Word: musketeers
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...gunfighter" was largely created through the mechanical ingenuity of one man: Samuel Colt. By 1861, there were nine main varieties of Colt revolvers (mostly known as "Peacemakers" or "hog-legs") in use on the frontier. They constituted the most dramatic revolution in sheer firepower since the invention of the musket. Colt revolvers were fast and reliable. In superior hands they could regularly hit a five-inch circle at 50 yards. At 100 yards, the Peacemaker could drive a bullet more than three inches into a pine plank. With such a weapon a skilled "shootist" became the most deadly single engine...
Once, successful Civil War memento collectors needed only a vague knowledge of where skirmishes had been fought and a sharp eye for rusty buckles, buttons and musket balls that lay for the taking in the battlefield grass. No more. Since the centennial battlere-enactment craze in the early '60s, the search for souvenirs has come to re quire 1) the battlefield instincts of a field commander, 2) a shovel, 3) a strong back, 4) a talent for telling lies with a straight face, 5) an ability to fend off enraged farmers, 6) a snakebite kit and, most important...
...trooper reined his mount in horrified astonishment. Spread out below him were the Zulu impi, or horde: 20,000 warriors crouched silent as death, carpeting the floor of the valley for more than a mile. The South African sun danced on long hide shields, glinted off a few musket barrels and a forest of assegais, the double-edged spears that sliced a man's belly to let his evil spirit...
...Petersburg to give diplomas to the eleven men and eight women of VISTA'S graduating class, explained the idea behind the organization. Said she: "America is many things. But above all, more than any nation in the history of man, ever since the first frontiersman picked up his musket to help protect a neighbor, we have been a nation of volunteers. We have been a land in which the individual says, 'My neighbor needs me. I will do something.' " After the ceremony, Lady Bird toured the nearby Negro communities of Ridgecrest and Old Baskins's Crossing...
Cardinal Cushing, presiding once more, seemed almost to hurry through the rote and ritual. Near the end, he blurted the words "this wonderful man, Jack Kennedy," into the midst of the stream of ancient Catholic prayers. A 21-gun salute boomed in the distance. Up the hill, three musket volleys cracked. A bugler began to play a perfect taps, then faltered twice...