18th Century Rifle Accuracy

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While my experience is limited to shooting the steel silhouettes, I did develop a pretty good hold on the bear targets at 200 yards.

I shot a 45 caliber caplock rifle, 90 grains of 3fg GOEX pushing a 0.445" ball wrapped up in 0.015 linen patched lubed with spit. Back when I shot regularly, I hit 2 to 3 of the 4 bears from a sitting position. The range had a bit of curve to it and prone covered too much of the bear. The target picture was , the front sight fully visible in the rear notch with the base of the full sight at the bottom of the notch and the top of the front sight held on one of the bear's ears depending on the wind. The ball would hit the mid section of the bear showing how the bullet dropped. I never developed a good hold on the turkey at 150 yards.

All of the supports Gus' speculation that it takes practice to consistently hit targets at a particular distance and the knowledge of the sight picture needed to hold the rifle on target. Often, when a target would present itself at these extreme ranges of up to 400 yards, it would be worth the expenditure of powder and ball to get these officers edgy.
 
GoodCheer said:
OK. So what was the expectation for rifle accuracy in the 18th century?
100 yds?
200 yds?
300 yds?
400 yds?

I have said it before but will repeat. I simply do not believe claims of super accuracy at long ranges. i.e. hitting a silver dollar at 100 yards. I have known and/or watched some of the very best offhand shooters in the country on the range at Friendship. That kind of accuracy is what is sought after but rarely every achieved. Our guns, powder and other equipment today is better than what it was 240 years ago. And, I believe, our top shooters practice more than was done back in the day. Even bench rest shooters can have difficulty finding that elusive 'X' at 100 yards. During the AWI, hitting a man was a chancy thing. Most likely it was a 'hold high and hope' shot at long ranges.

Edit: BTW, lot of posts on this thread. What is the record?
 
I have been thinking a lot about the original documentation that claims they could at least hit a man most of the time at 200 yards from the Offhand. As I already mentioned, I don’t see that as a major problem when the enemy was facing the Rifleman at 200, as far as elevation, because they most likely set their rifle sights a bit high at 100 or 110 yards and could have aimed at the top of his hat and the ball would then drop into the enemy’s torso.

I also assume they moved the rear sight so the ball would hit center side to side at 100 or 110 yards. It is far from usual that a rifle will send a ball downrange that is perfectly aligned side to side with the sights. So beyond that range, the rifle would have sent the ball more and more to the right or left of center as the distance increased. So at 200 yards the ball would naturally hit a little further right or left of center than it did at 100 yards, even with no wind blowing across between the rifle and the target. Again, assuming the rifleman actually did at least some practice at 200 yards, he would know how far to the left or right from center that his rifle naturally sent the ball at that distance, so he could "hold off" to hit center.

Hopefully that practice at 200 yards also included some days there was a cross wind blowing from the left or right, so he could also estimate how much he had to hold off left or right for a cross wind.

So with the information from the above paragraphs, a good rifle would have been capable of hitting a man size target at least in the torso, at 200 yards.

OK, so what about that kind of accuracy from the Offhand? The average person today probably has little or no experience shooting Offhand at 200 yards, unless they did it in the military. Also, unless they did a career in the military or shot in National Match Competition, they would not have shot a whole lot from the Offhand at 200. So allow me to add a little information from shooting Offhand at that distance.

The Black Bullseye on the 200 yard target that the Army and Navy used to shoot at and Marines still shoot at from the Offhand, is a 12 inch circle to get the full value 5 points out of 5. When the service members shot at that distance, they practiced shooting across the whole course for at least 3 days before they “shot for record” on the 4th or 5th day. That means they had a chance to set their sights for elevation and windage, for that distance, so the bullet would hit center. That takes the mechanical accuracy out of the equation and leaves it up to the shooter to be able to hit center from the Offhand at 200 yards, as long as he/she can read the amount of cross wind blowing ”“ just as Riflemen would have done with a little practice at that distance over 200 years earlier. So the question arises for shooters who are at least modern day Expert Class Shooters, can they usually hit that 12 inch bullseye from the Offhand at 200 yards on a target range? The answer is YES, they can. Now really good shooters can almost guarantee they will hit that bullseye all five times from the Offhand at 200 yards almost every time, if not every time. So the Riflemen who were very good shooters and had good rifles and loads, would have been able to do it 200 years ago as well.

Now, the average width of a man today at the shoulders is 18.4 inches and that would leave at least 3 inches on either side of that 12 inch bullseye to hit an enemy’s torso at 200. Though British Soldiers were on average not usually quite that size in the 18th century, outside the Grenadiers, that still gives us a good enough measurement to go from and maybe 2-3 inches on each side of the modern day bullseye. So IF an enemy soldier was facing the Rifleman and standing still or walking/marching towards the Rifleman, there was a very good chance they would have hit the enemy in the torso at 200 yards, even from the Offhand and as long as the wind was not too strong from the side.

If the Enemy was turned right or left, there is not as much of a target to shoot at, though I have not been able to find the back to front measurement on the average man. It seems it would be half of the distance of the width of the shoulders, more or less, so that would have been a more difficult shot, but still possible for the better/best Riflemen and when they had time to take a good aim.

If the Enemy Soldier faced sideways to the Rifleman and if a strong cross wind was blowing or the Enemy Soldier was walking/marching, that would have made it even more difficult to hit him in the torso. It is still possible that the better/best Riflemen could have hit the Enemy Soldier from the Offhand, but not every time. Perhaps as much as half the time or less, but not all the time.

Of course the odds of hitting an Enemy Soldier when the Rifleman used some kind of rest at 200 yards would have gone up, as long as he had done at least some practice at that distance.

Now of course the odds of hitting an Enemy Soldier in a full Battle line from the Offhand at 200 yards went up quite a bit. Didn't matter if you aimed at one soldier and hit the soldier to his right or left.

Considering all these things, it would not have been and was not “safe” for an Enemy Soldier to be within 200 yards of an American Rifleman during the AWI. Without even considering shooting at longer distances, that was extremely good accuracy in the 18th century and still very good accuracy today. For British Soldiers who were not used to taking those kinds of casualties until they got MUCH closer to an Enemy, that would have been extremely disconcerting, indeed.

Gus
 
I agree the original shooter who was able to hit the dollar size coin at 100 yards most of the time from the Offhand was a very unusual, if downright rare shooter and certainly not the "norm."

Gus
 
You mentioned eye sight .... the corrective lens being new or non existent up until a point, not sure when eye glasses became readily available. This is something I have been wondering about for myself because of the progressive onset of hardening lenses and having to put things down on the floor when one finds themselves without reading glasses. It is easier to see the front sight than the rear sight, and no problem seeing the target as it is far away. I did put my front and rear sight as far forward as I could without it being obviously ridiculous as I don't really like shooting with glasses on.
 
Goo,

Because I first got corrective eyeglasses in 2nd Grade and actually needed them earlier; from the early mid 70's, I have been studying period spectacles. I could not shoot without them.

Bi focal spectacles go back much further than some may realize, though at first they were known as "double spectacles."

Ben Franklin wrote, in August 1784 to his friend George Whatley, that he was "happy in the invention of double spectacles, which serving for distant objects as well as near ones, make my eyes as useful to me as ever they were."

From what I could gather back in the 1970's and 80's, the French seemed to have been better at making lenses than the British, though that information may not be as accurate today. This coincides with Franklin's Invention of Bi Focals, as he returned from France to America in 1785, so his first pair of Bi Focals had to have been made there, if the 1784 date quoted above was correct.

However, finding a pair of glasses that would aid a person in America in the 18th century was more of a "by guess and by golly thing." Prescription lenses were not available at all. From what I was able to learn, most spectacles were like modern reading glasses in that they offered some magnification, but that was about it.

When I first needed bifocals, I "fudged" using modern prescription bifocal lenses in Original and later reproduction period spectacles for both FIW and AWI. I also had at least one repro pair fitted with progressive lenses.

BUT, if I were alive back in the 18th century and especially on the American Frontier in that period, there would have been almost no chance of finding a pair of spectacles that I could use to shoot and accurately hit things at 100 yards or further.

Also just like today, the period Riflemen who were the very best shots, probably had something on the order of 20/20 vision.

Gus
 
Yes, mentioning period spectacles may be a bit off topic, but vision had everything to do with 18th century rifle accuracy. For those who did not have perfect or near perfect vision, they almost certainly could not have made long distance shots.

Gus
 
Artificer said:
Yes, mentioning period spectacles may be a bit off topic, but vision had everything to do with 18th century rifle accuracy. For those who did not have perfect or near perfect vision, they almost certainly could not have made long distance shots.

Gus

I agree. That is why I am very skeeptikal of many of the claims of long distance accuracy back in the day. That and most peoples inability to judge distance.
 
Exactly and I doubt we will ever know what percentage of people back than had that good of eyesight. We can guess by going off modern statistics, but I am not sure how accurate that would be for the 18th century?

Gus
 
I would caution everyone not to go overboard in their disbelief of the accuracy of riflemen during the Revolutionary War. Certainly there was exaggeration but these were NOT "city folk" who were new to rifles or just kept one in a corner of the house or above the mantle of the fireplace. These riflemen for the most part where from the frontier and back countries who not only fed their families by hunting, but also made their living for 6 to 9-months out of the year harvesting deer for the hides. To put that in perspective, deer populations were at an all time high in the mid-18th century and, prior to the Revolutionary War, deer hides were Virginia's second largest export behind Tobacco.

The rifle was the choice of weapon for these frontier hunters because it could take deer reliably at far longer distances than a smoothbore AND could result reliably at shorter distances in prime-hides because neck shots didn't leave a hole in the usable hide. Becoming a "good shot" with your rifle meant the difference between a decent life on the frontier and starving. The local store wasn't 10-minutes away. In many cases if you didn't grow it or shoot it, the supply from the nearest store was days or perhaps even weeks away.

To presume that the majority of these riflemen couldn't be accurate at long shots and didn't know how their rifles shot at all distances is using 21st century eyes to look at 18th century living conditions.

Twisted_1in66 :thumbsup:
Dan
 
I agree that many of them would have been very good shots and some truly exceptional.

But the other side of that coin is not to presume too much and especially not what we know can not be done at longer ranges, especially over unknown ground and with never having made any sighting shots and/or had someone to spot for them.

Since there were so many deer, there was no reason for them to take 300 yard or longer shots (when those longer ranges were actually available to the hunter) that would be so easy to miss at. Yes, they hunted for their profession and their survival; which meant they took every advantage they could get. Better still to sneak up closer and make SURE they got a hit for their shot.

And of course there is no documentation of regular shooting or hunting at 300 yards or longer, that would have given them the experience to make such shots more often at those distances.

Gus
 
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