Wads

[Cutfingers]

Just re-reading Osborne Russell's Journal of a Trapper and noticed a statement where he said the Indians were so close he could see the "blanket wads" coming out of the muzzles of their guns. Might be a wrong assumption but seems to indicate that they were shooting smooth bores and the balls were patched with blanket wadding and, if so, the ball size would have to have been quite small for the bore. (or a real old blanket)
Just throwing this out for general discussion.and/or comments.

 

[roundball]

Just re-reading Osborne Russell's Journal of a Trapper and noticed a statement where he said the Indians were so close he could see the "blanket wads" coming out of the muzzles of their guns. Might be a wrong assumption but seems to indicate that they were shooting smooth bores and the balls were patched with blanket wadding and, if so, the ball size would have to have been quite small for the bore. (or a real old blanket)
Just throwing this out for general discussion.and/or comments.

:hmm: Or, it might have just been a tongue-in-cheek comment...

 

[Capt. Jas.]

Wadding does not envelope the ball like patching.

 

[Cutfingers]

So what it could be is a "wad" of old blanket stuffed upon the ball to hold it in place! ie,powder, ball, wad.

 

[Capt. Jas.]

Yep. :thumbsup:

 

[boar]

I have read that. Also in another book the Indian had chewed his roundballs round out of stick or bar of lead. I beleive they would use any thing handy, stone.bone or whatever. Dilly

 

[Rod Lassey]

The blanket wadding also shows up in Henry Boller's book, Among the Indians. There are also passing references to wadding in any number of accounts, Alex Henry, etc.

I use blanket wads in my Northwest gun, and they work quite well. I pour in the powder, push an inch square piece of wool blanketing in, put the ball on that, and another chunck of blanketing on top to hold the ball in, and ram the whole works down. I'm using .570 balls in my 24 guage, so there is little windage. I've noticed also that the lead must be dead soft, or accuracy will suffer a bit. I suspect the soft lead ball upsets easily and fills the bore, while a little harder lead might skip it's merry way down the bore wobbling all the way. I got ahold of smoe lead that was little hard--nowhere near as hard as wheelweights that I use for blackpowder cartridge guns--but just somewhat harder than really soft lead. Wasn't any problem in a patched roundball form in my rifle, but it didn't work at all in my NW gun.

Rod