Regarding Maj George Hanger and the Brown Bess
Having come into this conversation late I thought I would add some information.
How effective were muskets? The fact is, they were very effective. They were both powerful and surprisingly accurate within the limits of their range.
The 'Brown Bess' which first appeared in English arsenals in 1722 is considered by many as the quintessential musket of the 18th century. Its .75 caliber bore fired a .71 caliber ball. At thirty yards the shot could penetrate 3/8” of iron or 5” of oak. The maximum range of the Bess was around 250 yards. The effective range of the Bess (fired individually) was 100 to 150 yards. The weapon's optimum range is 75 to 100 yards.
Major George Hanger, who fought in the American Revolutionary War wrote that:
"A soldier’s musket if not exceedingly ill-bored (as many are), will strike the figure of a man at 80 yards, perhaps even at 100; but a soldier must be very unfortunate indeed who shall be wounded by a common musket at 150 yards, providing his antagonist aims at him; and as for firing at a man at 200 yards with a common musket, you might just as well fire at the moon and have the same hope of hitting your object. I do maintain and will prove, whenever called on, that no man was ever killed at 200 yards by a common soldier’s musket by the person who aimed at him."
Field tests of smoothbore muskets in the late 18th and early 19th centuries reported widely variable expectations of accuracy and speed of fire. Estimations of rate of fire ranged from "one shot every fifteen seconds" (4 shots per minute), to "two to two and a half shots per minute" (one shot every 24 seconds). This was with the standard military loading procedure from prepared paper cartridges containing ball and gun powder in an elongated envelope:
1. Tear cartridge with teeth and prime the pan directly from the cartridge;
2. Stand the musket and pour the bulk of the powder down the barrel;
3. Reverse the cartridge and use the ramrod to seat the ball and paper envelop onto the powder charge
Standard European targets included strips of cloth 50 yards long to represent an opposing line of infantry, with the target height being six feet for infantry and eight feet, three inches for cavalry. Estimations of hit probability at 100 yards ranged from just over 50 to 75 percent, and over 80 percent for the shorter and taller targets. No allowances were made for overly tall targets, gaps in an opposing line or the realities of the battlefield. Modern testers shooting from rigid rests, using optimum loads and fast priming powder, report groups of circa five inches at 50 yards (Cumpston 2008).