Rifles During the Civil WarThe most common weapon of a Civil War soldier was the muzzle-loading musket-rifle. They loaded at the muzzle, or at the front of the gun barrel. These single-shot guns were accurate because they were rifled, as opposed to smooth bore rifles. Smooth bore meant that the inside of a musket's barrel was smooth, hence the name "smooth bore." Today, weapons are usually rifled. This means that the weapon's barrel has spiral grooves cut into the inside of it. This makes the bullet travel much farther and be much more accurate. During the Civil War, most of the weapons were rifled, granting the weapon greater accuracy and range. However, as weapon technology progressed during the war, combat tactics remained the same. New weapons such as repeating rifles and breeching-loading rifles were produced, but the main weapon remained the muzzle-loading, rifled musket-rifle.
The main weapon of the Confederate and Union armies was the Springfield 1861 musket and the Harper's Ferry Rifle. There were some other rifle models, such as the British Enfield and the Austrian Lorenz, that were also used during the Civil War. The range and accuracy of older muskets was extremely limited. General Ulysses S. Grant once said that "you might fire at a man from a distance of 125 yards without him ever finding out." With the addition of new rifled weapons, a soldier could easily hit a target about a half mile away. Unfortunately, the usual tactics (charging an enemy position with a mass of men), proved ineffective to combat these new weapons because an entire group of soldiers could be decimated even before reaching the enemy. Civil War generals were slow to recognize this dilemma and did not change combat strategy. Thousands of men died because of their clouded judgement. |
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