Berdan's Sharpshooters-- Part 6: Their Weapon of Choice, the M-1859 Sharps Rifle

From the July 2019 America's Civil War magazine.

Three features made the M-1859 Sharps such a fine weapon:  loading design, action and ammunition.

It was the brainchild of Connecticut gunsmith Christian Sharps as an update to his 1848 concept for a percussion lock breechloader.  This was at the time when most firearms loaded through the muzzle.  A gun that could be loaded from the breech offered many advantages, especially to a sharpshooter.

Standing a rifle on its butt and fumbling with powder, ball and ramrod would give away a sharpshooter's position.  But a breechloader enabled him to reload effortlessly, no matter what position he was in.  They could load the single shot and shoot downrange up to ten well-aimed rounds a minute, nearly triple of what a muzzle loader could do.

The design of the rifle caused rounds to leave the barrel at 1,200 feet per second, compared to a muzzle loaders 900 feet.  This gave it a flatter long-range trajectory.

--Guns, Guns.  --Old SeceshBang