Revolutionary War Weapons

A musket is a muzzle-loaded, smooth bore long gun, which is intended to be fired from the shoulder.

Usually, the musket is thought to be the weapon that replaced the arquebus, and was in turn replaced by the rifle. But the term ?musket? has applied to a range of different weapons, starting with a long, heavy weapon with a matchlock or wheel lock and loose powder fired with the gun barrel resting on a stand, and ending with a lighter weapon with rifling and percussion caps, affixed with a bayonet. Muskets were primarily designed for use by infantry. A soldier primarily armed with a musket had the designation musketman or musketeer. Initially, 16th-century troops armed with a heavy version of the arquebus called a musket were specialists supporting the arquebusiers and pikemen formations. By the start of the 18th century, a lighter version of the musket had edged out the arquebus, and the addition of the bayonet edged out the pike, and almost all infantry became musketeers. In the 19th century, improvements in ammunition and firing methods allowed rifling to be practical for military use, and the rifled musket became common. About the time of the introduction of cartridge, breechloading, and multiple rounds of ammunition just a few years later, the term "rifled musket" gave way to "rifle", and "musket" fell out of fashion.

Typical musket calibres ranged from to . A typical smooth bore musket firing at a single target was only accurate to about to . Rifled muskets of the mid 19th century were significantly more accurate, with the ability to hit a man sized target at up to ."Arms and Equipment of the Civil War" By Jack Coggins, Published by Courier Dover Publications, 2004 The advantage of this extended range was demonstrated at the Battle of Four Lakes, where Springfield Model 1855 rifled muskets inflicted heavy casualties among the Indian warriors before they could get their smooth bore muskets into range."Gunsmoke and Saddle Leather: Firearms in the nineteenth-century American West" by Charles G. Worman, Published by UNM Press, 2005 However, in the Italian War of 1859, French forces were able to defeat the longer range of Austrian rifle muskets by aggressive skirmishing and rapid bayonet assaults at close quarters combat."War in the Age of Technology: Myriad Faces of Modern Armed Conflict" by Geoffrey Jensen, Andrew Wiest, Published by NYU Press, 2001