400 yard hits with a patched round ball

[Birdwatcher]

Reading deeper into Frontier History one finds repeated references to a phenomenon mostly ignored in popular convention; that being the fact that many of the most skilled riflemen on the Frontier were Indians.

This quote from Carl P. Russel's classic "Firearms, Traps and Tools of the Mountain Men" (pub. 1966)

Some of the testimony regarding the Indians' use of the rifle against white adversaries is contained in the writings of participants in the Seminole War, which started in 1835.

Woodburne Potter, a staff officer in the U.S. forces under General Gaines, tells of examining the body of a hostile Indian killed on the Ouithlacooche River in February 1836. The Indian's rifle had been carried away by fleeing Indians, but "50 or 60 rifle bullets" were still on his body.

"The U.S. rifle throws a ball nearly 400 yards, but even in the hands of a good marksman it does not often hit a man at 120 yards. The Indian rifles, generally, seem to be much more accurate."

Bosworth quotes General Gaines's report to the War Department declaring that entrenched U.S. sentries were wounded, even killed, by single shots from the Seminole rifles at 400 yards.

This using technology with which even 300 yard hits were considered exceptional, and have been widely celebrated on those occasions where our guys pulled 'em off.

Birdwatcher

 

[M. De Land]

I don't believe it personally with a round ball. More than likely a few got a whole lot closer and were making the commander think they were shooting from 400 yards. Mike D.

 

[nkbj]

Well, we know they had swamp reeds.
Reckon the Seminoles invented papyrus?

 

[Supercracker]

I don't believe it personally with a round ball. More than likely a few got a whole lot closer and were making the commander think they were shooting from 400 yards. Mike D.

I agree with this.

To a General reporting back to the guys who decide if he gets to keep being a general "Guess what, the Seminoles are WAYYYY better shots than we imagined" works better than "Guess what, my guys are WAYYYYY more inept than I imagined".

 

[tenngun]

When rifles were adoped by the brits the complaint came out that men couldn't judge distance well.Its easy in fog or as smoky as a battle field could be, to miss judge. There were battle field tricks to help,but even at Gettysburg confederate gunners shot over the union line on the third day just before picketts charge.If 100 guys are shooting at your line you would notice 1 man getting hit. If your shooting at long range under battle field conditions you wouldn't see a hit enemy.Also if the enemy is better then you it makes your victory better,if you lose it wasn't your fault.

 

[Birdwatcher]

Well, we know they had swamp reeds.
Reckon the Seminoles invented papyrus?

Ignorance combined with sarcasm allus does make one look stupid

I got some googling to do, I got the same problem as most who have read much (prob'ly not including yerself :wink: ) in remembering where stuff came from.

I gotta find, in sort-of chronological order...

1) Earliest reference I can recall from the South, early 1700's, a guy commenting on the astounding proficiency of their Native guide
when hunting with his trade musket.

2) Mid 1750's (??) Adair among the Catawbas commenting that an Indian commonly shot a new gun "100 times or more" before it could be made to shoot to their liking (all sources seem to agree that the Catawbas were the baddest guys on the block in that era).

3) 1760's ?? A British column going against the Cherokees taking heavy casualties from long-range Cherokee rifles.

4) F&I war, Ben Franklin concerned the Pennsylvania farmers defending forts would be overmatched by the Indians on account of the Indians' superior skill with firearms, specifically referencing the wet weather and the fact that the Indians "knew how to make their guns work in the rain".

5) Over on the American Longrifles board support for Peter A. Alexander's suggestion that the longrifle owes is distinctive form to Indian preference, Indians possibly being the primary consumers for such weapons in the mid-18th Century...

6) The familiarity and ability of the Indians of that early era with rifles being backed up by the captivity narrative of James Smith among the Mississaguas (yer prob'ly gonna have to look up who they were :wink: )

7) Same Ohio country region, a generation later: Famed (among those who have looked) missionary to the Delawares David Ziesberger... "The Delaware Indians use no other than rifle-barrelled guns, having satisfied themselves that these are the best for shooting accurately."

8) Same time period, Six Nations in New York state: Almost no extant evidence of rifles in the hands of local Colonial militias yet post Rev-war claims indicating that about half of the firearms carried by the Iroquois were rifles ie. the Indians (and possibly their Palatine German allies) were the ONLY ones with a rifle culture in that time and place. Possibly a reason why Brant and his crew were able to so decisively decimate the Goshen Militia at the Minisink Ford.

9) The heavily one-sided toll inflicted upon local Indians when rifle-armed Eastern Tribesmen ventured West , which they did well in advance of White Trappers over the same trails, clear to California.

10) This latest reference to rifle-armed Seminoles.

11) Rip Ford in his memoirs commenting on a period of time in the 1850's when someone among the raiding Comanches they were intercepting was picking off his men from unusually long range with "a Swiss Rifle" (I suspect this was a Cherokee or some such riding with Comanches).

12) Same author, 1860, commenting on the fine rifle shot made by a Caddo Indian(or Tonkawa, author is unclear, he had about 100 Indians with him total) using a Mississippi Rifle (probably still in the original .54 cal round ball slow-twist form) to bring down the famed Comanche Iron Jacket in his (presumably) Spanish armor.

13) Last reference I have pertains to Dove Creek, 1864, where accurate riflery by Kickapoo Indians absolutely routed the Texas Frontier Battalion and Confederate Cavalry at Dove Creek ('nother one yer prob'ly going to have to look up, this debacle always gets conveniently omitted from popular Texas history :grin: )

All sarcasm aside, IMHO one has to have rocks in one's head not to find this stuff fascinating.

Birdwatcher

 

[necchi]

I can add another account;
In 1820) Here in Minn, Schoolcrafts journals depict a Buffalo hunt where the members of the brigade where incapable of harvesting Buffalo on a prairie alongside the Mississippi. They handed their mix of Rifle and Musket to the native guides, whom promptly killed 3 Buffalo using the borrowed guns.

 

[crockett]

1. I'm not sure how many rifles the Seminoles had, I thought fusils were used a lot.
2. In Florida it is hard to find anything 100 yards off unless you are on a lake- the woods are pretty thick. 200 yards? Only on a rifle range. 300 yards, not as far as I'm concerned. 400 yards?
The Army reports of trying to find the Seminoles pretty much has the Seminoles in areas of seclusion- not open areas.
3. The number of combatants- by the 3rd War the "Hostiles" numbered maybe a couple hundred. I doubt in that small a number there were many marksman of that ability.
4. Trajectory. What is the difference in bullet drop between 375 yards and 400 yards with a muzzle loader/round ball? 10 feet?
5. The army did a poor job tracking down the Seminoles, the reports might have been just to explain their lack of success.

 

[Birdwatcher]

Then in the 1860's there's Company K of the 1st Michigan Sharpshooters, an all-Indian outfit, known for sticking brush in their clothing while laying out on point.

From the Rev. War here's the Hessian Officer Von Ewald's drawing of a sort that sets the reenacting world on its head... :grin:

Fall of 1778; a Stockbridge Mohican from Massachussetts fighting on the American side. Note the linen PJ's which, if dyed black, woulda looked decidedly Viet Cong, flat straw hat, hawk, bullet pouch, bow, AND a rifle, on a sling yet.

Probably Christian, likely literate. His clothing and gear look supremely practical. A pity the Stockbridges didn't keep diaries that we know of.

Birdwatcher

 

[Rifleman1776]

Schoolcrafts journals

Schoolcraft is well known for his travels in Arkansas and the rest of the Ozarks. He is best known for his criticizm of everything American. He seemed to like and respect nothing.
I readily believe he told that story. Harder to believe it is true.
BTW, for those who don't know, Schoolcraft was English. Still bearing a grudge mebbe?

 

[Birdwatcher]

In Florida it is hard to find anything 100 yards off unless you are on a lake- the woods are pretty thick. 200 yards? Only on a rifle range. 300 yards, not as far as I'm concerned. 400 yards?

OK, so the Army was lying? Professional soldiers imbuing the savages with superhuman characteristics? And in 1835 the vegetation looked just like it does today?

What you should do is look up the remarkable saga of Caootchie AKA Wildcat and the Black Seminole Juan Caballo AKA John Horse, the same two guys who starved themselves skinny over the course of a month to slip out of that tiny prison cell window in St, Augustine.

Gave the army such fits that at the end of it they actually allowed 500 negroes, formerly in arms against the United States, to relocate to the Indian territories while still bearing arms, under the rationalization that they were slaves to the Seminoles.

Shortly thereafter Wildcat shows up over most of Texas at one time or another, with a rifle, alternately conspiring with and fighting against the Comanches.

In fact he ended his days in Mexico, struck down by smallpox in '57. A couple of years earlier him and John Horse had removed to Mexico in response to turbulent events in the Indian Territories and because a Federal edict had made it illegal for "slaves" to bear arms.

In Mexico they accepted land south of Eagle Pass/Piedras Negras in return for providing protection against Comanche raiders (a service the Cherokees and Shawnees had been providing along the Rio Grande since at least the 1820's).

During their brief heyday, Wildcat's bunch likely intercepted more Comanches than the Army and Texas Rangers, using aimed rifle fire.

John Horse weren't done until 1875, when he died in Mexico City negotiating for his people. Before that he had entered them into service with the US Cavalry out of Fort Clark, TX. Four Medal of Honor winners are buried in the little Seminole Indian cemetery there.

OK, did they have rifles in Florida? Yes, unless the Army was just lying.

Worth noting that the Creeks and Cherokees brung in to fight the Seminoles certainly did.

This was the end of the Golden Age of the Longrifle after all, by then lots of guys in the South had rifles, Indians too.

Birdwatcher

 

[Birdwatcher]

4. Trajectory. What is the difference in bullet drop between 375 yards and 400 yards with a muzzle loader/round ball? 10 feet?

More than that I'd guess. Sort of similar, but well in excess of 1,000 yards; Hess in his excellent book "The Rifle Musket in Civil War Combat" reports of a sniper accounting that he was aiming well over treetop level to hit cannon crew operating at the base of those same trees.

More to the point, the real question besides "can a round ball even go that far?" is...

What kind of accuracy and ability could you expect from guys whose main endeavor since childhood had been hunting, mostly with flintlock rifles?

Pretty durn good as it turns out.

Birdwatcher

 

[BrownBear]

I'll remain skeptical about called 400 yard hits on single targets with round balls, much less 300 yard hits, until I see it happen. One hit could be luck, so do it three times in a row, and I'll be convinced.

With today's weapons and components and dedicated match shooters you'd think it would be easier rather than harder, especially in controlled conditions rather than in the field.

I'm still waiting to see it. :bull:

 

[George]

I gotta find, in sort-of chronological order...

1) Earliest reference I can recall from the South, early 1700's, a guy commenting on the astounding proficiency of their Native guide when hunting with his trade musket.

2) Mid 1750's (??) Adair among the Catawbas commenting that an Indian commonly shot a new gun "100 times or more" before it could be made to shoot to their liking (all sources seem to agree that the Catawbas were the baddest guys on the block in that era).

You may be thinking of this reference for both of those.
http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/277043/post/1246131/hl//fromsearch/1/

Spence

 

[Birdwatcher]

Here's some folks claiming predictable 325 yard hits on a 14" rock...

oh heck, Claude gets upset about outside links.... just google "extreme long range patched round balls" and go on the longrifles forum.

Given one can drive a say, .50 cal. ball 400 yards, and given that it would continue to spin all that time, it oughtta be doable, tho' the effects of crosswinds would be horrendous and elevation extreme.

A large measure of luck? Sure, but it would take considerable skill behind the trigger to even qualify for that chance fortune.

Birdwatcher

 

[Birdwatcher]

Thanks, coulda sworn it was Adair on the second one.

 

[Rifleman1776]

An ml prb can be fired that distance and will spin all the way. Yes, winds would play a huge factor with accuracy.
But, at 400 yards a ball would be coming off it's rainbow trajectory almost straight down.
I have to wonder what the point is even talking about these kinds of ranges. This is a sport of using a very old, antique/obsolete, technology to shoot. Wanna do the modern stuff? OK, but go do modern, we don't need or want it here.

 

[Paul_R]

To a General reporting back to the guys who decide if he gets to keep being a general "Guess what, the Seminoles are WAYYYY better shots than we imagined" works better than "Guess what, my guys are WAYYYYY more inept than I imagined".

Exactly what I was thinking. :haha:

I imagine the "discussion" started out with something along the lines of "How in God's name could you have gotten your butts handed to you in that fashion???"

 

[54ball]

In the southern tribes, Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Shawnee and Creek, able bodied men were referred to as "gunman" starting very early in the 18th century.

In the deerskin trade the Indians had to be pretty good shots as the whitetailed deer was nearly hunted to extinction by the early 19th Century. As the trade went on through the 18th Century and deer became harder to hunt, the Indians started to demand rifles.

In the Rev War the a lot was made over the Pennsylvania and Virginia riflemen and their Indian dress and their preferred method of "Indian Fighting" what we know of today as "modern warfare" or flank and maneuver from cover.

Since these riflemen dressed and fought like Indians, Was not their main weapon, the rifle, a Indian weapon?

The U.S. Choctaw trading factor at Fort Stoddard just north of Spanish Mobile had this to say in 1805...

Quote:

Smoothbore guns are unsalable to the Choctaw, they want rifles.

Brown Bear says

I'll remain skeptical about called 400 yard hits on single targets with round balls, much less 300 yard hits, until I see it happen. One hit could be luck, so do it three times in a row, and I'll be convinced.

It does not matter what you or I think. Long shots with roundball rifles are documented all through the period.

crockett says

2. In Florida it is hard to find anything 100 yards off unless you are on a lake- the woods are pretty thick. 200 yards? Only on a rifle range. 300 yards, not as far as I'm concerned. 400 yards?

That's Florida of 2013. Lets not forget the the massive Longleaf pine forest that stretched from Virginia down the Coastal plain to Texas. These were big open woods that regularly had open grass savannahs. So shots at several hundred yards are possible.

Personally I have no problems with the Army's account. The Indian rifles they refer to is the American longrifle. As said time and time again throughout American history long shots are documented with such rifles all through their history. So a man sized target at 400 yards is not unreasonable.

How many have really tried such a shot? I honestly think if you had a man sized target at 400 yards and a day to spend shooting at it you would be surprised at how many hits can be achieved.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

OK, so the Army was lying? Professional soldiers imbuing the savages with superhuman characteristics? And in 1835 the vegetation looked just like it does today?

Yes to all three.

First, one commanding officer was mistaken. One officer is not equal to the whole army. We don't have written statements from other folks in the garrison . Second, WHY must the Indians have been able to make super long range shots (which is the only way the white folks could imagine the Indians were able to shoot the sentries.), and why are you so dead-set on THAT being the truth? Is it not equally or more phenominal that the Indians crept within 200 yards of the soldiers, fired and killed sentry after sentry, kept the soldiers from seeing the smoke from the shots (hence nobody knew they had krept close), and then snuck away undetected? THAT's pretty impressive. The whites obviously thought that it wasn't possible for Indians to fool them, so by default the Indians must be shooting at them from waaaay far away. As far as the flora of south florida, yeah, it's pretty much the same as its always been, in fact there was much more water, and much less chance of being at a sufficient elevation to make a 400 yards shot back then, than there is today.

LD