The Battle of Preston
The Battle of Preston (17–19 August 1648), fought largely at Walton-le-Dale near Preston in Lancashire, resulted in a victory for the New Model Army under the command of Oliver Cromwell over the Royalists and Scots commanded by the Duke of Hamilton. The Parliamentarian victory presaged the end of the Second English Civil War.
Musket
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating heavy armor. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket went out of use as heavy armor declined, but the term musket continued as the name given for any hand held long gun until the mid-19th century. This style of musket was retired in the 19th century when rifled muskets (simply called rifles in modern terminology) became common as a result of cartridged breech-loading firearms introduced by Casimir Lefaucheux in 1835, the invention of the Minié ball by Claude-Étienne Minié in 1849, and the first reliable repeating rifle produced by Volcanic Repeating Arms in 1854. By the time that repeating rifles became common, they were known as simply “rifles”, ending the era of the musket.
Description
4 English civil war lead musket balls. Found along with other civil war artefacts a couple of miles from Walton-Le-Dale, by the river Ribble.
The battle of Preston was fought at this location on the 17th-19th August 1648.
Date: 17th Century
Provenance: Acquired in 2021 from a metal Detectorists private collection – Bought in 2021 at auction from Britannia Antiquities – Now in the authors private collection
Battle of Preston Musket Balls 
Battle of Preston Musket Balls 
Battle of Preston Musket Balls