Load in nine times

Yesterday I spent the entire day learning how to load, drill, fire, and clean an 1861 U.S. Springfield rifle. The morning was spent learning the basics of civil war troop organization and order of battle so we didn't embrass ourselves when talking with visitors to the park. Next the three of us in the class learned all the parts of the rifle and drilled with them over and over and over until we could repeat the firing procedure by memory. We then got into wool uniforms and stepped out into the 93 degree heat. At first the wool held in the cool of the air conditioned building that we'd been in but that wore off rather quickly. Our instructor (Randy) had us form a rank and march doing various changes in direction for about a mile. In addition to our uniforms we wore cartrige pouches, haversacks, cap pouches, bayonetts, and canteens. By the time we stopped to learn how to actually fire the guns we were all dripping sweat and our right arms were aching from holding a rifle at the slightly awkward position of 'shoulder arms'.

We'd already learned the loading process so we were glad to be able to go throught those motions without much delay this time with life ammunition. The loading process for a Civil War soldier is called 'Load in Nine Times' and that is the order a soldier would hear if he were being drilled. I won't bore you with the whole process, but it does have nine steps and the last two are 'Ready!' and 'Aim!' followed by a seperate order to 'Fire!'.

Any of you who've fired weapons before will know that I'm no expert on the subject, but I will give a few thoughts on the things I found remarkable. First, I understand now why the millitary emphasizes drill so much. Actions become automatic and therefore easier to do. One member of our group, who began the day unsure about firing a weapon, ended it by throughly enjoying the feeling. Second, blackpowder really gets your hands dirty. Third, there was almost no kick. I was expecting to really need to plant my feet when firing but I hardly needed to. Lastly, the sound was perhaps the most impressive thing. It hardly needs to be said that this was nothing compared to the cannon, but the report from the rifle was very loud and much deeper than modern guns I think. It could have easily been heard miles away. For people elsewhere in the park the sound of three guns firing in rapid succession must have sounded like the opening of a battle.

As quick as I like to think we were, we were actually pretty slow. Some soldiers during the Civil War could fire three shots every minute, and that's impressive.  I'm not sure how they did it.

Below is a picture of me in full uniform about to fire. I'm hoping I can use the uniform and rifle to do demonstrations for the kids later in the summer.