I'm no Civil War expert, but the armies of that era mostly used RIFLES, which were deadly accurate out to as much as 400 yards. That was made possible by the minie ball, a type of bullet that somewhat cleaned out the fouling in the rifling caused by the black powder propellants of the day. Between that and the author's sketchy math on how many bullets were fired and how many casualties were incurred, I sort of lost interest in this post.
The weapon of choice was the rifled musket which as you say was made possible by the Minie ball. This combined the loading speed of the musket and the accuracy of the rifle. 57/58 caliber created horrific wounds. Doctors were called ‘sawbones’ because the big, slow Minie ball shattered bones so a wound to the arm or leg usually called for amputation.
I can’t imagine the horror of charging into a cornfield. Between the smoke of battle and the corn itself, you wouldn’t really be able to see the enemy, yet the corn would offer no protection from enemy fire.
Generals who had learned their trade in the era of the limited range of muskets took too long to take into account the much longer effective range of rifled muskets. The same thing happened in WWI. One reason why both wars were so bloody.
Pardon me for pointing out that about 15-25% of long-arms on both sides were SMOOTHBORES & sometimes even Brown Bess & CHARLEVILLE flintlocks were used in combat & loaded with “buck & ball”.
Btw, all the “smoothies” weren’t old/military surplus arms. = BOTH sides of the WBTS built new smoothbore muskets using “up to date” parts.
The CSA’s NAVY & MARINES very much liked BROWN BESS muskets, converted to percussion, for on-board & boarding party use.
(BOTH maritime forces had plenty of rifled arms.)
Yours, TMN78247