the winner, by a nose

[Artificer]

Thank you for the in depth explanation. Oh, the information on the Deringer trade rifles was very interesting. Was that the same Deringer who made so many M1817 "Common" Rifles on contract? The reason I ask is because I owned one in basket case condition years ago, but had to sell it before I could restore it.

Gus

 

[Artificer]

Firing at a 'mark' in a peaceful environment is quite a bit different than firing in combat whilst being fired upon.
Attempting to gauge a weapons capability is very hard to address under those conditions.
It's a tad more than 'buck fever' I'd say.
Same examples with modern arms and troops.

I could not agree more. No matter how well a person could shoot on a target range or even a seasoned hunter, they would not shoot as well in warfare. Fatigue, poor diet, long periods of boredom or nearly so sprinkled with extreme combat stress when a fight is going on, homesickness and missing loved ones and more physical and psychological factors combine to make accuracy much more difficult than in peace time.

Gus

 

[Artificer]

I get your drift and think it's pretty common sensical. You're up pretty late.

We train basic riflemen, today, to shoot with iron sights to 300 meters (avg. small arms engagement range). They do pretty good on a range.
Does that mean in combat they'll be as effective...no.
OTOH, there are those who are better trained, more inclined to the art that can kill at 500 meters or more with an M4 and iron sights. Consistently...and further out.
So I buy your scenario and I think that's why certain long range shots were noted....they were better trained and more inclined to the art and impressed friend and foe alike.

Before I go further, allow me to say I am not criticizing how the Army trains Soldiers for combat.

We Marines still train out to 500 yards as part of our annual qualification for every Marine. That is 10 shots on a man sized silhouette, slow fire, prone. We know our newer/younger shooters won't usually be able to use that distance everywhere in the world, but having the knowledge and experience at shooting at longer ranges (and the sight settings for one's rifle at those ranges) does allow more effective fire and gives one more confidence.

What I have never been able to find is a mention of training at longer distances for Riflemen in the Rev War or even shooting at 300 or more yards on game prior to the war, though. As stated earlier, there was no need to shoot at those ranges and risk missing game and scaring away game that was closer to the hunter. So, unless they actually trained and shot at longer ranges prior to the war, very few Rifleman would have known where to aim their rifles for longer ranges.
Gus

 

[Artificer]

...what I immediately recognized as ranges in hundreds of yards and the windage and elevation clicks to get there for him and his M-1 Garrand rifle. Shooters know how to shoot, have practiced, zeroed and sighted in. Hello!!!

Well, yes, in WWII Soldiers and Marines were trained at far greater distances than most of them ever shot in hunting or otherwise in civilian life before they came in the Armed Forces. The Army was still training to 500 yards for every soldier and my Dad related how they even got some shooting in at 1,000 yards while he was in Army Boot Camp with his Garand.

However, even with rifles that were a LOT flatter shooting than Longrifles and people zero'd at further ranges and recorded their sight settings and kept them for battle (as your Dad did in his helmet), the average accuracy was surprisingly poor. In the Post WWII era, the Army came up with figures showing most German soldiers who were hit by regular rifle fire (not Sniper fire), were hit at 100 yards or less. This led them to spending a lot of money in the 60's on the experimental SPIW frangible/multiple projectile ammo and later the flechette ammo concept for rifles because they figured they could get more hits at or under 100 yards. Of course the Army still had real riflemen who scoffed at the idea as much as we Marines.

Gus

 

[Alden]

Dad did snap-shoot a running rabbit at 100 yards...

 

[Pete G]

Marksmanship under stress can be way different from regular range marksmanship.

I once read of a gunfight where both participants held to the end of a bandanna with their left hand while they drew and fired their pistols with their right. Both parties emptied their gun and neither was hit. :shocked2: :shocked2:
I imagine there was quite a bit of jumping and bouncing around from both participants and witnesses....

 

[gearheart]

My best friend's father was a shooting instructor at Camp Borden during WW2. When my friend expressed the desire to be able to shoot as well as his father, the response from the old man was, "Son you haven't got enough money to buy the ammo that you'll burn before you get that good" For someone who is well acquainted with his piece, amazing feats are indeed possible.

 

[bpd303]

Dad did snap-shoot a running rabbit at 100 yards...

I saw my Grandfather make head shots on squirrels, with his .36 caliber flintlock, that my Dad & I could not make with our scoped .22 rifles.

 

[Dphar]

Not the "they could not have had rifles thing again".....
Gus, honestly you really need to read the books. Win/loss figures have been in published form for years in "The Frontier Rifleman" by Richard B. LaCrosse, Jr. There is a great summary of the Riflemen and their various triumphs and failures in Huddleston's published Masters thesis "The Colonial Rifleman..."
The casualties inflicted on the British leadership at Breeds Hill were PURE RIFLEMEN tactics so one assumes based on the RESULTS that some riflemen were there. The fallacy that there were no rifles in New England is just that. This has been discussed on the Frontier Folk forum and proved false not once but several times.
For example there is a letter from Gov. Dongan to the Gov. of PA in 1688 in which he stats "Last summer I raised 500 foot, 50 riflemen, 800 Indians wch is a vast Charge".
SO 10% of the Militia in NEW YORK were rifle armed in 1688? Yet we are to believe that there were no rifles in New England prior to the Revolution as some folks insist on promoting? I would also ask why would the a German Officer with Burgoyne on the march down from Canada prior to even meeting with any organized resistance wrote that they were being shot at by rifles? Then we have the battle of Bennington VT where a German Officer wrote that Baum the German officer in command was killed by a rifle ball? Then there is the song "The Riflemen of Bennington" which is credited to the 1770s.
Then we have the Shawnee and Iroquois using rifles BEFORE the French and Indian War. Documented.
Finally back to the Breeds Hill thing. You tell us how poorly the rifleman shot in combat in previous posts then you want me to believe that the decimation of the British officers and NCOs at Breeds Hill was done with a musket or other common smoothbore? Under similar if not worse conditions? A firearm which when loaded with regulation ammunition of the time and not to "illbored and many are" would strike a man at 80 yards. The French found in 1818 that with the ball size used in the 1700s would produce 88% hits on a 2 meter square target at 100 meters. This tells me that shooting at a point target past about 50 yards with a musket in the mid-1700s was pointless under field conditions.

This is from the Wikipedia account of the Breeds Hill fight.
"The British had taken the ground but at a great loss; they had suffered 1,054 casualties (226 dead and 828 wounded), with a disproportionate number of these officers. The casualty count was the highest suffered by the British in any single encounter during the entire war.[56] General Clinton, echoing Pyrrhus of Epirus, remarked in his diary that "A few more such victories would have shortly put an end to British dominion in America."[1] British dead and wounded included 100 commissioned officers, a significant portion of the British officer corps in North America.[57] Much of General Howe's field staff was among the casualties.[58] Major Pitcairn had been killed, and Lieutenant Colonel James Abercrombie fatally wounded. General Gage, in his report after the battle, reported the following officer casualties (listing lieutenants and above by name):[59]

1 lieutenant colonel killed
2 majors killed, 3 wounded
7 captains killed, 27 wounded
9 lieutenants killed, 32 wounded
15 sergeants killed, 42 wounded
1 drummer killed, 12 wounded"
I was not there obviously. Other than in general terms we do not know who was there. We do not know at what ranges the command and control personnel were engaged. Perhaps they were killed within 40-60 yards of the brestworks but I doubt it based on the English officers account of the man standing in plain sight being handed "muskets" firing for 15 minutes until volley fire are directed against him, probably at a range under 60 yards. Did he fire during their advance?

Furthermore if the musket armed Militia was capable of this why was it not evident at the very start of the Revolution during the fight at Concord Bridge and the retreat back to Boston? Yet we see no indication of excess casualties among NCOs or Officers here. But by the time of Breeds Hill people had arrived from various locations. It would not take many men from PA or Maryland to have a force of sharpshooters at Breeds Hill.
I have spent quite a bit of time in discussions of this subject on Frontier Folk. Frontier Folk is a site where people who reenact the 18th c come to discuss the past and their weekend dress up activities. What seems to be a major bone of contention or at least irritation, is that too many people show up dressed as Frontiersmen with (ack!) rifles. They want more soldiers and pig farmers with fowlers and muskets if they must have a gun at all. Having too many scouts and market hunters and such makes for an inaccurate depiction.
Then they rely in estate inventories to determine how many of this or that people have. This is a notoriously inaccurate way to find out what firearms people had since to this day older people tend to sell off or give firearms to descendants like Grandsons etc before they die. But they take it as gospel. There is a certain animosity toward the rifle in general to help this along. Then we have the militia thing AND the Confiscation of Arms for Militia use. So people at any given time in America might HIDE expensive arms. AND... Everyone needed a Militia arm. It was required by law. So people, such as some store clerk who never used a firearm was supposed to have a gun, preferably of "regulation" bore size and a pound of powder (or more) and some lead balls for it. I suspect that many of these staid in the closet semi-permanently. But they appear in estate inventories (these were "gun owner" class individuals). Some folks had firearms they used regularly for hunting or even commercial hunting, these we would call "shooters". Most market hunting in the NY, Philly and Boston areas would have been waterfowl shot on the water with something like a Hudson Valley fowling piece or even a punt gun. Then we have people that also had rifles or perhaps owned nothing else and used them, "Riflemen".
It drives some reenators to near distraction to tell them that by the 1740s the PA natives were heavily rifle armed. This from material in the PA archives, see "British Flintlock Military Rifles" by DeWitt Bailey.
So now we have an answer as to WHY the frontier was so heavily rifle armed (actually 2 reasons but we will get there later). Its impossible to counter the rifle with a musket unless BOTH sides use Linear Tactics, IE stand on an open field ahd shower each other with musket balls. This will not work if the rifle armed enemy uses cover and concealment and refuses to hang around long enough to be charged and bayoneted. Nor are fortifications "safe". Note George Rogers Clark at Vincennes for an example of trying to defend a fort against rifles with only muskets and artillery. This did not work unless the people in the fort have rifles too. THEN comes the question of HOW did the natives get started with rifles in the 1740s if there were no rifles in America as what I like to call the "Cult of the Smoothbore" like to state? They did not invent them afterall.
THEN people say, but most natives used smoothbores, true. But if only a few people out in the trees have rifles and know how to use them. From page 75 of Bailey;"...which they will at a great distance from behind a tree...take such sure aim as to seldom misseth their mark" But natives were not ALL riflemen, most were shooters. And rifles were expensive. More importantly the traders and the Gov't of the time did not WANT the natives to have rifles at all again see Bailey. First its was VERY bad from a combat standpoint, and next THEY USED LESS POWDER AND LEAD. This was a REAL gripe with the traders from south shore of Lake Erie south. There were unworkable attempts to outlaw selling rifles to natives. But it did not work.
Then we have the "rifles were so expensive poor people could not afford them" argument. It like the others is refuted by writings of the past (see Bailey).
"Cult of the Smoothbore" in the reenactor community in the east especially who are irritated that so many rifles show up at what is many cases is little more than a dog and pony show put on by people who cannot even sharpen their own butcher knifes. :rotf:
So they go on a anti-rifle crusade so they can have more soldiers, shop keepers and pig farmers in their dog and pony show so it looks more "representative". So "scouts" or such showing up with rifles are frowned upon or so it seems. They then work hard to make the past fit THEIR IDEAS. Making totally unsupportable and in fact false statements (proven so by writtings of the time) as to how there were few rifles in America before about 1760 or other "facts" that are easily refuted with only a little research. Rifles were so common on PA by the 1760s that the inventories for the Moravian Gunshop at Christian Springs shown in "Moravian Gunmaking of the American Revolution" show only rifles and rifle parts for the first 10 years or so. By the mid-1770s shotguns and such begin to appear. But rifles were made all through the Revolution. For example the May 1777 inventory shows that J Dickert owed them for 18 rifle barrels. Though they were apparently doing a lot of muskets as well by then.
Then we have the REAL problem. The term musket and rifle were sometimes used interchangeably. Bailey points this out. So while the British officer at Breeds Hill might tell us "musket" the evidence shows something else. Sometimes this is more cut and dried than others.
I would also point out the Morgans men at Saratoga did far more than fight from the woods. After their arrival the DOMINATED the battlefield and cut off ALL intelligence from Burgoyne. I will not bother to quote the British officers who wrote on this subject. Its on the books I have cited here.
Here is another little "gum up the works" idea. Years ago at the Palmer Alaska gunshow I found a table with FL rifles and other antiques on it. One, obviously a light fowler was labled "Militia Rifle" circa the 1770-90 period. I ask the vender what made him call it that? He says look in the bore. It was about 58 smooth at the muzzle but had very strong rifling about 4" down. It had a small blade sight set in the barrel for a front and the typical chisel raised rear sight often found on fowlers and trade guns with a notch. So how would THIS be cataloged on the battle field? It had been rifled then bored smooth at the muzzle (remember the British stating that Riflemen were to be given no quarter at one time). Perhaps this was intended as a "its not a rifle" defense for a Rev-War sniper...
I post book titles so that people can do their own research. The PA archives for example seem to have a lOT on material in them if people will look. But a lot of people in the east are so virulently anti-rifle that they are not interested in facts. They seem more intent on making the past fit THEIR chosen "persona".

Dan

 

[Artificer]

Dan,
Glad to discuss “Colonial Riflemen in the American Revolution” Joe. D. Huddleston. I purchased my copy in either 1978 or 1979 before I was transferred back to Quantico. Yes, it is an excellent reference in many ways. How about some quotes from that book, Dan?

Page 11, “The apparent sentimentality of some writers with the rifle leaves their reliability open to question. This is particularly true of some historians writing in the 1800’s. Many writers of the second quarter of the 19th century, in particular, rhapsodized so freely that there is little resemblance between their work and fact.”

BTW, Dan, this is the time period when the Myth of Tim Murphy at Saratoga first began to appear in 1835 as shown in this link: http://allthingsliberty.com/2013/0...thy-murphy-and-the-power-of-the-written-word/



Page 12, concerning American Rifleman prior to and during the Rev War - “Was the rifleman himself a better shot than his German counterpart? From the opinions expressed, it would appear that he probably was, but not by any very great margin.”

Also on page 12, “With the reputations of the riflemen already tarnished, their sorry performance in the campaigns of New York and New Jersey certainly did not help their cause. On the other hand, it must be submitted that mediocre generalship was at least equally to blame. Their poor reputation was not entirely justified, as other units in the same exposed positions would probably have performed no better. Their one action of holding up the British advance over Throg’s Neck, allowing Washington and his forces to escape over Kingsbridge, may have had much more significance than is generally recognized.”

Also on Page 12 concerning George Rogers Clark taking the fort at Vincennes. “Suffice it to say that for purposes of this study, the conclusion may be reached in the absence of American artillery, accurate rifle fire certainly helped speed up Lieutenant Governor Hamilton’s surrender.” My comment: Of course it was the brutal tomahawking of captured Native Americans close to and outside the Fort that is generally accepted for the reason Hamilton surrendered when he did.

Page 12 concerning the Battle of King’s Mountain. “Contrary to the statement that King’s Mountain was a hunting rifle victory, it was Patrick Ferguson’s tactical failure that cost him the battle and his life. There is no indication that there was a superiority of weapons held by either side.” And”¦ “Credit for losing the battles and winning the war in the South must ultimately go to General Nathaniel Greene rather than the presence of riflemen in his forces.”

Finally on page 12, “ In summary, it must be concluded that the rifle and the riflemen were effective military tools only when applied in a specialized manner. Used in this way, the colonial Riflemen may have affected the speed with which the war was concluded, but not the ultimate outcome of the conflict.”

Page 15, “The time-honored legends of the past are true in one respect; the rifleman was different than the average colonist. While life in the tidewater areas of the east coast and Chesapeake Bay was almost equal to that of Great Britain in security, style, and luxury, things were very different on the plateaus and in the hills to the west. It was here that the American Longrifle had evolved, and almost exclusively where it was used. Outside of New England, where the rifle was virtually unknown, the pioneer and frontiersman was normally armed with the rifle.”

So, Dan, you are arguing against one of your own primary sources you listed.

More quotes to come in following posts.
Gus

 

[Artificer]

BTW, at the time "Colonial Riflemen in the American Revolution” by Joe. D. Huddleston was written and most New Englanders one runs across today, New York was/is not considered part of New England.

If one is not found to be a generations long "Down Mainer" in Maine, one is considered an outsider in that state.

Gus

 

[Artificer]

Dan,

In your above post you wrote, “You tell us how poorly the rifleman shot in combat in previous posts then you want me to believe that the decimation of the British officers and NCOs at Breeds Hill was done with a musket or other common smoothbore?”

This is a complete mischaracterization of what I have written in this thread. I clearly stated in earlier posts that Riflemen could use the top of the head or hat as an aiming point at 200 yards and the ball would/could normally strike the enemy in the torso ”“ when the Rifleman took up a good shooting position and the wind was not blowing very much. That is at least three if not four times the distance than the distance between the American lines and the British, when the British stopped their advance at Breed’s Hill at 50 to no more than 60 yards and the Americans opened fire. I also stated the terrible rifle marksmanship at the Battle of Wetzel’s Mill was possibly the worst documented example of accuracy by Riflemen in the war. However, I gave Riflemen their full due of their actions at the Battles of Saratoga being their finest hour. You are certainly welcome to quote me, but please do so accurately.

The distance between the forces at Breed’s Hill were not just from a single British Officer, but from a comparative investigation of the accounts from both American and British forces. Colonel Prescott looked down the hill and quickly realized he was way outnumbered by the British and he knew he was low on ammunition. Whether or not he told his men not to fire “until they saw the whites of their eyes” (as if often contested and may or probably is not true) he did know to hold the American fire until the British were close to make every shot count and hopefully inflict such carnage that the British would retreat before they realized the Americans were low on ammo. Further, the American Colonel Stark (who had been a Lt. in Roger’s Rangers) came up to reinforce Colonel Prescott, Stark ordered range/aiming stakes to be driven into the ground 40 yards from his position and ordered his men not to fire until the British advanced past that line. Stark’s men actually DID do so much carnage on the British Flanking attack that the British chose to retreat to their boats and row away ”“ as Colonel Prescott had hoped to do against the main British line. These examples are elegant proof of the distances at which the Americans fired on the British at Breed’s Hill.

Why weren’t the American forces more effective at Lexington/Concord and the British retreat to Boston? For all the bluff and bluster, few on either side really wanted a battle to break out. Both sides hoped a show of force would cause the other side to back off without bloodshed. As the first unexpected shots broke out, the British did more damage, but that was most likely due to better discipline than the Americans, even though many of the British forces may not have been combat veterans, either.

Dan, I’m sure you remember or at least heard of some Newbies in Viet Nam who did not hit anything or did not even fire their rifle in their first firefight ”“ at least until an NCO or Officer realized it and got them to fire. (Examples of this come from most every war in our history as it is a psychological thing soldiers have to learn to deal with.) This even though in Viet Nam the Newbies KNEW we were at war compared to the American Militia in the first battles of Lexington/Concord who really weren’t expecting a war to break out. It took them a while to realize what was happening and form into fighting forces as they were not trained soldiers.

Finally, the fairly recent and well documented 1994 book “Paul Revere’s Ride” by David Hackett Fischer, dispels the myth any rifles were used by American forces at Lexington/Concord and the British retreat to Boston. You may find his credentials below: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5062.David_Hackett_Fischer

Gus

 

[MacRob46]

Dan,



Page 12 concerning the Battle of King’s Mountain. “Contrary to the statement that King’s Mountain was a hunting rifle victory, it was Patrick Ferguson’s tactical failure that cost him the battle and his life. There is no indication that there was a superiority of weapons held by either side.” And”¦ “Credit for losing the battles and winning the war in the South must ultimately go to General Nathaniel Greene rather than the presence of riflemen in his forces.”

That Ferguson got himself in a mess prior to Kings Mountain is a certainty. That there was a superiority in tactics as well as weaponry for the Over the Mountain Men is, while not certain, certainly something to be considered. Having visited the battlefield many times I can assure the reader that the Patriots had an advantage over the Loyalists. The ridge on which they fought was wooded and there were plenty of places for the riflemen to conceal themselves and take careful shots. Ferguson's troops, on top of the low ridge where the battle was fought, were using smoothbore muskets and bayonets. Shooting downhill generally causes the shooter to shoot high - personal experience here as well as testimony by participants in the battle - and their smoothbores were less accurate. The heavy timber made volley fire less practical than on an open field and the bayonet charges mounted were spectacularly unsuccessful. While there is no doubt that Ferguson screwed up in more ways than one - he never should have threatened the mountaineers with fire and sword, he isolated himself from the main body of the army and chose to make his stand in an area where his troops could not fight as they were accustomed and could be easily surrounded - the comparison in casualties suffered by each side, 157 Tories killed outright (and quite a few more after the fight was over and on the march into captivity) versus 28 Patriots, has to mean superiority in equipment as well as tactics. It cannot be attributed strictly to Ferguson's mistakes. Finally, the Tories had a larger force at 1125 troops to the mountaineers 900 - 1000.

 

[Artificer]

I don't mean to be critical, as you just wrote a very good short explanation of the strategic and tactical blunders made by Ferguson that led to his defeat. Perhaps or even probably the Americans had more rifles than the Loyalist Militia, and maybe the approximately 200 Loyalists away on scouting duty were mainly armed with rifles, but it was still the strategy and tactics that lost the day.

I'm glad you pointed out the threat that had been made to the Overmountain Men about using "Fire and Sword" against their families. Though it is debated who said it or if had actually been made as a threat, the Overmountain Men firmly believed it by most accounts. So they did not just come there to fight as soldiers, but apply Mountain Vengeance to those who threatened to kill all their family members. I think this point is too often overlooked on how powerful a psychological factor that was for the Americans and why they fought so well.

Gus

 

[Wes/Tex]

In one of those clever little twists of history of rifles and riflemen, there's an interesting account left by Lt. Colonel St. George Tucker, of the Virginia militia who found the tables turned one evening in the approaches outside Yorktown. Briefly, his command had been used to working along the British defenses and staying outside a 100 to 150 yard range limit. One early autumn evening things took a turn...his journal entry from Saturday, September 29th:

"This morning about eight o'clock, the enemy fired a few shots form their advanced redoubts, our right wing having now passed Mumford's Bridge. About nine or ten, the riflemen and jaegers exchanged a few shots across Moore's Mill Pond, at the dam of which the British had a redoubt. A few shots were fired at different times in the day and about sunset from the enemy's redoubts. We had five or six wounded, one mortally and two others by the same ball. The execution was much more than might have been expected from the distance, the dispersed situation of our men, and the few shot's fired."

Without knowing it, he'd answered his own question is his journal. A jaeger company from the Anspach-Bayreuth. Somehow in 100 years, American's forgot their best weapon's origin!

Tucker, St. George, "Journal of the Siege of Yorktown, 1781," Wm. and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., V (July, 1948), P. 375-95.

 

[Alden]

I don't think that when folk say there were NO rifles in New England they mean that perfectly literally, rare as they were. As for Yorkers being New Englanders... I think that might have surprised them to hear and there were certainly rifles there -- remember the Fur Trade and long hunting started there.

 

[Wes/Tex]

Probably true about the rifles in New England. What i see is the fact that every male from 16 to 60 was in the militia and though I don't know every colony's rules, Massachusetts was set up for requirements for bayonets or hatchets or swords, iron ramrods, " a hundred of buckshot", etc. This pretty much dealt out rifles unless the person was wealthy enough to own two guns. How many could do that is anyone's guess.

 

[Artificer]

I suggest the concept of rifles being "virtually unknown in New England during the period" is a modern term and generalization to describe the period and locale. This is why I added the post about modern people who normally do not consider New York to be part of New England, as I believe the author Joe Huddleston meant.

As with any generalization, it should not be considered an absolute, though. "Virtually unknown in New England" does not mean there were absolutely NO rifles in the New England Colonies north/nor'east of New York. That was not what was written and though I do/did not know Joe Huddleston, personally, I believe IF he actually meant to say there were NO rifles in New England, he would have written that.

Of course with generalizations, there are going to be people who take them way out of context. Some will go the "no rifles route" and others will say that since SOME rifles were known to have existed, that should mean there were a lot more of them or in different places/periods than they were actually used in those places/periods.

Scholarly research from authors such as David Fischer have dispelled the myth that rifles were used by the American Militia forces at the Battles of Lexington/Concord on 19 April, 1775. There was a two month time period between those battles and the Battle of Breed's Hill on June 17, 1775. So it is 'POSSIBLE" that one or a few rifle armed individual/s showed up from the western areas of New England or other Colonies during those two months. If so, I would love to see documentation of it.

However, it is also documented the Militia Units that came to Boston between Lexington/Concord and Breed's Hill were Smoothbore/Musket armed units and Colonel Stark placing aiming/range stakes at 40 yards in front of his line, just before the battle, is elegant proof of that.

What we can document is that on 14 June 1775 (three days before the Battle of Breed's Hill) the Continental Congress authorized 10 Rifle Companies to be raised and brought to Boston. The next day they chose George Washington to be Commander in Chief. Two days after that, the Battle of Breed's Hill was fought.

We can also document the first Rifle Company showed up in Cambridge near Boston as early as 25 June, 1775 which was 8 days AFTER the Battle of Breed's Hill and exceedingly fast for the time period being only 11 days from the time the Continental Congress called for 10 Rifle Companies.

I am not close minded and if someone has documentation showing rifle armed troops did in fact show up in time for and fought at Breed's Hill, I would love to see it. However, I do not agree there is anything about the Battle of Breed's Hill that proves rifles were used there. Documented distances and tactics at the Battle prove that.
Gus

 

[Artificer]

I enjoyed reading the account of Lt. Colonel St. George Tucker you posted. Thank you.
Gus

 

[Turtle Creek]

The Marine Corps has excellent marksmanship programs.
The 300 meter Army range is simply a cmbt. tng experience.
The 300 meter range is a pop up tgt range. The 75 meter are head shoulder, the 150 and beyond are 3/4 silhouettes about 3 1/2 ft. high.
You just watch an area (hilly and with vegetation) and when a target pops up from 75 to 300 you have a few seconds to engage then it goes back down unless you knocked it down. Multiple targets get double the seconds of eng time.
Don't think shooting in that manner would be very solid for 500 meters. 40 targets is the sequence from the prone and foxhole.
Unless you are training long gun shooters (sniper sequence) KD ranges are pretty ineffective for your basic combat tng as they teach the wrong skills....too slow and deliberate.