| Small
Arms
The Civil War witnessed a technological revolution
in weaponry. This was highlighted by a changeover
in shoulder-fired weapons from smoothbore firearms
that had to be loaded through the muzzle each time
a shot was fired to rifled-barrel firearms, some of
which loaded at the breech. Most of these new rifle-muskets
still had to be loaded between each shot, but repeating
weapons such as 7-shot Spencer and 20-shot Henry rifles
and carbines were developed as well. Unfortunately
for the common soldier, tactics did not advance as
quickly as technology. Napoleonic linear tactics from
earlier in the century now combined with more accurate,
faster-firing weapons to result in catastrophic casualty
figures throughout the War.
The Confederacy, whose industrial base was far weaker
than the Union's when the war began, accomplished
a great feat by establishing a viable arms-manufacturing
capability in short order. The North's industrial
machine also swung into high gear to produce huge
quantities of weapons and ammunition. Agents from
both the Union and the Confederacy scoured the shelves
of European arms-dealers to enure that their armies
had an adequate supply of weapons. The rifle-musket
most Confederate infantrymen favored was the English-manufactured
Enfield.
Infantry Small Arms
Most Civil War infantrymen, both Federal and Confederate,
carried .58 or .577 caliber rifle-muskets. The rifle-musket
was first manufactured in the United States in 1855
and quickly replaced earlier smoothbore guns. The
rifling--spiral grooves etched inside the gun's barrel--greatly
increased the accuracy of the weapons by spinning
and stabilizing the bullet as it sped towards the
target. A trained marksman could hit targets as far
as 800 yards away, and even an average shot could
expect to strike the mark at 250 yards. Smoothbore
muskets, some of which were still used during the
Civil War, were generally unreliable at any range
more than 75 yards.
Accuracy of Smoothbore Muskets vs. Rifle-muskets
(Shooting at a target 6 feet high and
20 feet wide. From U.S. Army experiments in 1856.)
| Distance from Target |
Smoothbore Shots that Hit Target |
Rifle Shots that Hit Target |
| 100 yards |
74.5% |
94.5% |
| 200 yards |
42.5% |
80% |
| 300 yards |
16% |
55% |
| 400 yards |
4.5% |
52.5% |
These rifle-muskets were chiefly percussion weapons;
pulling the trigger of a rifle-musket caused the weapon's
hammer to strike a small metal cap. The charge of
fulminate of mercury inside the cap would explode
to ignite the gunpowder charge in the barrel. The
force of the gunpowder explosion drove the bullet,
either a round ball or minié ball, down the barrel.
The metal cap was tiny, about the size of a pencil-eraser,
and had to be set into place by hand each time the
musket was fired. Soldiers had to follow nine careful
steps to load and fire a single bullet from a muzzle-loading
gun, and five to fire a breech-loading weapon. Rifle-muskets
weighed between six and ten pounds and many were designed
to fit a bayonet on the business end of the barrel.
After we had abandoned the line, and
on coming to a little stream of water, I undressed
for the purpose of bathing, and after undressing found
my arm all battered and bruised and bloodshot from
my wrist to my shoulder, and as sore as a blister.
I had shot one hundred and twenty times that day.
My gun became so hot that frequently the powder would
flash before I could ram home the ball, and I had
frequently to exchange my gun for that of a dead comrade.
----Confederate Private Sam R. Watkins, 1st Tennessee
Regiment. (From "Co. Aytch" by Sam R. Watkins, published
by Collier Books.)
One of the most highly rated of the rifle-muskets
was manufactured at the United States Arsenal at Springfield,
Massachusetts (or at other armories under license).
Other prominent U.S. gun makers included Colt and
Remington. In addition, rifle-muskets could be imported
from Europe. During the early campaigns, Confederate
soldiers often armed themselves with captured Federal
Springfields. Both the Federal and Confederate armies
also carried large numbers of English Enfield rifle-muskets
as well as Austrian, Prussian, French, and Belgian
guns. The quality of imported guns ranged from the
first-rate Enfield (equal or superior to the Springfield)
to barely functional.
On the 13th, marched 10 miles, to camp
Stanton, on big prairie in Missouri. Target shooting
was practiced here by companies for the first time,
and the muskets, owing to their large calibre and
forcible shooting, were dubbed by the Col. "light
artillery," causing much amusement." --From the
newspaper of the 11th Kansas Volunteers, Buck &
Ball, December 6, 1862.
The Confederacy captured the gun-making equipment
at the U.S. Armory at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now
West Virginia) in 1861. The Southerners used the Harpers
Ferry machinery to establish factories in Richmond,
Virginia and at the Fayetteville, North Carolina arsenal
that manufactured guns very similar to the standard
Federal rifle-musket. Other Southern arsenals turned
out small quantities of Enfield-style weapons and
copies of Colt & Whitney revolvers as well as
a few designs of their own.
In addition to standard muzzle-loading rifle-muskets,
a few Civil War infantrymen carried breech-loading
guns (like the Sharps) or repeaters (like the Spencer
and Henry). Breech-loading weapons were easier and
faster to reload than muzzle-loaders--even from a
position flat on the ground. Repeaters offered an
additional advantage since they could be fired--in
the case of the Henry--up to twenty times without
reloading. Although the breech-loaders and the repeaters
were only a small percentage of the total number of
guns used by Civil War infantrymen, units that carried
these weapons gained a distinct edge over even much
larger enemy forces.
Cavalry Small Arms
Although they most often fought on foot--particularly
as the War progressed--cavalry units typically looked
for firearms that would be easy to reload from the
back of a galloping horse. Cavalry in both the Union
and the Confederate Armies employed a variety of breech-loading,
single-shot, rifle-barrelled weapons known as carbines.
The carbines, because their barrels were several inches
shorter than the rifle-muskets the infantry carried,
also had a shorter range. In addition, the cavalry
weapons had a brutal recoil when fired, and--despite
their advantages in loading--most still required the
cavalry soldier to manipulate a tiny cap in order
to fire. Confederate cavalry often brought sawed-off
shotguns and cut-down hunting rifles from home. Others
used the standard infantry rifle-muskets, though the
longer barrels were awkward and muzzle-loading was
difficult on horseback.
The storm of battle [at Chickamauga]
was sweeping over the ground I had just left. Hastily...returning,
I found the 39th Indiana regiment coming from a cross-road,--a
full, fresh regiment, armed with Spencer's repeating-rifles,
the only mounted force in our army corps...Colonel
T.J. Harrison, its commander...dismounting his men,
dashed at the enemy in a most effective charge. [Colonel
John T.] Wilder, coming up on our right, also attacked.
Wilder had two regiments armed with the same repeating-rifles.
They did splendid work. [Confederate General James]
Longstreet told Wilder after the war that the steady
and continued racket of these guns led him to think
an army corps had attacked his left flank." --Union
officer Gates P. Thruston. (From Battles and Leaders
of the Civil War, Vol. III, published by Castle.)
In addition to the carbines, cavalrymen also frequently
were issued percussion revolvers. These handguns used
rotating cylinders, bored through with five or six
chambers, to allow multiple shots without reloading.
The soldier had to pour a powder charge into the chamber,
ram a round or conical ball on top, seal the front
of the cylinder with grease to prevent one chamber
from igniting the adjacent ones, and then place a
cap on the rear of each chamber before the guns were
ready to be fired. Once this time-consuming process
was complete, the soldier could rely on five or six
shots in succession. However, the sights on the handguns
were crude; a soldier could not expect to hit any
target much beyond 50 paces--less from horseback.
 One massive Confederate revolver, the LeMat, clustered
nine pistol chambers around a central shotgun barrel.
Smith & Wesson perfected self-contained metallic
cartridge revolvers in .22 and .32 caliber. Earlier
cartridges had been made of stiff paper or animal
skin wrapped around the charge, primer, and projectile
of the gun. While more convenient to load and carry,
these smaller guns lacked the power of their .36 and
.44 caliber percussion competition. One French revolver,
the Lefauchaux, used a small firing pin integral to
the cartridge to ignite the charge. Federal forces
used several thousand of the Lefauchaux revolvers,
and Confederate Generals J.E.B. Stuart and Pierre
Beauregard also carried this model. The preferred
weapon of Nathan Bedford Forrest's Confederate horse
soldiers was a pair of the .36 caliber Navy revolvers
manufactured by Colt which Forrest believed was far
superior to the Yankee infantry's bayonet.
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