✅ SOLVED Musket ball?

[Hosensack]

Never found one, and didn't think they would corrode like this but it's out of a 1700's homesite, weighs exactly 1 ounce and is 5/8" diameter.

 

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[Hosensack]

My other thought was the ball inside a cow/carriage bell. I've seen them a little rough but never so perfectly round.

 

[tennessee digger]

Is it lead? If so, it may have been chewed on by an animal. Tennessee digger

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

If it is made of lead or a similar "white metal," it's precisely-measured weight (1.00-ounce) indicates it is most probably a .69-caliber muketball.

Remember, with firearms projectiles, caliber does not mean the same thing as the projectile's actual diameter. For example, a .69-caliber musketball's actual diameter was between .65 and .67-inch, depending on the era of manufacture. (Colonial era ones were .65-inch and civil war era ones were .66-to.67-inch.)

Yours does look like it was chewed by an animal. I've been told that happens because deer and wild hogs mistake the musketball for an acorn.

 

[Hosensack]

Thanks guys. A little morbid to think an deer was chewing on something that might have taken down his fellow herd mate.

 

[tigerbeetle]

These chewed lead balls are kinda common. In my youngest days of detecting, I used to be convinced they were bitten by a wounded solider, as surgery was being done on a wound -- without anesthesia. That theory might work around a battlefield but not in the outback areas where I've most often found them.

 

[SOSDIVING]

Congrats on the chewed musketball. I have one in my collection from a 1700's site and it weighs almost 1oz also, representing .69 caliber. After washing off, it was evident that there was human molar and incisors impressions in the musketball. I had a local dentist inspect mine and also provided some of the past research for chewed musketballs on hospital and battle sites during the American Revolution. I have seen some ideas of animals chewing musketballs, but, deer and wild hogs have very sensitive noses, and I cannot imagine a deer or boar chewing on one. You would think a lead musketball would be that last thing an animal would chew on. Just a thought. It is amazing some of the chewed musketballs that have been documented online, from the Revolutionary War and into the Civil War times too. Thanks for sharing!

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

They are animal-chewed bullets and musketballs. Animals chew them because lead tastes sweet, not because of scent. (The ancient Romans are notorious for using lead to sweeten wine -- you can look that up.) The subject of these so-called "pain bullets" (or, "hospital bullets") has been medically and historically researched, and debunked as myth.

1- The human jaw does not possess enough "bite-strength/bite-force" to mangle a large-caliber bullet like we see in Hosensack's photo. Do a google-search for "bite strength" or "bite force" comparisons of animals and humans.
Also, human teeth break if you use enough force to mangle a large-caliber bullet. Ask your dentist about broken teeth from biting down too hard on a solid object.

2- Even more importantly, we have not seen anybody report finding even a SINGLE historical documentation of soldiers being given a bullet to bite on during surgery. No report of such a procedure has turned up in historical Medical Literature. However, doctors WILL tell you that the last thing you want to do is put a small TOXIC swallow-able object in a patient's mouth during agonizing surgery.

3- We have not seen even a SINGLE report of the use of a so-called "pain bullet" in historical Military reports (such as the 128-volumes "War Of the Rebellion: Official Records Of The Union And Confederate Armies"). We relic-diggers have found many thousands of chewed bullets. If those thousands are truly "pain bullets," why does there not seem to be even a SINGLE report of their use in actual Military documents?

4- How do you explain the large numbers of so-called "pain bullets" turning up in farmers' hog-lots... and (especially) turning up in areas of the country where there never has been any military combat surgery?

Also, please read the article at the link below, written by a well-credential civil war Military Medical researcher:
http://www.ebay.com/gds/HOSPITAL-or-PAIN-BULLETS-/10000000004424188/g.html