Weapons and Artillery

Soldiers during the Civil War used two types of firearms: small arms and artillery, also called cannon. Below is a list of the different weapons within those types.

Definitions

Smoothbore: Having a barrel of perfectly smooth surface. Smoothbore cannons were typically used during battle because they shot at a shorter range. Smoothbore guns were also short range and were not accurate unless soldiers ran directly into the enemy firing line.

Rifled: Having a barrel that has spiral grooves cut into it. Rifled cannons had a longer range and were typically used to destroy forts or ships. Rifled guns were more accurate and had a longer range (over a half-mile).

Muzzle-loading: Receiving its charge through the muzzle, front-loading. Nearly all cannons were muzzle-loading. Muzzle-loading guns could fire the minie ball, but were slow to load.

Breech-loading: Receiving the charge at the breech (in back of the barrel), rear-loading. Breech-loading cannons typically were not used during the Civil War because of their awkwardness. Breech-loading guns, although they were able to hold more ammunition and fire repeatedly, neither army typically had enough ammunition to use with a breech-loading gun.

Cannons >>

Source: www.civilwarhome.com

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