Rifle Accuracy 1776

[Rkymtn57]

Hope this subject hasnt been beaten to death but....
Id love to hear your thoughts and beliefs on long distance (200 - 300 yd.) shooting
because my grandfather was at Saratoga with Timothy Murphy.
Also love the historical aspects of it  , their lifestyles , components , conditions of their rifles ?
With all the technicalities im learning about , its tough to see them doing it then ?

Hope you'll join in.  DD

[smylee grouch]

I think that when you talk about men who used the rifle every day/all day a 300 yd. shot is absolutly posible. I cant do it any more but I have a few round ball guns that you could     garantee hits at 200 and that is by people who only use the rifle as a hoby.

[EC121]

It is possible if you have practiced some.  Once at Fort Toulouse in Alabama we shot at a metal plate that was hung against a cut bank across the Coosa river.  Had to be 200yds.  After shooting a few times to see the water splashes we learned how high up the bank to hold and offhand hits were fairly regular.  The visitors were really impressed by the "old timey" rifles.  Of course we acted like we did it all the time. 

[1911tex]

EC121:  You just rang my bell (no pun intended)...you reminded me of the time when we were shooting for fun across the Colorado River out in the country in the early 60"s....it was an easy 150-200 yards....my .50 cal Penn. kept kerplunking in the river and I kept raising the muzzle until finally hitting a big rock on the other side...the final kerplunk was at the opposite waters edge and I was a good 2 feet above the rock before I hit it.  A great lesson in elevation !

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

It's quite wonderful and satisfying how consistent you can get, if you practice those long shots.

[necchi]

because my grandfather was at Saratoga with Timothy Murphy.

If you are 80 years old and your father was 80 years old when you where born, and his father was 80 years old when he born,,
Your grand father could have been 4 when the battle you speak of was in progress.

[drago]

President John Tyler, born 1790 still has 2 grandsons alive. I think they are about 80. They were all late bloomers.

[Rkymtn57]

Excuse me ....Thomas Dickerson 1757....He was 19 when he enlisted Aug. 9th. 1776 at Ft. Pitt.
Fought at Bound Brook before being transferred to Morgans Rifles and the 8 th. Pa. reg.
Then wintered at Valley Forge.
Why don't check the muster rolls on the Saratoga Battlefield website.
Or perhaps you need a copy of his pension or maybe if you read much , you have
heard of Brady's Rangers whom is two brothers Kinser and Vachel spied and scouted for
Out of Fort Henry ( Wheeling).
Just a polite question would have been fine before you called me a liar !
The question was about long distance shooting and accuracy.
DD

[Rkymtn57]

Here ya go........5th. GG.

[yip]

    its very possible!  we shoot at a bucket size plate at  200 meters (230 yds?) and we have guys hitting that. and those who miss it ain't that far from hitting it. the guys look forward to shooting it. verrrrry possible

[bob in the woods]

When you said " your Grandfather .." I  took it for granted that there were some " Great G. missing "    I refer to my great Uncle as just " my Uncle " all the time  
We used to have a formal target match down in Kingston called " Kingfest" and these matches were at 100 and 200 yards.   All round ball rifles, and the scores at 200 yds were pretty darn good.  I took my rear site and in my eye imagined a set amount of space above it for the front site. If you shoot a smoothbore, you'll get the idea.
Drift from the wind is more of an issue, but the question re how accurate .....pretty darn accurate.  I would not want to put money on a bet that some in our club couldn't hit a man sized target at  200 or 300 yds.   I'd lose.

[Rkymtn57]

I agree with you Bob , I also like to add in the factors of
Rusty pitted barrels , loosely woven linen patching , bears grease and powder of the times.
I guess it all boils down to familiarity with your weapon thru daily use.
Fascinating to me ! Thanks

[Hungry Horse]

 Just to give y'all an idea as to how good you can get with a muzzleloader, by just shooting a lot, heres my story.
  I started this hobby when I was in my mid twenties. That was back when everything worked, nothing shook, or trembled, and I had eyes like an eagle. I bought two rifle kits, from Dixie Gun Works, with the first Christmas bonus I ever got from an employer. The flinter was just what you'd expect for $65.00, but the CVA mountain rifle kit was pretty good. I literally shot it every day. My father had a pear ranch, that was up against the foot hills, that was teaming with jack rabbits, and ground squirrels, both detrimental to pear trees. I hunted varmints after work every evening ( this was long before cable TV, and Monday night football). The best shot I ever made on varmints was a 210 pace head shot on a ground squirrel standing on top of a smudge pot. The second rendezvous I attended I got into a long gong shoot off elimination, that required the shooters that hit, to back up ten yards, until all but one was eliminated. The usable range was 300 yards, the target was an eighteen inch metal disc. At 300 yards there was still four of us int the game. The range officer made us make our next shot standing on one foot. One shooter missed, one shooter with a GRRW Leman blew the drum out of his gun, and two of us hit the target. After the drum incident the range officer made the two of us stand on one foot, and reduce our charges to 75 grains of powder. I hit a foot low. The other guy shot second, and held a little higher, and rung the gong. Practice, practice, practice. Nuff Sed!!!
                             Hungry Horse

[Rkymtn57]

Very cool Hungry !

[Hungry Horse]

Rocky;

  I'm very interested in your family connection with the American rebels. My mothers family have been in the new world since the King didn't like their refusal to change religions, and got tired of staking them in the Irish surf. I'm sure they were involved in the revolution, and possible the F&I war as well. I just haven't been able to find that elusive nugget of information. They were in the Carolinas, and possible Virginia.
  A recent article in the American Rifleman about a rifleman in Daniel Morgan's rifle corp, named Stark Brown, inspired me to start the search all over again. My families earliest  relative of record in North Carolina, is Daniel Morgan Brown, who would have been too young to serve in the Continental Army, but may have been a relative of one or more that did serve. TTYL.

                  Hungry Horse

[Rkymtn57]

I read tons of stuff Hungry and I will keep it in mind. I can't get enough of the history.
If you like to read , learn to use "books google " and search for any topics that interest you .
All the older stuff is free to download.
I have lots of books saved but just enjoyed "Frontier Advance on the Upper Ohio"
Now reading "Frontier Retreat on the Upper Ohio" all free reads.
I would be glad to help you Hungry , try typing in his name and a key work like Rev. War , or Colonial Militias , diff. Things and see what pops up on Google.
DD

[Dphariss]

Hope this subject hasnt been beaten to death but....
Id love to hear your thoughts and beliefs on long distance (200 - 300 yd.) shooting
because my grandfather was at Saratoga with Timothy Murphy.
Also love the historical aspects of it  , their lifestyles , components , conditions of their rifles ?
With all the technicalities im learning about , its tough to see them doing it then ?

Hope you'll join in.  DD

If we find the right books we can find TARGETS from the late flint era or from experiments by people like Dillon or Cline using original rifles. I would have to refresh my memory but I think Dillon has some photos of early 19th c targets found with a rifle.
Then we have the documentation from the past, while riflemen and rifles vary the accuracy was pretty impressive. But 300 yard hits are not that difficult. Sighted about 2" high at 60 yards I need about 6 ft of elevation to hit pigs at 300 meters (in this case "pig" I only hit one about 5 shots). This with a 44" barreled 50 using 109 gr of FFF Swiss off our plank rest at Cody. According to Hanger the patriot rifleman liked to shoot from a prone position if possible. Had the wind not been blowing and a better aiming point to be had I would likely have gotten more since I had some near misses. Were close in elevation and would have hit a tall target easily. Back in the day there were complaints of the rifleman firing at too great a distance and efforts to keep them from firing past 150 yards, but 150 is pretty sure with a Kentucky of 40 caliber or above on man sized targets. This goes back to the skill of the rifleman and his ability in loading the rifle properly. Wind is a major factor. This is mentioned in Rev-War times. At 300 yards any breeze can result in several feet of drift. With no wind groups can be fired today at 200 yards that would, as they claimed in Rev-War times, to strike a mans head at 200 yards. But a very slight breeze at 200 will have a serious effect on a round ball of the calibers we typically use, under 1" anyway.

Dan

[Daryl]

In the very early 70's, Taylor and I had read many of the books Dan speaks of and the attraction of longer range shooting with round balls and slugs was not lost on us. We figured if they could do it, we sure could as well.

When we were just kids (good eyes) - in our 20's, Taylor and I used to shoot at about a 14" to 18" white coloured rock that sat in a large V-shaped patch of black earth in a notch of rock on the side of the "Chief".  The Chief was a granite mountain at Squamish, B.C.  That rock made for a handy & alluring target for 2 young muzzleloading shooters.  That was about 37years ago, now.  For us with our muzzleloading rifles, it was an offhand target challenge and once we knew our sight picture, ie; how much sight and barrel over the rear sight to hold, hitting that rock was the norm. Missing was abnormal.  I was able to hit it with Tracy's little .36 Seneca as well, but using the 128gr.  MB slug - about 60gr. 2f if I recall correctly as did not like 3F with that bullet - too fast an excelleration, I guess.
 
By that time, I was shooting Bauska barrels on my reworked TC or maybe my first 1/2 stock build and Taylor was shooting GRRW or perhaps a Large barrel on his .62 Hawken.  We already knew about feeding a rifle what it wanted for powder to give accuracy at longer ranges and about tight ball and patch combinations.   The sighting method of holding front sight over the rear, is the one we still use today for long pokes. That method was Elmer Keith's long range handgun method.  It worked for him, worked for us and still works for us.  $#*!, we could see - back then. 

[Standing Bear]

"He'll, we could see back then".

X2. Had an ongoing thing with a couple other nuts to shoot a 16" steel target on the 200 yd berm w.22 pistols standing. I had a mark on the front sight for hold over. My best was 9 of 10 but average was 6-7.

[Jerry V Lape]

Interesting you used the exposed barrel and front sight to aim at those distances.  I too would shoot at distant targets but with a .22LR.  My method was to estimate the hold over, and wind drift then identify an aiming point which provided the correct aim off.   Once the aiming point was confirmed  it was very routine to hit a 18" gong at 300.yards.  I have even done it with a .45 1911 which apparently produced about the same trajectory as the .22 at that range.   Killed a groundhog at 463 places with the .22lr but it was well into the second box of ammo so I consider it was his bad luck and a large number of chances which got him more than any skill I possessed.   

[WadePatton]

   @ Jerry and the deaf groundhog above what eventually walked into a leaden raindrop.


I figure it like this: Their supply of weapons (though state of the art at the time) probably wasn't nearly so consistently well-made as ours are (though replicas of antiquity) these days.  Which boiled down very neatly means to me that the "off-the-rack" gun back then was less likely than ours to be capable of great accuracy.

It always takes a marksman to make such shots with any regularity, but we don't have to start over working up a new load with every batch of powder we buy these days either. 

Our equipment* and powder tends to be better, whereas they tended to shoot more and with more motivation i would say. 

*speaking of our small world of enthusiasts, not the production-gun consumers.

[Standing Bear]

Jerry I've used hold over and hold off using .223 w/ 52 gr HPs on prarie dogs. Took 4 rds to walk in on longest at near 600 yds (walk off between fence posts and count sections).
TC

[galudwig]

Hello Rkymtn57,

When I read your post about your grandfather, it all sounded too familiar.  I wonder if we are talking about the same Thomas Dickerson?  The birth date on the grave doesn't jive with yours, but everything else seems to.






My wife and I grew up on the border of Jefferson/Harrison Counties (Ohio) and she is related to the Dickerson Family through her grandfather, Edgar Dickerson Flowers (son of Benjamin Flowers and Carrie Dickerson).  While wandering through the Dickerson Church Cemetery near Cadiz one day, I came across this grave site and was astonished to see a direct link to the Revolutionary War and Daniel Morgan.  I knew of some Civil War links, but nothing of anyone that far back.  I tried for awhile to find out more info about Thomas and his family, but could not find much of anything. 

Seems like you have found some good info and I'd be interested to learn more if you would be willing to share.  PM me if so.  I have more pictures of grave markers from other family members as well if interested.  I'd love to learn more about Thomas and his brother's links to Brady's Rangers! 

galudwig   

[Robby]

Some years ago, someone posted a picture of an original barrel with lines scratched or filed perpendicular to the bore on the top flat. It was explained that these were for longer ranges, as the line on the barrel would be placed on top of the rear sight and the front sight would be held on the target.
For an experiment I made a set of low to the barrel sights much like the originals, fitted them to one of my rifles that I knew real well, put some masking tape on the top flat and without magnumizing the load, had at it. Other than having to use something similar to the 'Meret Device' because of my old man eyes, it worked!
Robby

[Rkymtn57]

Yes Galudwig , I would be very interested in talking to you more.