Need These Identified please

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<img src="http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=1063117"/>

I found these on top of a cliff at Cliff Cave Park in St. Louis, Mo.

 

[TNGUNS]

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To be able to get a good ID you need to post with precise measurements. On bullets weight also helps. We have a "what is it section" and some really great folks who love to help us all with ID's. Read the "stickies" at the top. A good set of calipers aren't very expensive and will be a big help to ID many things. Believe it or not even buttons and corroded coins can be determined with measurements. Would gladly help if I could, but just no way to tell. The casings look rimfire but could be .32 or .22 and so on. Best of luck and HH

 

[coinman123]

The casings look post civil war, rimfire casing were first made in the late 1850's (the .22 short round first made in 1857 and the .22 long round first made in the 1880's) but are still made today. These look like .22 or .32 short rimfire rounds, they did make .38 and .41 rounds but those are rarer, I would need measurements to give you a more specific ID. You can tell that a cartridge is rimfire by looking at the bottom, you will see a rectangle imprint from the firing pin on the side. I see a "US" on one of the casings which means it was made by the United States Cartridge Company from 1869 until 1927. What is the letter on the bottom of the other cartridge, if we know that we could give you more info on the cartridges.

The bullet on the left is the oldest of the bullets, probably from the second half of the 1800's, the middle one is the newest, it appears to have a copper jacket, that means that it is probably very recent (within the past 10-20 years). The middle bullet is most likely from the 20th century (probably a 22 or 32 rimfire).

 

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Sorry the pic is upside down. Here's the best measurement I have at this time. The weight read 0.02 oz. I hope this helps. I'm getting mixed results on weather or not this is Civil War era. I truly hope this is my 1st Civil War Relic.

 

[coinman123]

Sorry the pic is upside down. Here's the best measurement I have at this time. The weight read 0.02 oz. I hope this helps. I'm getting mixed results on weather or not this is Civil War era. I truly hope this is my 1st Civil War Relic.

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Thanks for the measurements, I was able to find out that the bullet is a .25 caliber. Unfortunately the first .25 caliber gun/bullet was not designed until 1905 making it not from the Civil War era. Even though they still make .25 caliber bullets, this bullet appears to be fairly old. It is not copper jacketed, there is some nice old patina, plus it has rings, the new .25 caliber bullets have vertical lines about 1.5 mm long instead of rings. I edited you photo to make it easier to see the measurements. I think you wrote the weight wrong because .02 oz would be very tiny, so I figured that it was .2 oz, which makes it 87.5 grain, being .25 caliber. Than I wanted to check with the width, which is 1/4 in, being 6.35 cm, also being 63.5 mm, it ended up being exactly 0.25 calibers, consistent with the weight. Thanks for letting me know about the measurements, without it I would have been lost.

One more thing, now with the measurements of the bullet I can tell you that the brass cartridges are .22 calibers because of the relationship between the size of the bullet and the casings in the first photo, and with the only possible size smaller than the bullet being .22, I'm sure that's what it is. Also the bullet on the left is the same size as the .22 casings it is also a .22 bullet, because most .22 bullets from the 1800's have rings to stabilize the bullet inside of the barrel so it will come out more accurately, and this one doesn't, meaning that there was mostly likely newer technology in the barrel to stabilize the bullet.




Here are some civil war bullets (found on a Civil War battlefield in Maryland), and some 1700's-1820's musketballs (the round balls), musketballs were the only bullets used in the revolutionary war, but these musketballs were not found in an area that had any Revolutionary War activity, but were likely used for hunting in roughly the same time period (Some pre-Revolutionary War, some post-Revolutionary war) The Civil War bullets are miniballs, and carbine bullets, and have the right measurements, and characteristics for those bullets, the Civil War bullet photographed by itself is the most common kind of Civil War bullet, the three ring Mini-Ball.



Coinman123,

 

[treblehunter]

Looks like modern bullets to me, lead bullets and balls are hard to ID because I have hunted with both patch and ball and buffalo bullets
Here is a link to just one small tip of what is available.
Sabots and Reloading Bullets - Muzzleloading Ammo : Cabela's