Rifles and Riflemen at the Battle of Kings Mountain

United States. National Park ServiceProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.0

Word count: 37K words
Chapters: 4

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Rifles and Riflemen at the Battle of Kings MountainAuthor: United States. National Park Service,Language: English, Class: E151: History: America: United States, Release Date: May 31, 2018

Editor's review

This National Park Service title focuses on the rifles and riflemen of the Battle of Kings Mountain, an important engagement in the southern theater of the American Revolutionary War. It examines weapon performance, militia tactics, and participants' experience in an interpretive public-history format rather than a work of advanced military theory. Its strengths are the documentary grounding and on-site perspective that an institutional author brings, together with concise narrative and discussion of the fighting and terrain. It serves well as an introduction to eighteenth-century North American militia warfare. Readers can set weapon details against the course of the battle and note how the author links technical conditions to battlefield decisions. It also offers useful background for visitors to the historic site. The book is short; it is best read alongside maps and a timeline.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Beginning readers interested in American Revolutionary War history
Military enthusiasts curious about eighteenth-century militia weapons and tactics
Prospective visitors to the Kings Mountain battlefield
Schoolteachers seeking a public-history text to support instruction

Not a good fit for

Researchers seeking original scholarship or archival-level detail
Readers expecting a full narrative history of the American Revolution
Readers of pure literature with no interest in military technology or battle accounts

Reading tips

Look up the date, location, and opposing forces of Kings Mountain before turning to weapon and tactical details.
Read with a map or battlefield diagram and relate terrain to troop movements.
Consider rifle performance in light of the actual conditions militia faced rather than memorizing specifications in isolation.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this an academic monograph or a public-facing book?

Produced by the National Park Service, it is a public-oriented interpretive work that surveys the battle's background, weapons, and participants' experience rather than presenting new archival scholarship. It suits introductory and pre-visit reading; deeper study requires specialist military histories.

Can I follow it without knowing the American Revolution?

Yes, though it helps to learn basic background first: Kings Mountain's date and location and its place in the southern campaign. Weapons and fighting are explained concisely; reading with maps makes the spatial picture clearer, otherwise details may seem scattered.

Are the rifles discussed the same as firearms today?

No. The book covers flintlock-type arms used by eighteenth-century militia, whose loading, rate of fire, and accuracy were limited by period manufacturing. Understand them within a pre-industrial combat setting rather than by direct analogy with modern firearms, which would misjudge their battlefield role.

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About the author

United States. National Park Service Author

The United States National Park Service is a federal agency responsible for the protection, interpretation, and public education of national parks, national monuments, and other natural and historical heritage sites. The library holds 18 of its works, covering both natural landscapes and historical events: guidebooks to national parks and monuments such as Yosemite, Grand Teton, Great Smoky Mountains, and Devils Tower, as well as historical studies on Fort Sumter, the Battle of Kings Mountain, John Brown's raid, and the Charlestown Navy Yard. Its writing is generally explanatory and aimed at the general public, distinguished by on-site knowledge, careful use of historical sources, and accessible interpretation, serving both as guidance and as popular history. Because public information is limited, the agency's institutional history and individual authorship cannot be described in detail.