Loading C&B Revolvers

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

Of course there is a SANTA!!!!!

You can write him at;

Santa Claus
North Pole
CANADA  HOH OHO

[PJ Hardtack]

Our club just had it's 2nd annual 'Frontiersman' cap & ball event - BP in long guns required. NO ONE used paper cartridges. We shot two stages before lunch, two after. The first stage after lunch was in a steady rain.

It was a good mix of Colt 'wedgies' and solid frame Remingtons, and we ALL suffered failures to fire, attributable to the rain, no doubt. It was good lesson in the impracticality of cap & ball guns as an 'all weather' fighting gun.

I'm the only one with any experience in paper cartridges, having loaded many for my Shiloh '63 Sharps rifle and carbine. The most practical by far were made by rolling a lubed bullet with .54 calibre 60 gr Pyrodex pellets which are just under chamber length in my .50 '63s.
They handle well and the onion skin paper is 100% consumed most times.

[rifle]

Load them in the manner they were intended to be loaded .......with cartridges?
The Army also issued flasks for powder and cap boxes fer caps and flask holders on the belt didn't they?
The Army may have used paper cartridges in the Cavalry but did they do that in all instances?
Civilians used the paper cartridges sold in hardware stores and trading posts I guess since it would be hard to sell and carry around a fist full of powder in one hand and some balls and caps in another. The cartridges were made and sold by Colt and they were simply convienient that way.
Civilians and Army used the flasks too I'd assume. There are examples of antique flasks around from the period. The Patersons had that five at a time reloading flask with balls in part of it.
I'd guess when considering the entire populace including the Army the practice of loading with the flasks would have been more popular.
The pocket pistols being the most popular guns sold by Colt and others would have made paper cartridges popular where they were readiy available but the flasks left at home were probably as popular or more popular than the paper cartridges. It was probably whatever the person with the gun preferred. Like today.
I guess what I'm trying to get across is that the paper cartridges weren't the accepted one and only proper way to load the guns.
The instructions for loading the guns that Colt Manufacturing Co. put in the box with the guns the way they were sold didn't mention paper cartridges did it? I don't thunk the instructions mentioned anything about lube under the balls or over the balls either. Am I right here?
I checked online and returned here. The original instructions supplied with the guns mentioned simply "put powder in chamber" but.......the second way explained was telling about the "foil cartridge" and pulling the black tape and puncturing the foil  cartridge to insure powder would pour in and be exposed and easily ignited.
Foil? Now that would be interesting for making cartridges fer the cap&ballers. Easier maybe than the danged paper. I couldn't say how the foil carts were made. Foil over the paper? No paper? Stuff the foil in the chamber and shoot it out like with the paper carts?

[PJ Hardtack]

I've read that the foil used was extremely thin and fragile, but a little more moisture proof than paper or collodion coated skin cartriidges. All of them burst when seated by the rammer.
In Logan's "Cartridges", I only find examples of conical revolver loads, which means a lubed bullet. There were some RN bullets as well.

"For the lubrication in the grooves, around the bullet, the following was used: ... three parts best tallow, two parts wax (vegetable preferred) one part native gutta percha; melted together in the order named, the scum removed while near the boiling point."

What exactly was meant by "vegetable wax", I've no idea. Crisco wasn't around then.

[Paladin UK]

Fer hammer1

What do you mean Paladin? Are you insinuating there isnt a Santa Claus??!!

Like I signed off...   Paladin (what still believes in    ) UK


`n Yep
Paladin (what STILL believes in    ) UK

[cpt dan blodgett]

Wonder if the foil was similar to chewing gum or cigarette pack foil

[PJ Hardtack]

Try it. Let us know how it works ....