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The Model 1861 was a step forward in U.S. small arms design, being the first rifled shoulder weapon adopted and widely issued as the primary infantry weapon (earlier U.S. martial rifles such as the Harpers Ferry Model 1803 rifle were issued to riflemen rather than the infantry as a whole and production and issuance of the Model 1855 prior to ...
Various types of Minié balls. The four on the right are provided with Tamisier ball grooves for aerodynamic stability. James H. Burton's 1855 Minié ball design (.58 caliber, 500 grains) from the Harpers Ferry Armory. The Minié ball, or Minie ball, is a type of hollow-based bullet designed by Claude-Étienne Minié for muzzle-loaded, rifled ...
Springfield Model 1863 rifled musket and Enfield Pattern 1861 musketoon Springfield and Enfield lockplates. The Springfield Model 1863 was a .58 caliber rifled musket manufactured by the Springfield Armory and independent contractors between 1863 and 1865. The Model 1863 was only a minor improvement over the Springfield Model 1861. As such, it ...
Various musket balls including (second from the right) a Williams bullet. The Williams cleaner bullet, also known as "cleaner bullets", refers to three different types of bullets that were used by the Union Army during the American Civil War in the standard .58 caliber rifle muskets.
At 56 inches long and weighing nine pounds, the Model 1861 was a single-shot, muzzleloading rifle that used the percussion cap mechanism to fire a .58 caliber Minié ball. It was capable of firing three rounds a minute at an effective range of 500 yards but could be deadly at longer ranges.
The smoothbore barrel and inaccurate round ball were also being replaced by rifled barrels and the newly invented Minié ball. While older muskets had an effective range of about 50 to 100 yards (46–91 m), the Model 1855 had an effective range of 400 yards (370 m) and was deadly to over 1,000 yards (910 m).
Model 1863 Springfield rifled musket and Pattern 1861 Enfield musketoon Springfield and Enfield actions. The Pattern 1861 Enfield musketoon was a short-barrel version (610 mm or 24 inches) of the Pattern 1853 Enfield rifled musket, having a faster rifling twist rate (1:48 versus 1:78), along with more rifling grooves (five grooves versus the Pattern 1853's three grooves), which made it as ...
To keep the ball in place once the weapon was loaded, it would be partially wrapped in a small piece of cloth. [61] However, the smaller ball could move within the barrel as the musket was fired, decreasing the accuracy of musket fire [62] (it was complained that it took a man's weight in lead musket balls to kill him). [63]