Sport: Flintlocks at the Fort

The marksmen gathered at Fort Ticonderoga, N.Y. were a strange-looking group, dressed in checked shirts and funny hats. One man wore a skunk pelt on his head, another sported a black sombrero with a feather stuck in the band. The firearms were out of the ordinary too: long-barreled pistols, archaic-looking rifles decorated with carvings, etched designs and inlays. They were all old-style muzzle-loaders—flintlocks or caplocks*—and the oddly hatted people were devoted muzzle-loader fans.

Muzzle-loader fans have to be devoted. Their guns are handmade (many fans make their own), and firing them takes effort. To load a flintlock rifle, the marksman 1) measures out a charge of powder, 2) pours it down the barrel, 3) moistens a cloth patch with saliva, 4) puts a lead ball on the patch, 5) sets patch and ball in the muzzle, 6) taps the ball with a little mallet or some other appropriate tool, 7) trims away the excess cloth, 8) shoves the ball down the barrel with a short ramrod called a bullet starter, 9) works the ball home with a long ramrod, 10) deposits a priming charge in the pan. He uses black powder instead of smokeless (which is too powerful), so each shot envelops him in a dense cloud. After a five-shot event, he is powder-blackened, tearful and half-deafened.

In spite of all the trouble, the National Muzzle Loading Association has some 6,000 members. Their principal shoot is held in late summer at Friendship, Ind., but the most devoted also get together for a yearly shoot at Fort Ticonderoga. This year 85 true believers made the trip, spent a smoky weekend happily blazing away at National Rifle Association small-bore targets. “They’re all crazy,” commented a Ticonderoga resident (no muzzle-loader fan), “but they have a lot of fun.”

* The flint attached to the hammer of the flintlock (the standard Revolutionary War weapon) strikes a fixed steel, sparking the priming powder in the open “pan” just below. The hammer of the caplock (patented early in the 19th century) explodes a small percussion cap.