How proficient were the man killers of old?

[Joe S]

Exactly. Won't a 40 lb bow shoot clear through a deer? Plenty for CQB style mankilling and allows volume of fire to be a tactical advantage.

40 lbs won't generally go through a deer, although it is generally considered adequate for whitetail or smaller. It is many states minimum legal draw weight.

[Caballoflaco]

40 lbs won't generally go through a deer, although it is generally considered adequate for whitetail or smaller. It is many states minimum legal draw weight.

And a 40lb bow at that 15-20 inch draw length is going to have a lot less power than a bow pulling 40lbs at 28 inches. Another example is that it takes a 1000lb medieval crossbow to equal a 170ish lb English longbow in kinetic energy due to the 30+inch draw length of the long bow vs the 12ish inch draw length of a crossbow.

Lars Anderson puts out some interesting content, and I like that he experiments with different ways to manipulate the bows and arrows. But in a lot of ways he’s like a dude trying to figure out shooting using airsoft since he primarily uses toy weight boys. I’ll have to check some sources on Comanche bows again, but while the 40lb range of draw weight was common for Native American hunting bows a lot of tribes had separate warbows for mankilling that were pulling 70-90lbs. And pulling that much weight makes things....different.

[spyderco monkey]

Looking at the older black powder loading manuals shows some noticeably differences in velocities and pressure between the powders available at the time, (1970s). Studying and talking with black powder cartridge shooters, swiss powder generally runs higher velocity than most other makes, less fouling and not as dry and hard of fouling, less accuracy degradation over a number of shots.

There was numerous makes and types of black powder in the days it was used. It is a case of an art being lost for some time, with most common powders available today not performing as well as the older ones, with apparently the only real exception of Swiss. Many arent willing to pay for it, The result is many people make statements about "black powder this" or "black powder that..." without acknowledging theres different makes and qualities of powder, or that most powder made today is any different than in the past.

In terms of black powder performance / differences.

Black powder is fairly unique in terms of pyrotechnics/explosives in that it has huge variations in performance despite having a well known formula.

The reason being primarily differences in charcoal. Potassium Nitrate is Potassium Nitrate, Sulfur is Sulfur...but theres gigantic differences in charcoal. Charcoal is less a chemical and more a 'dish' that has been prepared.

What type of wood is used radically effects how 'hot' a blackpowder load is. In pyrotechnics/fireworks manufacturing, different types of charcoal are used for different types of fireworks blackpowder for this reason. 'Hot' charcoal is made from willow, balsa, grapevine, whereas slower burning charcoal is made from pine and other hardwoods. Further variation is then induced by how long and how the charcoal is cooked, and how finely it is ground.

Theres a brief overview of various woods used, but this segment on willow helps hilite the variations within even a single wood type:

https://pyrodata.com/chemicals/Charcoal



Another pyro tested various charcoals to see how high they could launch a 35g film canister from a PVC tube to simulate a small mortar shell using a 2g lift charge. Tremendous differences in flight time were recorded depending on charcoal type used:

http://www.wichitabuggywhip.com/fire...oal_tests.html



So its entirely possible the Swiss are using better Charcoal wood, and that 'vintage' black powder may have also used different/better charcoals than modern US powder.

[Stephanie B]

re: black powder-- I have a dim memory of reading that the Whitworth sharpshooter rifles used by the <deleted> other side in the Civil War were calibrated to use black powder that was made using charcoal from a specific species of trees in a specific forest in England.

[Caballoflaco]

re: black powder-- I have a dim memory of reading that the Whitworth sharpshooter rifles used by the <deleted> other side in the Civil War were calibrated to use black powder that was made using charcoal from a specific species of trees in a specific forest in England.

A short article on alder buckthorn, also known as dogwood.

http://ramblingsofanaturalist.blogsp...plant.html?m=1

Alder buckthorn grows quite widely in my home area around the village of Sedlescombe in East Sussex, UK, mostly occurring in woodlands. I have come across a few plants, in Brede High Wood for example, that appear to have been coppiced, but I think coppice plantations of this small tree were not established locally in the past. However, as the following paragraphs will indicate, it seems highly likely that the wood was harvested as a valuable item of underwood for converting to gunpowder charcoal, either locally or further afield.

The value of alder buckthorn charcoal for gunpowder dates back many years and it has been described as being of “major military importance in the 15th to 19th centuries.” (Mobile Reference, 2010). In 1785 Major William Congreve (later Sir William) carried out tests on the charcoal from various woods and in 1791 listed alder buckthorn (as black dogwood), alder and white willow as the best types to be used in gunpowder production. Writing in 1831, Elizabeth Kent said that the charcoal made from the wood was “much prized by the manufacturers of gunpowder, who buy up all they can procure of it, and use it only for the very best gunpowder.”

Part of the reason why the economic role of alder buckthorn was obscured is that its vernacular names were confusing. John R. Jackson, curator of the museum at Kew, wrote in 1870 “In most books relating to economic botany, or to the application of woods,Cornus sanguinea, or dogwood, is referred to as yielding the best charcoal for gunpowder. Certain it is that the gunpowder makers all know the wood they use in such large quantities, by the name of dogwood, and it was generally believed that Cornus sanguinea was the plant which furnished them with their supplies.” At that period, samples of ‘dogwood’ used for gunpowder charcoal in many different places were sent to Kew and all turned out to be alder buckthorn. Jackson continued that this was proof that alder buckthorn “is the plant from whence the gunpowder-makers draw their supplies, and that Cornus sanguinea, or true dogwood, is never used, now, nor, indeed is there any proof that it ever has been, for the powder makers maintain that what they now call dogwood is the same wood which has always been used by them.”

Also, if wants to go down the historic BP rabbit hole this video is worth a watch.



ETA: Brett Gibbs who did this video is an Army Ordnance Officer who did graduate level work researching the development of British Black Powder paper cartridges and bullets. He’s one of the worlds SMEs on military rifle use in the 1800’s. Especially the British Empire. and he runs a website selling artisanal BP paper cartridges if you want to load your 1857 Enfield in the proper British fashion.

https://papercartridges.com/#

[gato naranja]

This thread has been around a while, but the black powder notes fired a synapse that has been dormant for a while.

Not only was the black powder "strength," etc, variable, the amount of historical literature and firsthand accounts prove that not only were there arguments about powder brands, granulations, and compositions, there were arguments about everything else, too. Flints (later on, percussion caps). Bullets. Patches. Lubes. Loading techniques. Cleaning techniques. I remember being particularly amused by reading one source praising Eley Brothers' percussion caps to the sky, then getting a copy of John Chapman's book wherein he extolls the French "G.D." caps for target work. Eventually, I concluded that there were so many variables back in the day that something as simple as getting damp from sitting through a passing thundershower on the levee at Prairie Du Chien might render a barrel of the best "English Sporting Powder" less than stellar... and thus great-great-grandpa lost a buck while hunting in the Driftless Area, and from then on he stubbornly swore by one of Hazard's powders.

Rightly or wrongly.

As for the title topic, I can only say that I have run across a few gentlemen in my life who had been around the block, and who would probably have been holy terrors whether they used a club, a sword, a crossbow or a flintlock. Or a phaser. Technology might make them more efficient, but not any more - or less - formidable to an opponent. Even when these men were blood relatives and good - if imperfect - guys, they had a sort of "presence" that set them apart. Anyway, my guess is that by today's standards, they would be considered firearms "duffers" by the shooting sports pros, but damn... I think I'd still put my money on them in their prime.

[feudist]

re: black powder-- I have a dim memory of reading that the Whitworth sharpshooter rifles used by the <deleted> other side in the Civil War were calibrated to use black powder that was made using charcoal from a specific species of trees in a specific forest in England.

Lost Cause?