I’m pretty sure this was a feature film. Whatever it is, I’m also fairly certain that it was produced in the last 5 - 6 years.
Someone in the main story, presumably in the 21st century, is telling about something that happened during the American Civil War. Flashback to a soldier standing guard, in the inevitable pouring rain; some guy rolls up on him. Probably the storyteller, if he’s a time traveler or very long-lived/immortal. If not, perhaps his great-whatever antecedent, or just someone he heard of. Anyway, the scene keeps cutting between Civil War and present-day. The stranger prompts the sentry to check something on his rifle, maybe the manufacturer’s name, which requires him to point the barrel upwards, so rain can fall into it. Some more cutting between timelines, then the stranger snarls, “You didn’t keep your powder dry!” and either shoots or overpowers the sentry, who of course can’t shoot back.
But that’s all I’ve got! I don’t remember the actors, and I don’t remember the purpose of this: for spying? To steal gold or something else valuable? Or just to cause mayhem? DH says he vaguely remembers it too, but can’t connect it with anything, except that he can’t rule out it being something from the MCU. I’m also fairly certain that whatever it is is not 100% real world: either superpowers, time travel, immortality or something else paranormal is involved. Anyone?
Sounds like it may have been a Twilight Zone episode? Needs to be re titled to The War Between The States though, just for accuracy.
Sorry, I should have come back – someone already clued me in. It was The Current War!
As someone who owns a Model 1853 Enfield Musket (the second most widely used weapon in the Civil War), I can tell you that pointing the barrel up in the rain probably won’t prevent the musket from firing.
A Civil War era musket uses a Minie ball, which despite the name is bullet-shaped and not ball shaped. The way the Minie ball works is that it is hollow on the back end, which forms kind of a “skirt”. There are grooves around the “skirt” which are filled with grease. You put the powder into the musket, shove the pre-greased Minie ball into the barrel, and ram it down with the ramrod. The pre-greased Minie ball along with a proper measure of powder are rolled up into a paper “cartridge” which is stored in the soldier’s cartridge box which is worn like a satchel.
The point of the grease isn’t to keep water out, it’s to keep the expanding gases from the fired gunpowder from blowing by the Minie ball when fired. By making a tight seal with the grease, all of the energy goes into expanding the skirt so that it grips the rifling, and pushing the Minie ball out of the barrel.
But that grease seal will also prevent water from getting by the Minie ball and soaking into the powder.
Civil War muskets also used a percussion cap made out of mercury fulminate for the firing mechanism. These will fire even in the rain.
Revolutionary War era flintlocks are much more finicky in the rain. Soldiers in that era used to have leather covers to put over the flintlock mechanism to keep it dry in the rain. Flintlocks also used round balls and did not have a grease seal around them. Paper wadding would keep most of the rain away from the powder in a flintlock, but it wouldn’t make a water-tight seal like the grease in a Minie ball would.
Rain was actually one of the main reasons Alexander Forsythe invented the percussion cap. The other main reason was to significantly reduce the delay from when the flint struck the powder in the pan until the main charge in the barrel went off. The delay in a flintlock is just long enough to startle a bird and have it move out of the way before the main powder charge goes off. Between rain and the delay, Forsythe was tired of going home hungry when hunting.
Soldiers in both eras also had wooden plugs called tampions that they could stick into the end of the barrel to keep rain and mud out of their musket.