One of the nice aspects of collecting American Civil War artifacts is the wide variety of items that can be added to a collection. To name a few categories, this includes weapons, uniforms, hats, flags and projectiles. While the term projectile can incorporate artillery balls and shells, the beginning collector, and many seasoned collectors for that matter, often concentrate on the bullets and cartridges used during the war.
There are a couple of reasons for this. First, price and second the seemingly endless number of different bullets and cartridges employed. W. Reid McKee and M.E. "Mac" Mason, Jr. were two devoted bullet collectors and researchers who developed what is considered by many collectors to be the definitive guide to civil war bullet collecting:"Civil War Projectiles, Small Arms and Field Artillery." Before their deaths in the early 1990s, McKee and Mason, or M & M as they are often referred to, cataloged more than 1,000 different bullets, bullet variations and cartridges. Their guide assists most collectors, and the "M & M number" is frequently used to identify bullets and cartridges being sold or added to collections.
So, where does a new collector start? Most begin with bullets, as these can be obtained for very reasonable prices, usually just a few dollars for the more common types. Naturally, there are going to be bullets used by the Union Army and bullets used by the Confederate Army, and that is one way to get a collection started. Another avenue is to collect different variations for specific weapons, such as the Sharps carbine, Springfield rifle or Enfield smooth-bore muskets. It is possible to add more than 40 varieties of Sharps carbine bullets and more than 50 varieties of Enfield muskets alone, and that process can take years to find them all. Hence, collecting even very selective types of bullets can be a long range project.
Then there are a whole bunch of specialized specimens to add to a collection. Some of these include the Gardiner explosive bullet, the three-piece Shaler bullet, the Williams cleaner bullet, the Volcanic "Rocket Ball," the Whitworth sharpshooter rounds, the Sugar Loaf Pickets, and the list goes on and on. This aspect of bullet collecting can be very fascinating for those who like to collect a wide variety of different artifacts.
Cartridges are just as varied as individual bullets, and while usually a little more expensive, are equally as much fun to collect. First off, for every bullet just mentioned, there was a matching cartridge that held that bullet. Then, there are some additional cartridges aside from the individual bullets.
When collecting cartridges, there are two ways to go: excavated and non-excavated. Actually, many collectors add relics of both types to their collections. At the risk of stating the obvious, the difference is cartridges recovered from the earth, usually at campsites because the battlefields are normally off limits to hunters, and cartridges that have come from armories or packages of unopened ammunition. Generally speaking, the non-excavated artifacts are more valuable, but in some cases, such as civil war Henry Repeating Rifle rounds, it is next to impossible to find anything but excavated cartridges.
As stated before, many collector like to have one of each type in their collection. With cartridges such as the Spencer or Burnside carbines the two types complement each other in a display case.
Another area of cartridge collecting involves a large number of "paper" cartridges issued during the war. These are actually some of the more common cartridges a collector can obtain, as metal cartridges were just coming into their own when the American Civil War broke out. The most common cartridge issued on both sides of the battlefield consisted of a lead Minie ball bullet and a load of back powder wrapped in what closely resembled today's brown wrapping paper. A soldier would normally tear the back of the paper wrapping off with their teeth while holding the gun in their other hand, pour the powder down the barrel, drop the bullet in and ram the round tight into the barrel. The addition of a primer cap made the weapon ready to fire.
Paper cartridges were made for both long arms and hand guns and can be obtained from many civil war artifact dealers and other locations on the internet. In addition to the standard issue rounds, some to look for are the Williams cleaner bullets that have blue or yellow paper, .36 and .44 caliber pistol cartridges and rounds designed for many of the carbines used during the war.
For anyone interested in collecting the many different projectiles used during the American Civil War, this hopefully provides at least a few starting points for your collection. I seriously doubt anyone could obtain a complete collection of every bullet and cartridge employed during the war, but there's certainly no harm in trying.