Black Powder, White Smoke — April 2016

Black Powder, White Smoke

Most Civil War historians and buffs are aware of the famous afteraction report regarding the muskets and rifle-muskets picked up on the Gettysburg battlefield in the aftermath of that famous fight. What was noteworthy was the revelation that many of them were loaded multiple times. To be more specific: “Of the whole number received (27,574) we found at least 24,000 of these loaded; about one-half of these contained two loads each, onefourth from three to ten loads each, and the balance one load each.” This problem, which had apparently never been studied after earlier weapons recoveries on previous battlefields by either side, was used as a rationale for a subsequent order to every unit in the Army of the Potomac in the spring of 1864 to engage in target shooting before the opening of the campaign season that year. The shooting program was, however, actually little more than what would be called in the modern army “familiarization firing.”

There were also more detailed findings than those generally reported. Investigating ordnance officers discovered that “in many of these guns from two to six balls have been found with only one charge of powder. In some the balls have been found at the bottom of the bore, with the charge of powder on top of the ball. In some as many as six paper regulation calibre [sic] 58 cartridges have been found, the cartridges having been put into the guns without being torn or broken.

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Twenty-three loads were found in one Springfield rifle-musket, each load in regular order”

A few of these problems may well have been due to a soldier picking up the weapon of a wounded or dead comrade without knowing it was loaded, an explanation often offered. Most, however, were no doubt the result of either ignorance of proper loading procedures due to a lack of training or understandable panic under fire.

For a look at modern shooters live firing rifle muskets the “old fashioned way,” with traditional paper cartridges being “torn or broken” rather than the modern style plastic tube rounds used by most rifle-musket shooters, check out this youtube video from the American Civil War Skirmish Association: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_w2sQC- GjM&feature=youtu.be

The Sharpshooting Jersey Muskrats

The 9th New Jersey Infantry was raised in the autumn of 1861, and recruiting posters stressed that it would be a sharpshooter unit. Some of those who volunteered for the 9th did so under the mistaken assumption that they were joining one of Hiram Berdan’s United States Sharpshooter regiments. The unit recruited around the state, drawing German target shooters from Newark and coastal watermen and duck hunters, although the latter’s firearms experience was with short range shotguns rather than accurate long range rifles.

Instead of a conventional ten-company infantry regiment, the 9th was

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composed of twelve companies organized into three battalions as a “rifle regiment” and rank insignia were green instead of infantry blue. Each company had a bugler who was supposed to communicate orders on the skirmish line, rather than assume the usual musician battle position as a stretcher bearer in the rear. Despite all the hoopla, it appeared that the regiment would be issued smoothbore muskets, as Springfield rifle-muskets, which the men had been promised, were in short supply in 1861 and usually reserved for regular army units. New Jersey Governor Charles Olden, however, made a special plea for Springfields and a supply was delivered directly from the arsenal to Trenton to arm the men of the 9th.

The 9th New Jersey was specifically chosen for General Ambrose Burnside’s North Carolina coastal campaign in early 1862, but not for its shooting acumen. Burnside was impressed with the large number of watermen in the regiment’s ranks and shooting ability, albeit a plus, was not his primary motive for selecting the

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regiment. In the field the 9th, dubbed the “Muskrats” because of their ability to successfully cross swampy terrain under fire while assaulting an enemy position, gained an excellent reputation at Roanoke Island and New Bern, but was reorganized as a standard ten-company regiment in 1862. Eventually a 50-man group was established as an official sharpshooter detachment within the regiment.

The 9th spent most of the war along the coast, and was assigned to the siege of Charleston in the spring of 1863, which proved an unhappy experience for the regiment, as the Jerseymen suffered from both disease and boredom. On the regiment’s return to North Carolina the 9th’s sharpshooters practiced for the first time since before the Charleston expedition, but the results were far from satisfactory, and after they fired several hundred shots at a target 100 yards away an observer remarked that “not more than a dozen would have taken effect.” The shocked detachment commander imposed a refresher training regime and after a couple of weeks, “out of 200 shots

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fired at a range of 230 yards at a target resembling a Confederate soldier, 140 struck the target and nearly a dozen hit the Rebel squarely in the eye.” The lads of the 9th New Jersey were ready to go back in action!