.69 Bore Paper Cartridges

[FlinterNick]

I've been using brown "butcher paper" and finding it a bit on the thick side. Thus far, I've been buying packing paper, which is a nice thin sheet of un-printed newspaper. That stuff works pretty good.

Dave this is expensive but works great for patching

http://parchmentsheets.com/hear_ye_-_our_parchment_paper_catalog

 

[tenngun]

I've noticed that no one has mentioned using a period-correct type of paper. Modern wood pulp paper didn't exist at that time. Linen paper is what was used. It's more expensive but gives better results. I use a 13.5# linen for both my combustible revolver rounds and my Pritchett cartridges. Using wood pulp paper for the Pritchett doesn't work too well because when it is dipped in beeswax the wax will soak through and cause the paper to stick to the bullet as it leaves the muzzle. This will cause flyers. The linen paper if much more resistant to this(providing the wax is heated to the correct temp). This seems to be less important with smooth-bores because the smooth-bore was never considered to be a precision device by the doctrine of the day. But having the paper sticking to the ball as it heads down range certainly can't be helping it.

Just thought of this this morning... paper was linen rag paper back then, it twernt cheap. People didn’t use scratch pads, that’s what slates were for.
Civilian are not recorded using cartridges. You don’t ‘need’ them hunting. In self defense they wouldn’t give you a chance to get a second shot, it was shoot once then hand to hand. So maybe they simply weren’t worth wasting expensive paper on ???

 

[Grenadier1758]

Tenngun
You made a valid observation.

Paper cartridges are used in military formations where multiple shots are likely and necessary in line of battle formations. Cartridges are just not likely for hunting or civilian defense.

 

[Stantheman86]

The only way I can see a Civilian of the period using paper cartridges was if he was a military vet of any of the various developed nations , and the concept stuck with him. Much like many current Veterans have "habits" they acquired in service that they apply in daily life.

Or if he was a Militiaman , i.e. Minuteman and his fowling piece doubled as a Militia Musket and he had a box of cartridges made up to be on "standby".

 

[Grenadier1758]

Cartridges were assembled by artificers associated with the unit. The private infantry men did not roll their own cartridges. Cartridges were issued as needed and returned to stores when not needed. Sure infantry and militia could see the cartridges and figure out how to load them. I can imagine how it would be accepted in the family home when the family bible was asked for to tear out pages to make cartridges. He'd be wishing he was using live hornets' nests.

 

[Stantheman86]

It's like back when I was into military surplus rifles , and people wanted to modify their guns or gear but still "stay historically correct" ......the rule for them was if one person may have done it, it's "historically possible" and that makes it OK

At least one hard charger in the Militia had to have rolled up some cartridges for his fowling piece from paper out of an old book or something , maybe not a lot of guys did it but someone outside the "standing Army" had to have, at some point in history made some cartridges.

The ghosts of those guys probably watch us rolling up cartridges and laugh at us, like "what are these idiots doing"

 

[FlinterNick]

Most 17th and 18th century civilians used what ever they had to shoot with, this could be anything from scrap paper, to old clothing that was used for musket wadding. Flax Tow, pulled husks (burlap), twine fibers, and even bee and wasp nests were used.

Old news papers were a typical favorite.

Most militias that were organized has cartridges preparation requirements, the earlier conflicts such as Pontiacs Rebellion, Lord Dunomr’s War and the Regulator conflict in the Carolinas had local militias armed with contract muskets and military style paper cartridges.

 

[Stantheman86]

The term "militia" is a broad term, most people picture just average guys who were required to serve under the "militia laws" and maintain a Musket caliber weapon.

Movies like Last of the Mohicans do a good job of showing the Militia aspect , also in the series Turn, which also shows the British "Home Guard" regiments and has a good scene with Brown Bess instruction.

For a true "civilian" who only fires when he's taking game , you can use whatever you need to , many people think every person had a Kentucky rifle but relatively few men owned a dedicated rifle, the Fowling piece was more common.

 

[DaveC]

In New England at least, the "militia regulations" of the late 1700s were actually quite rigorous. These laid out and specified in some detail not only the musket, but also the cartridge box, and the edged weapons required. This was at a time, recall, where the term was a "stand of arms." A "stand" implied not just the fowler or musket, but also the bayonet and cartridge box and cross belts and even a few simple tools to service the firelock. In deference to the civilian fowler pressed into militia service, a sword, hanger, cuttoe, or hatchet/ tomahawk could be substituted. "Minute men" had to have a powder horn or even cartridges ready to go in the household.

In Spanish America, the regulations for the Presidio soldiers called for six pounds of powder per man per annum. But in fact, many soldiers had to make do with just three! This meant that there was little if any opportunity to fire practice rounds, and what little they had was carefully husbanded. Small wonder that the espada ancha/ short sword/ hanger was almost always carried--or indeed the Model 1728 broadsword--which is a big sword!--and the lance remained a primary weapon on foot or on horseback long into the 19th century. It didn't have to be reloaded, it was cheap, reliable, robust, easily repaired, and quite deadly in practiced hands. In the case of San Antonio de Béxar, powder was stored in a polvorín or magazine outside the vulnerable city limits under guard. Woe betide anyone who set off rockets or fireworks near the place... Penalties for doing so specified many "azotes" or blows in the public flogging that would ensue.

By the time of the Napoleonic Wars, cartridges were made in vast numbers and even began to be distributed in packets of ten to fifteen, with a gun flint for every twenty cartridges issued.

 

[FlinterNick]

Having an unorganized militias was something that the early United States paid for during the War of 1812.

The forces that were sent to invade Canada, were not armed with standard muskets; they were permitted to use their personal arms, this could have been anything from an older Revolutionary War Musket to a hunting rifle, and which many did not have access to bayonets and the local militias called up to defend Washington DC were so poorly armed they ran from the field at the sight a British line with fixed bayonets marching (Congreve rockets too). Having cartridge bags or boxes with paper cartridges was required however most of the militias needed to have their own personal ammo, other than powder which was supplied by the government. Some war of 1812 paper cartridges have been found with balls at .60 - .69, the standard Springfield cartridge used a .657 ball for a .689 bore.

The European system of a para-professional militia worked well in colonial wars. The payoff for the well organized American militias of the French and Indian War was a strong foundation from which to build the continental army and its officers.

 

[FlinterNick]

The term "militia" is a broad term, most people picture just average guys who were required to serve under the "militia laws" and maintain a Musket caliber weapon.

Movies like Last of the Mohicans do a good job of showing the Militia aspect , also in the series Turn, which also shows the British "Home Guard" regiments and has a good scene with Brown Bess instruction.

For a true "civilian" who only fires when he's taking game , you can use whatever you need to , many people think every person had a Kentucky rifle but relatively few men owned a dedicated rifle, the Fowling piece was more common.

Turn did have some good qualities that showed how the loyalists were trained and armed. Getting into the finite details, most were not armed with a second model Brown Bess Like shown in that episode, most were armed with left over older muskets, its not likely the British would have addressed the use of a Brown Bess, they would have simply called it musket or firelock. The older muskets would have been many of the guns captured in New York City; and older long lands. Regimental contract muskets like the Wilson guns saw wide use on both sides.

 

[Stantheman86]

I think some poetic license was taken because viewers of a Revolutionary era show would enjoy a little side scene about the Brown Bess , with the hardened British Sgt with a scarred face calling it the Brown Bess by name and making little jokes like "if you treat her right , she'll treat you right, most of the time she might even work if she feels like it" likely all the muskets in the show are Indian muskets so it was likely easier and more understandable to an audience to just get 100 Brown Besses rather than a mish mash of different weapons

They also briefly show the Loyalist Home Guard placing paper cartridges in cartridge boxes but it's not clear if they were supposed to have made them or were issued them.

 

[Stantheman86]

https://www.samsonhistorical.com/products/cartridge-paper

They sell precut linen paper

 

[FlinterNick]

I think some poetic license was taken because viewers of a Revolutionary era show would enjoy a little side scene about the Brown Bess , with the hardened British Sgt with a scarred face calling it the Brown Bess by name and making little jokes like "if you treat her right , she'll treat you right, most of the time she might even work if she feels like it" likely all the muskets in the show are Indian muskets so it was likely easier and more understandable to an audience to just get 100 Brown Besses rather than a mish mash of different weapons

They also briefly show the Loyalist Home Guard placing paper cartridges in cartridge boxes but it's not clear if they were supposed to have made them or were issued them.

The best Brown Bess musket movie scene is depicted in the film “The Bastard” with Andrew Stevens and Kim Catrall. In the film the Marquie De Lafayette is instruct Phillip Kent how to use a Brown Bess Musket.

 

[FlinterNick]

At the range yesterday with a miruko Charleville, pedersoli 1763 charleville and a Brown Bess by Miruko. Trying out different lubes; used blistex, Burt’s bees hand balm, and a homemade mixture of beez wax, and walnut oil. The walnut oil hardens over time so it was much more pasty like a wax, The walnut oil and beez wax worked well, but the burts bees worked great, smells nice too.

Paper cartridges (cooking parchment) I rolled 10, 2 paper tube style, first tube with the ball, second tube with the powder folded the end and perfortated an edge to tear easily. Ball was .69 for the bess, .66 for the charleville, .66 was a little too tight.

The rest of my 20 shots I wrapped the balls with coffee filter paper, that works very well, and I rolled up balls of pulled burlap.

Nice cool crisp day to shoot.

 

[DaveC]

Recall that while the militia regulations were quite specific on having a full "stand of arms" and not just a musket, a goodly portion of the militia simply refused to serve outside their home states in the War of 1812. Defending hearth and home from foreigners is one thing; invading someone elses' home turf with the expectation that they'd recognize it would be better to be American citizens instead of British subjects--particularly after so many Loyalists were driven northward to Canada--is another.

People have forgotten just how brutal the War of 1812 got... From the get go in the west of course, what with Native American participation and "pay back" for the many outrages and crimes of settlement and dispossession. By the winter of 1813, settlements and food stores on both sides of the Great Lakes were deliberately burned, leaving freezing, starving refugees.

When the U.S. Army re-emerged by 1814 as an institution chastened by the many defeats, and the older, inefficient or even treasonous officers (for example, James Wilkinson, "agente trece"/ Agent 13 of the Spaniards) were replaced by a newer meritocracy, victories like Plattsburg/ Lake Champlain were possible. And as for the militia, recall that in the South, at New Orleans, a multi-racial army of militia and veterans of the fighting in the Mississippi Basin and the Red Stick/ Creek Civil War leavened by French privateers and pirates successfully defended the port from the British through January 1815.