Black Powder in War

And a friend has the journal of a "gentleman ranker" during the Napoleonic Wars when British issue was the .75 Brown Bess.
"Fired 70 rounds ball today. My shoulder is black."
 
The most recoil tolerant shooter I knew was a little shrimp of a guy, by modern standards, maybe 5'7' at most and wiry in build. Probably normal or taller in the 18th century.
 
I believe people of small stature tend to give with the recoil instead of fighting it and thus are less hurt by it.
 
I've never been recoil sensitive so I really don't understand it. I was shooting 12 gauges and 30-06's both with steel or hard rubber butt plates when I was 11 and I was small for my age. To me a steel butted 30-06 or a .58 Enfield with 70 grains of powder and a 510 grain minie don't have enough kick to bother mentioning. I see guys come on here complaining about a .308 or a 30-30 and all I can say is WTH?
 
Agree with Johnwilliam. Hold it loosely and the butt will slam into your shoulder. Hold it tightly and it pushes you back. I can shoot 65-70 grains all day without injury. I don't want to try that with 120 grains.
 
Well, how you handle recoil has a lot to do with proper stance and hold of the rifle along with fit
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Proper stance....Me? Now that's funny right there. I don't do anything by the book.:D
 
I dunno, but my muzzleloading shotgun seem to kick a lot more when I'm aiming at the patterning board and squeezing off a shot than it does when I'm shooting at a flying clay bird.
 
B.L.E., get some .69 caliber round balls and tight patch them on top of 100 grains of powder. They make some awsum holes in stuff.
 
I also wonder about urinating down the barrel. Between sweating in those wool uniforms and the 1 quart canteens of the period, any water a solider ingested would probably come out his pores first.
 
B.L.E., get some .69 caliber round balls and tight patch them on top of 100 grains of powder. They make some awsum holes in stuff.
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Better yet, how 'bout tightly patched .90 roundballs behind about 200 grains of cannon powder loaded into this six gauge. ;) If that don't kick hard enough for you, there's always the 4 gauge.
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People back then were a lot smaller in stature.
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Most people back then were a lot smaller in stature.

FIFY.

George Washington was 6'2 1/2" .....Jefferson was, too.

Abe Lincoln was 6'4" .....

Americans in the mid-19th century were, on average taller and stronger than their European counterparts- they were better fed.
 
Abe Lincoln and George Washington were unusual in that they were taller than the average person.

Look at the images of Lincoln and his generals. He almost always towers over them. The average height of the Civil War soldier was 5'8". They were also skinny compared to today's Civil War reenactors. It's one of the reasons why Wicked Spring was filmed in Romania and not here in the U.S. Skinny people. Compare that to the average Walmart Shopper.

OK, I concede there were big people back then too. Ben Butler, Heros von Borcke are examples that big was around too; just not as frequently as today.
 
Personally, I ...

...prefer the description, "happilly rotund".

I remember when I was 180 lbs., like Lincoln, but that was before Ronald Reagan introduced me to jelly beans.:)
 
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