"Brown Bess" is a nickname of uncertain origin for the British Army's muzzle-loading smoothbore flintlock Land Pattern Musket and its derivatives.

Most male citizens of the thirteen colonies of British America were required by law to own arms and ammunition for militia duty.

[7] In 1808 during the Napoleonic Wars, the United Kingdom subsidised Sweden (during the period when Finland was under Swedish rule) in various ways as the British government anxiously wanted to keep an ally in the Baltic Sea region.

He writes, "'Bess' was a generic and sometimes derogatory name, a bit like 'Sheila' in modern Australian English", and "brown" simply meant plain or drab.

[10] Early uses of the term include the newspaper, the Connecticut Courant in April 1771, which said: "... but if you are afraid of the sea, take Brown Bess on your shoulder and march."

The 1785 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, a contemporary work that defined vernacular and slang terms, contained this entry: "Brown Bess: A soldier's firelock.

Military and government records of the time do not use this poetical name but refer to firelocks, flintlock, muskets or by the weapon's model designations.

However, in the case of russeting at least, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) and Ferguson note that "browning" was only introduced in the early 19th century, well after the term had come into general use.

So far, the earliest use noted of the term "Brown Bess" was in a 1631 publication, John Done's Polydoron: or A Mescellania of Morall, Philosophicall, and Theological Sentences, page 152: Things profferd and easie to come by, diminish themselves in reputation & price: for how full of pangs and dotage is a wayling lover, for it may be some browne bessie?

As the firearm gained ascendancy on the battlefield, this lack of standardisation led to increasing difficulties in the supply of ammunition and repair materials.

There it served as a reference for arms makers, who could make comparisons and take measurements to ensure that their products matched the standard.

However, Spearman also mentioned that "the service charges given in [the] table, although established by authority, [were] too great, and [could] be reduced by about one-fourth" due to advances in black powder quality.

[15] Analysis of two paper cartridges from the American Revolutionary War found that they contained approximately 115 grains of powder, which was consistent with Spearman's observations that the standard service charge could be reduced by one-fourth.

[20] According to the Russian lieutenant-general Ivan G. Gogel, all the muskets of the European nations were able to penetrate a wooden shield with a thickness of 1 inch (2.5 cm) at a distance of 300 yards.

[21] British soldiers armed with Brown Besses preferred to reduce the standard number of steps for loading a musket.

By the late 1830s and into the early 1840s the weapon was becoming obsolete and its flintlock mechanism was being replaced by the more efficient and reliable percussion cap ignition.