Aiming a Brown Bess?

[Comfortably_Numb]

I must admit I have never owned or shot a Ped Bess. I did own and shoot an original 3rd model for quite a few years. It shot right off the top of the barrel plane. You had to slide your head back a bit to be able to see down the top of the barrel. It was very accurate with round ball and shot. As long as your gun is set up to shoot off the top plane of the barrel and you can see down that plane it's going to work. In an ideal world the drop of the stock would fit the shooter, but that always doesn't happen.

 

[Juice Jaws]

You might as well give up. Sooner or later you'll come to find I'm right about everything. It's my way or the highway.

I tied a national record at Friendship with a 20 bore flintlock in '86. I'm not just blowing a bunch of hot air up your dress. I've been building flintlock smooth bores for 39 years, I know how to set up and shoot a fowling gun, I have literally made hundreds of them. One of my flint doubles has won "Top Gun" at Friendship for many years...probably decades by now. I didn't fall of the tatter wagon yesterday.

I just throw my musket to my shoulder take a short bead on my bayonet lug, and pull the trigger. Never, never have I lost a match yet.

 

[Artificer]

I must admit I have never owned or shot a Ped Bess. I did own and shoot an original 3rd model for quite a few years. It shot right off the top of the barrel plane. You had to slide your head back a bit to be able to see down the top of the barrel. It was very accurate with round ball and shot. As long as your gun is set up to shoot off the top plane of the barrel and you can see down that plane it's going to work. In an ideal world the drop of the stock would fit the shooter, but that always doesn't happen.

If you like the fit of an original 3rd Model Brown Bess, you would love the way original P 1730 through P 1748 Brown Bess stocks fit. They had an extremely nice drop and fit to their stocks. However, they began straightening the stocks with the P 1756 muskets and though not as nice as the earlier muskets, they still fit pretty nicely.

However, the Pedersoli stock is even more straight than an original stock. I don't know for sure why they did that, but it has been suggested they did it to get more stocks out of each plank of wood. Even with my unusually long arms and long neck and general body shape, I found I had to work to conform to the stock to do the best shooting with either shot or ball.

BTW, I'm very glad to learn of someone new to me, though who has been doing it for years, and who knows how to fit a fowler stock. So I'm glad you joined the forum.

Gus

 

[Comfortably_Numb]

You undoubtedly know who I am, I'm very active on the internet. Got R-U-N-N-O-F-T here years ago. I have built 3 or 4 of the early model bess's They all fit exceptionally well and were very shootable. Unfortunately They were built for customers so I never got to shoot them.

 

[Britsmoothy]

My Ped Bess is odd in that with a shot load I have to get down on the stock and that is after a little barrel bending! I also had to whittle some wood away for my cheekbones sake!!
With ball I have to make sure I am seeing barrel, the opposite to using shot!

 

[Griz44Mag]

Comfortably Numb, can you help me with this problem I am having with my new Bess????
It's even worse with the bayonet mounted.....

 

[Britsmoothy]

Comfortably Numb, can you help me with this problem I am having with my new Bess????
It's even worse with the bayonet mounted.....
View attachment 7702

Your gonna have to cut the top Offa the safe. Should be good then.
Or send the Bess to me for modification and I will return it as soon as I can.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

So the Brown Bess I got from Shamm66 showed up today and a fine looking piece it is indeed!
BUT - I am left with a question about aiming the beast.
Holding cheek and looking down the barrel, the check is so tall that alignment with the barrel is a tall order, taller than the barrel breech for sure.
If I move my line of sight down the barrel to a point I believe to be a good aim, the stock is nearly off my shoulder.
So someone who has successfully mastered this monster, please educate me on the proper way to hold and aim, especially given that there is no rear sight????

Alas, my fellow Bess shooters forget that while the Bess has the bayonet lug/front sight post, it's also on a tapered barrel..., which in many cases makes up for the height of the lug.

Some of the Bess have what appears to be rear sighting grooves filed into their tangs. Folks tell me these are merely index marks for the breech plug BUT they don't appear on every Bess on the tang... so perhaps they are not index marks but are up to the commanding officer if he allowed rear sighting reference marks ??


So these might be index marks:





But these are a bit too robust to be simply indexing marks....,




So what you can do is to file a groove at the back of the barrel, BUT this is permanent, and might disqualify you from some competitions. So what a lot of guys do is to use the groove in the tang bolt (which will be out of focus to your eye) as a reference point when "aiming-at-marks" and they lower their head so that they can just barely see the top of the bayonet lug above the curve of the back of the barrel. A few folks put a tiny index mark on the barrel to ensure when reassembling the musket, they get the groove of the rear bolt aligned in the same place, and they don't file the groove in the tang as seen in the photo that I used (it was the best to use as my example).



You can also simply put a brass angle-brace from the hardware store under the tang bolt and fashion that into a rear sight if you're just hunting or target shooting for fun...


LD

 

[Many Klatch]

Most smoothbore rules don't allow a rear sight above the plane of the barrel. That means that grooves in the tang are OK. Also, you can file down the bayonet lug about half way and cut a groove in the middle of the lug. Solder a small front sight in the groove. I used a lucky penny that I found in a parking lot. That helps a lot.

However if you are doing Military with a bayonet that will cause problems with the bayonet ring.

 

[tenngun]

About that, I’ve put a rear site on all my smoothies. Unless your in a military group you just shoot your Bess for fun. I just have to fight to hard to line my cheek and concentrate tang screw center of barrel front site target aaagggghhhh. Slap a rear sight on, bingo. Mittens and woolen coat or shirt and weskit,er ah waist coat, shooting in a normal stance or when sitting under a tree at an odd angle it’s no problem to just see if I’m lined up barrel and target.
No, some games you can’t play if your smoothie has a rear sight, but that’s why God created beer, so you can have something to do while no sight people are playing.
Historicly rear sights were put on smoothies. A Bess in the hands of a civilian was out of the ordinary and a private owner could do what he wanted with his gun. A photo from Gettysburg shows an ol boy who grabbed his war of 1812 US musket that he had heavily modified for personal use, and went out to defend his home.

 

[spudnut]

I had a 1st model 42 from narregansett arms ,I held my head up straight and brought the line of sight up to my eye, put the bottom of the lug on target and that worked for me, took 1st a few times and even put a few rifles under. Wish I still had it

 

[Rat]

I'm with Tenngun...I put a "period correct" rear sight on my Bess, and cut a groove in the bayonet lug, for a front sight blade. Rules? RULES?? I don't need no stinking rules. Works good with shot too, keeps me (usually) from rushing my shot. Those dead grouse in the picture to the left all agree.

 

[Adneg]

I dont think aiming a Brown Bess is really ‘meaningful’. I think the better way of thinking about it is to point and shoot. Your first couple of shots out of a clean barrel with a tight patch and well greased ball will get you home at a fair distance of say 50 yards however... you’ll almost never hit the target where you intended to, but you’ll hit your target. The Charlevills are a little better with accuracy but its not significant. Muskets were really designed for mass fire to cover a field or direction, and utilize the bayonet, not an ideal weapon to hunt considering the Brown Bess and like kinds size and weight.

 

[Rat]

Truth. Especially true for "back in the day", even though there does exist original muskets that had rear sights added, back in the day. For the hunter though, adding a rear sight makes sense, as with a good load you can keep your hits on a paper plate at 50 yards, consistently, with a rear sight. Some will say a bit further, but I think 50 yards is a good/realistic bench-mark. But not easy-peasy by any means.

Of course, if one's interest is in shooting in organized shooting matches, with rules, then one must follow those rules. For the hunter, aiming a Brown Bess is very meaningful, and if not bound by contest rules, I'm not sure why anyone would not put "period correct" rifle sights on a Brown Bess.

 

[Rat]

Comfortably Numb, can you help me with this problem I am having with my new Bess????
It's even worse with the bayonet mounted.....
View attachment 7702

Easy, if you cut the top off, turn it upside down, and weld it to the bottom, it will make it longer. Oh wait...I'm thinking abut daylight savings time. Never mind.

 

[Griz44Mag]

I'm with Tenngun...I put a "period correct" rear sight on my Bess, and cut a groove in the bayonet lug, for a front sight blade. Rules? RULES?? I don't need no stinking rules. Works good with shot too, keeps me (usually) from rushing my shot. Those dead grouse in the picture to the left all agree.

What would be considered a "period correct" rear sight? I am not going to shoot competitively, just want to hit what I am aiming at and maybe take a hog or two with it. I have a big face to go with the rest of me and getting far enough down to line up the tang screw with the lug is very uncomfortable. Taller sights would not be a bad thing. I was even thinking a peep post in the tang screw hole.

 

[Artificer]

I got very good accuracy from my Brown Bess Carbine, BUT I did not load it like they did in the period.

As I remember, my Carbine had a bore size of .753" and the closest mold available in the mid late 1970's to that bore size was a .735" mold. That is MUCH closer of a ball to bore fit of only .018" difference than was common in the period and I used greased pillow ticking as my patch material. That load was so tight, I HAD to use a Short Starter to load it and that was not done in the period.

Original British Ordnance/King's Musket Besses were .76" to .78" and from Unfired Balls excavated from British Military Sites all over North America, we know their ball sizes actually ran .690" to .710". Of course they used a paper cartridge that filled up some of the excess space between the smaller ball sizes, but the fit was not near as tight as the load I shot.

How accurate was my load with that tight of ball and patch fit? I never actually bench rested it at 100 yards, though we commonly shot Offhand at 1 Gallon Milk Jugs at 100 yards. I got to the point I could hit the body of those jugs 8 to 9 times out of 10 and my Mentor hit very consistently at least 9 times out 10 with his Navy Arms Charleville Musket. There were even then quite a few people who could not do that well shooting offhand with a Rifle at 100 yards. My Mentor was a better Offhand shot than I was and he actually did often place and occasionally win the Northwest Trade Gun Match on the Primitive Range at the Nationals at Friendship.

More recently Spence has mentioned he adds a card over the powder, then a greased cushion wad, then a patched ball in his Smoothbore and can shoot even better groups at 100 yards from a rest. I think he mentioned a three to four inch group with that load at and slightly over 100 yards using some kind of rest, but I may be mistaken? Even though I had cushion wads when I shot my Carbine, I never thought to try that.

Now of course if one doesn't do the load development, learn and use the basics of marksmanship and doesn't practice, then the Pedersoli Carbine is not very accurate. However, that is the fault of the person shooting the gun and not the gun itself.

Gus

 

[Gene L]

I read somewhere that the British command to fire was: Ready, Present, Fire. The American command was Ready, Aim, Fire.

A certain amount of lack of aiming was kinda battlefield protocol. Mass fire...British marksmen with Baker rifles were dealt with harshly when captured by the French because aiming wasn't considered entirely acceptable among the smooth-bore soldiers and especially the officers.

I don't know if this is true. The level of accuracy of the smoothbores was predicated on firing into a mass, and IIRC acceptable accuracy was measured in feet windage. And if you didn't hit the guy you pointed at, if you did indeed aim at a particular soldier, you'd probably hit someone to his right or left in the nearly shoulder to shoulder press. I know nothing about the Bess except what I've read here, but the way you shoot a shotgun is without aiming...your eye and cheek are the rear sight.

I would think the idea of shooting a bird in flight with a Bess would be a most foolhardy activity.

 

[Rat]

What would be considered a "period correct" rear sight? I am not going to shoot competitively, just want to hit what I am aiming at and maybe take a hog or two with it. I have a big face to go with the rest of me and getting far enough down to line up the tang screw with the lug is very uncomfortable. Taller sights would not be a bad thing. I was even thinking a peep post in the tang screw hole.

To my mind a period correct sight would be the same as what you would find on any rifle of the same era. I have a full buckhorn on mine. To me, it looks natural on the gun, nothing like when you see modern, or semi-modern sights on an old gun. There is a Brown Bess or similar musket in the NRA collection that has a rear sight on it, which would probably be the most period correct, as it was put on during the....wait for it....period. There was a pic of it in one of the American Rifleman magazines a few years back. As to my sight, I'll post a pic, it works very well. I've always found the gun to fit me very well, and kind of wonder when I hear people mention that the Bess does not fit them well, and that the comb is too high.

 

[Rat]

I read somewhere that the British command to fire was: Ready, Present, Fire. The American command was Ready, Aim, Fire.

A certain amount of lack of aiming was kinda battlefield protocol. Mass fire...British marksmen with Baker rifles were dealt with harshly when captured by the French because aiming wasn't considered entirely acceptable among the smooth-bore soldiers and especially the officers.

I don't know if this is true. The level of accuracy of the smoothbores was predicated on firing into a mass, and IIRC acceptable accuracy was measured in feet windage. And if you didn't hit the guy you pointed at, if you did indeed aim at a particular soldier, you'd probably hit someone to his right or left in the nearly shoulder to shoulder press. I know nothing about the Bess except what I've read here, but the way you shoot a shotgun is without aiming...your eye and cheek are the rear sight.

I would think the idea of shooting a bird in flight with a Bess would be a most foolhardy activity.

This is true, but using the gun for hunting, or making meat, is a whole other story.