Ferguson Breechloading Rifle, Sporting or Officer's Model Ferguson Rifle

Major Patrick Ferguson, the British commander of the loyalists at the battle of Kings Mountain, had improved and patented the design of a breechloading rifle in 1776. Inventors had designed other breechloaders previously, but the Ferguson rifle could shoot further, faster, and longer than those weapons that preceded it.

The Ferguson rifle could be loaded and fired six times a minute, double the firepower of the standard British Brown Bess musket. The rifle could also hit its target at up to 200 yards, more than double the range of the standard musket. There may have been a few Ferguson rifles at the battle of Kings Mountain. A patriot named David Witherspoon recalled that he saw one of Ferguson's red-coated Royal Provincials "prostrate on the ground, loading and firing in rapid succession." This would have been difficult, if not impossible, to do with a muzzleloading musket or rifle. However, the patriots did not record any breechloading rifles among the weapons that they captured.