Musket and Bayonet
date: label: date made
content: 1762
label: Associated Date
content: 1762
name: label: maker
content: Jordan, Edward
notes: label: Description
content: Physical Description
label: Description
content: British Short Land Pattern musket with socket bayonet.
label: Description
content: General History
label: Description
content: The British Short Land Pattern Musket was the standard arm of the British infantry soldier during the American Revolution. The muzzle-loading musket was slow to load, inaccurate, and often unreliable. It fired round lead balls, some the diameter of a nickel. The smooth interior of the barrel made it an inaccurate gun, so soldiers were massed tightly together, firing a volley of lead balls at the enemy. For charges and fighting at close quarters, soldiers fixed deadly, spear-like bayonets to the ends of their muskets. The musket was known as a “Brown Bess,” and there is much conjecture as to how she came by her nickname. The walnut stock may be an explanation for the brown. Another explanation is the browning of the barrel, a process used to prevent corrosion which also gave it a rich brown color. The origins of “Bess” are more varied. Some believe it was a reference to Queen Elizabeth I, though she had been dead more than 100 years before the musket was standard issue. Some believe it is an allusion to a notorious highwayman whose horse was named “Black Bess.” It may have been the mispronunciation of two foreign words. The Dutch word for gun barrel is “buss” while the German for gun is “Buchse.” It could be a simple case of poetic alliteration. In the 1785 Dictionary of Vulgar Tongue--a vernacular dictionary of the time--the following entry appears: “Brown Bess, a soldier’s firelock”.
place: label: place made
content: United Kingdom: England
label: Associated Place
content: United Kingdom: Grand Bretagne
label: used
content: United States
topic: label: Subject
content: Firearms
label: related event
content: Revolution and the New Nation
setName: label: See more items in
content: Military and Society: Armed Forces History, Military
label: See more items in
content: Military
label: Exhibition
content: Price of Freedom
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Charles Bremner Hogg Jackson
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1980.0399.0881
label: accession number
content: 1980.0399
label: catalog number
content: 1980.0399.0881
objectType: label: Object Name
content: musket
label: Other Terms
content: musket; Firearms; Flintlock; .78 In; Smooth Bore; Muzzle Load; Sa
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 8 in x 62 1/4 in x 3 3/4 in; 20.32 cm x 158.115 cm x 9.525 cm