My First Round Ball?

[Hawkeye35]

Found this stuff this weekend along with a ton of clad and toy cars. The top item I think is some kind of valve or sprayer head tool but I'm not sure. And then left to right I have a cci 9mm cartridge. A fired bullet about 35 caliber and 152 grains. An 1899 O Barber dime. What I hope is my first round ball. It is .53" in diameter and weighs 223 gn or .51 oz. Hoping it's at least CW era but it looks to be in remarkably good shape so I'm gonna need an expert opinion. Lastly, a 1941 wheat penny. Really interested in the round ball though. It was found in the backyard of a house in a neighborhood that's been around since the 1970's near Charleston SC.

 

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[BosnMate]

I can't see the round ball well enough to even make a guess. Does it have a mold seam, or the remains of a casting spru? .53 relates to 32 balls to the pound, and would have been used in a .54 caliber muzzleloading rifle. Muzzleloading rifles use undersized balls that are patched with cloth for ease of loading. .54 caliber was very popular with the mountain men, who boasted that their rifles "threw a half oz of galena plumb center." There was a huge surge in the use of muzzleloading rifles starting in the early 70's, and continues today, so your find could very well be modern. If it is a lead ball, and shows mold marks there is the possibility of it being old, but if there are no mold marks, that means the ball was swaged, and that's modern.

 

[Hawkeye35]

Being familiar with muzzleloaders myself I thought it looked a little too perfect to actually be as old as I was hoping. I've cleaned it up a bit since I took that photo and I also think it's modern. It doesn't have as thick of a layer of patina as it would if it were old. Perhaps whoever lived in that house in the past owned a traditional muzzleloader and was cleaning it on the back patio when they dropped the round ball. It was found right up against the edge of the concrete patio. Still my first round ball though! Any one have any ideas on the Western tool? It has a black paint finish.