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I bought several of those lots. I got all three sizes - pistol smalls, rifle sized, and mostly the big musket ones. Most are very crude by modern standards, but work wonderfully!

The brownell's tool is the ticket. I have also had some success with taking a 1/2" dowell, cutting a slit in the end, inserting emery cloth and oil, and spinning it in the bore with an electric drill. I use heavy paper to make sure the emery roll on the end fits tight. Cheap and easy. Use...

You tear off the "tail" of the cartridge with your teeth. Look up a period military manual, it describes holding the cartridge between thumb and forefinger just at the top of the powder, flick the folded (tucked) tail up with thumb, carry to mouth, tear off with teeth. Left hand holding...

Based on archeology and surviving examples, the ball diameter for the military loads of the Bess (.75) run from .69 to .72, with the .70 to be an "average." French, and later US standard was .65 for the .69 muskets. A lot of the "windage" is taken up by the paper wrapping of the cartridge...

Thank you Woodwright! My google-fu was too weak. Amazing its in a "biodiversity" library!

Smithsonian Misc. Collections volume 129 (1956) is the source of info, it details paper cartridge manufacture from F&I to CW, drawings of how to make, summaries of US ordnance changes, etc. The original .69 US musket load was about 120, with 10 gr. allow for priming, later dropped to 90 due to...

There was a major improvement in powder quality made by a improved technique for refining the potassium nitrate to a purer state. There's a Smithsonian paper on blackpowder cartridges that explains this change that occured in the 1820s, and US service loads were greatly reduced during this era...