Why did the most famous of (fictional) musketeers so rarely show up with muskets?\u00a0 Some have suggested they might have been \u201cafraid\u201d of muskets, but \u201cfear\u201d is not the answer.\u00a0 Let\u2019s look at the military history.<\/p>\n
In the first half of the 1600s (when the Three Musketeers are depicted, when Cardinal Richelieu was destroying things), the \u201cmusket\u201d was a matchlock musket.\u00a0 The switch to flintlock muskets came at the end of that century.\u00a0 A musketeer in line of battle was protected by 7-8 pole-arm soldiers, usually with pikes.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because the firing rate of matchlocks was SLOW.\u00a0 1-2 shots every two minutes.\u00a0 You can find videos of loading a matchlock online; it was a complicated process, starting with the \u201cmatch\u201d\u2014a length of fairly thin rope treated to burn slowly at a given rate.\u00a0 A length of match would get its light from an officer\u2019s flame-source (lantern) and from then on be blown on to keep the burning ember alight.<\/p>\n
The match would then light the black powder, first in the pan, and then in the barrel, to propel the ball (solid lead) down the smooth barrel. \u00a0Balls were not perfect spheres, and between the powder tamped down the barrel and the projectile ball there\u2019d be a patch of some sort, to clean the inside of the barrel from unburned black powder and compress the powder behind the ball.\u00a0 The tool for pushing patch and then ball down the barrel was called a scouring stick, not a ramrod. Caliber varied but was usually large\u2026half an inch diameter or more.\u00a0 Black powder was used in two places..in the \u201cpan\u201d and down the barrel.\u00a0 When the measured amount of powder had been loaded in the pan (and the pan cover closed) and down the barrel, followed by the patch and then the ball, the match would be attached to the \u201cserpentine\u201d jaws.\u00a0 This was an s-curve of metal with gripping jaws at the top end, hinged to swing down and apply the hot match to the powder in the firing pan.\u00a0 Now the musketeer was ready to open the firing pan lid, lift the weapon, aim, and fire, by lowering the serpentine with its hot match ember to the pan.\u00a0 BOOM.<\/p>\n
Even with well-drilled troops, the loading process, which required keeping the burning match safely away from the powder even as the powder was poured into the pan, the pan lid closed, the musket set vertically, muzzle up, on the ground, more powder poured down the barrel, the patch shoved down the barrel with the scouring stick, the ball shoved down the barrel with the scouring stick, the muzzle picked up, the match fitted to the serpentine, the pan lid opened, and then the weapon lifted to firing position and aimed….that loading process was nowhere near instantaneous.\u00a0 It might take a full minute, especially in field conditions, with cannons roaring, cavalry charging, pikemen bellowing, pikes rattling against each other. Musketry was effective if the ball actually hit an enemy but slow, much slower than later weapons. Lots of ways to make mistakes.<\/p>\n
Not a process you could do on horseback (you could pre-load and fire a pistol much faster), or if suddenly accosted by the Cardinal\u2019s Guard.\u00a0 The matchlock musket was a short-medium range weapon, very effective against plate armor, useless in melee combat, almost useless at longer than short-medium range. The smooth bore and the irregular shape of the balls resulted in lousy accuracy at anything farther away than maybe half a football field length.\u00a0 Musketeers were useful in a planned battle, or guarding a fixed position (with additional foot soldiers.\u00a0 But such battles were less common than the need for light-cavalry duties such as scouting, escorting, communication (carrying messages), and suchlike.\u00a0 In those duties the musket was useless, and the right weapon was some form of sword, backed up by one or two pistols.\u00a0 Contact with the enemy would either be distant (and fast\u2014horses galloping) or very close melee style either mounted or afoot.<\/p>\n
For readers, galloping horses and swordplay are far more interesting to read than the slow repeat of the loading process of a 17th<\/sup> century matchlock.\u00a0 So the King\u2019s Musketeers are a household light cavalry who *can* act in the line of battle with their matchlock muskets, but are more economically used for spying, scouting, escorting important persons traveling incognito, and most commonly fighting in alleys, streets, courtyards, palaces, highways, etc. in circumstances where the musket of their period is useless.<\/p>\n All through the 17th<\/sup> century, weapons were being developed and trialed in the constant wars, nation by nation, across Europe.\u00a0 By the end of the century, the flintlock musket was taking over from the matchlock and wheel lock, and through the 18th<\/sup> century muskets began to yield to rifles, first as specialist weapons and finally as the standard, as the technology for producing rifled barrels advanced.\u00a0 Rate of fire improved, accuracy of fire improved, and tactical changes came with the changes in firearms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Why did the most famous of (fictional) musketeers so rarely show up with muskets?\u00a0 Some have suggested they might have been \u201cafraid\u201d of muskets, but \u201cfear\u201d is not the answer.\u00a0 Let\u2019s look at the military history. In the first half of the 1600s (when the Three Musketeers are depicted, when Cardinal Richelieu was destroying things), Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[64,63],"class_list":["post-1577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-history","tag-weapons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1577"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1577"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1577\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1578,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1577\/revisions\/1578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}