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To: Vendome

No, they were not.

The rebels had rather few rifles and riflemen.

Most people had muskets of various types of their own.

Worse, rebels were generally less equipped in general.

The other advantage of most muskets over any of the PA rifles was they carried bayonets. Not a single rifle was made to carry a bayonet. And that is what scared rebels the most - when the ammo was spent and it was down to hand-hand combat - with vicious bayonets (not the wimpy knives of the last 100 years).

And again, rebels had relatively few of these for themselves. Equipping the troops was a major and constant problem.

There are many myths about the AmRevWar and the guerilla/rifle thing is a major one.


19 posted on 04/07/2018 7:29:47 PM PDT by the OlLine Rebel (Common sense is an uncommon virtue./Federal-run medical care is as good as state-run DMVs.)
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To: the OlLine Rebel

Uhmmmm....maybe I don’t understand what you are trying to say but, your post is whack...jack.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.forbes.com/sites/frankminiter/2014/07/03/the-american-longrifle-has-a-censored-but-very-patriotic-story-to-tell/amp/

And you can read some other posts on this thread as well.


22 posted on 04/07/2018 8:12:21 PM PDT by Vendome (I've Gotta Be Me https://youtu.be/wH-pk2vZG2M)
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To: the OlLine Rebel

The musket also had a relatively higher rate of fire given the ease of ramming a ball down a smooth tube as opposed to a rifled bore. Well drilled British (or for that matter Colonial) troops could sustain a steady rate of massed forward fire in close ranks allow a closure of distance with the enemy preceding a bayonet charge, or in a holding action allowing a flanking attack by cavalry or reserve infantry.


38 posted on 04/08/2018 12:27:44 PM PDT by Joe 6-pack (Qui me amat, amat et canem meum.)
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