Soldiers Heart: Being the Story of the Enlistment and Due Service of the Boy Charley Goddard in the First Minnesota Volunteers

In his descriptions of the battles in which Charley is involved, Paulsen provides historical facts concerning warfare in the 1860s and shows how battle practices were determined largely by the available weapons of the era like the smoothbore musket. The muskets used in the Civil War had a range of about 400 yards, but as Charley notes in the novel, they hardly shot accurately even at a range of 50 yards. This meant that soldiers had to wait until the enemy was close before starting to shoot, a strategy that Charley experiences in each battle. Furthermore, Paulsen describes Charley’s unit forming a line of battle with two rows, or ranks, of soldiers. The soldiers in front would shoot from a kneeling position while those in the back would shoot standing. They waited for the command from their officer and shot a volley, each man firing simultaneously. Since the muskets were not particularly accurate, this tactic of firing together was a way to concentrate the maximum amount of bullets at the enemy so that at least some would hit.

Paulsen also shows that Charley fought many battles in an open meadow. The men did not shoot from protected or spread out positions. At first, this practice seems ill-advised, as the soldiers were particularly vulnerable as a compact group standing in a field. However, factors such as the heavy smoke caused by the musket gunpowder and the lack of modern communication necessitated such tactics. Noise from gunfire was deafening, and made it difficult for a commander to be heard giving orders, while the smoke reduced visibility. Therefore, keeping the men together as a group allowed them to hear commands. Although these battle tactics seem to lack strategy and cause high casualty rates, they reflect the limits of technology and weaponry that existed in the 1860s.