside, I have a smooth bore Tower pistol reproduction that I experimented with using three OO buck shot over a 75 cal ball at 10 yards and less. As a weapon used in a ship boarding action in the same time period the result was equally impressive.
Thanks for doing this test. Very informative and entertaining.
This is pure science 🎖
Thank you Mike , very interesting . Been experimenting with a Indian made Hawken style 12g single barrel musket shooting 3 x 00 buck and a Lyman slug 1 1/8 ounce . Only 25 yds and again not as accurate as single slug but hits a 2 1/2 foot gong . Shot a 6 inch thick pine plank and the slug went through ( 80 grains of fffg black powder ) . 00 buck penetrates to about 2 inches . I would not like to be hit by that load . It would spoil your day 😮
Mike. Thank you so much for the forethought to the shooting experiment. And reference to historical battles. You are the best presenter on this historical period of firearms and tactics.
You have the highest quality content Mike!
Hi Mike, glad you figured out what to do with the video setup after your intro video the other day
I remember reading about a guy loading bird and ball...yes you read that correctly. He used this as a sort of do it all close/mid range foraging round.. His reasoning was that you would more than likely miss the quail/dove/pheasant with the ball, but hit with the bird shot, and if a dear presented itself, the ball would do the real work and the birdshot would only pepper him. Ever heard of such a thing?
Yet another fantastic video, Mike, thank you very much. I am actually somewhat surprised with what I learned here, because before watching this I thought buck and ball to be somewhat gimmicky (like you, I am a rifleman, and prize the rifleman's approach), but this video made it absolutely clear that Washington was right about this load. I am especially surprised at its effectiveness at 100 yards, as I really expected the bullets to fly all over the place with fewer hits than if you had just used a regular ball at that range.
Good video mike, can't help but comment on your comments about the weather. I live in central North Carolina, 92 and 100 percent humidity is a normal day in late spring and summer here. As a man who works outside, I would say a bandana is always a good thing to have.
Very interesting! Love this kind of experimental archeology!
There are some war of 1812 British Army reenactors in New Zealand with a UA-cam channel and they've done all sorts of tests with Brown Bess muskets and Baker rifles (duplicating stuff that's in the Sharpe's movies). One thing they did was set up a canvas tarp about 7 feet tall and 20 feet wide with silhouettes of ranked soldiers painted on the canvas with spray paint. They had 4 or 5 reenactors volley fire into the tarp from 100 yards multiple times to simulate a gun line and counted the the bullet holes. The videos I've seen make no mention of buck and ball. George Washington promoted buck and ball, saying it was the best load to use.
What a great history lesson. You truly earned a giant icy beverage! I have a flintlock I've never fired; perhaps I'll have to fire it up and try your test...
I've wondered about the effectiveness of buck n' ball since reading about Washington's orders in grad school. I can now see how it is useful with an Army of vastly differing skilled volunteers with differing quality of equipment. Thanks, that was more of a gnawing question than pressing question like how the Brits used or ignored their advantages in Georgia during the war.
Buck and Ball was used during the Civil War as well as the Revolution! My own Great Great Grandfather, a Captain in the 64th Illinois Infantry, was wounded by Buck and Ball at the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain on June 20th 1864.
I reckon if you have a bunch of troops that haven't been able to develop decent marksmanship, the buck and ball loads might be good. It's really cool that you're wearing what looks like period correct specticals to go with your outfit.
one point the buck and ball i think would do better in the sense that two or three rows together would have a larger chance of success. i too enjoy this
I can't really get excited about buck-N-ball myself, but this was a great video with great historic value. Thanks Mike for always sharing great content!!!
I appreciate the drum sound effects. Interesting test as well.
Great Video ! ( Try to) Stay Cool !
Watching this made me wonder why troops lined up shoulder to shoulder in battle, rather than having some interval between them to lessen the effectiveness of oposing force fire.
That was a great video Mike thank you for the look into 18th century fighting techniques
Appreciate duelist1954 channel, always interesting.
great content. excellent hit probability between 50-100
So we now understand the flintlock submachine gun. These guys weren't stupid or unobservant. With the smoke from black powder, it would seem that using something with multiple projectiles going down range would be the optimum solution.
Thanks for the video. I do really enjoy this kind of experimental history.
I was always told that the sentries got buck and ball so that if they had to shoot at something approaching that didn't reply with the password they would have a better chance of hitting in a lower light condition.
Thank you for sweating for the oldies.
Impressive and scary against packed rank and file.
Awesome!
Thanks for doing this firearms test with the Buck-and-Ball shots.......must have been a lot of work to get this all completed......I can only imagine, thanks for all your hard work.....
Thank You Mike.
We haven't been getting notified when your videos are up like in the past. Thanks for the hard work.
Like a lot of gun channels, I seem to be getting shadow banned by UA-cam. A lot of subscribers say they no longer get notifications.
@@duelist1954 Bill Raby, another black powder gun build channel, just had all of his videos nuked for "community guidelines violations" today. The channel itself is still up.
B&B is the origin of 'Spray n Pray' I've done the same tests on 4x8 sheets of plywood (back when it was CHEAP) and came to pretty much the same conclusions as you..
Enjoyed this one much , real data 👍
Very informative and worthwhile video Mike. In battle, the object is to disable your opponents and buck and ball would have been very effective.
Great video as always Mike.
This channel is an absolute gem!
Very well done!
Huzza… for experimental archaeology! Thank you, Sir.
Love it, thank you. Remember, units that used buck and ball in the Civil War, such as Stonewall Jackson and General Meagher, loved it for its close quarters capability, not its distance work.
MT: Clearly at 50 yards it is absolutely deadly.
There was a shortage of mimi balls and this was easy to make, both sides used it seems mainly in the west
The best test of the legendary buck & ball in use that I have ever seen. Your test clarifies the reasoning behind its use in the Continental Army. Well done sir. new sub!
Thanks!
Very Nice - Thanks!
😎👍
I this video excellent shooting. I think that the buck and ball is verry accurate, and efectine.Like your videos.One of these I will have to get one of these muskets. David Back.
Great Work and effort with this!
Nicely done.
I like all of your video's keep them coming, this one was was very interesting and informative.
Thanks Mike, kinda curious how that smoke pole of yours would do shooting bird shot on the Sporting Clay Range. I gotta think after the War of Independence lots of settlers took captured/surrendered Brown Bessies out to settle the frontier
The musket was not that much different from the regular fowling pieces of the day, though most fowlers tended to be of smaller gauge than "Brown Bess". I have shot both the British Short Land Pattern and French muskets at sporting clays before and you don't realize how slow the lock time is on a flintlock until you are trying to follow through on a bird! It is, of course, doable as hunters have been taking birds on the wing since there were firearms.
I think so .
Thanks for braving the heat for such a cool test!
Like all your work great videos
well done .
One hint, if you have to use a public range, do your 5 minutes of blathering at HOME off of the range to minimize the time you have to share the range. Simple, talk at home, shoot at the range. You could find that range empty during busy hours but only for a few minutes ........
By shot five of test three you didn't have your signature after shot barrel flip flair. That is how we know it was a hot day!
Theirs usually more then one tank of soldiers too so buck and or ball that misses could be hitting them. And the ball would generally go through one and possibly into another solider.
Thank you very much Mike! I am picking up my first Bess and excited about putting it thru it’s paces. Will be my first smoothbore. I am looking to possibly join a central PA club with a muzzle loading interest. I’m in Carlisle.Thanks again for all your educational info. Jeff
Awesome information. Your having to much fun.
Great video.
Mike, grate video.
Outstanding!
Great video as always!!