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Cannon shot and musket balls from the Battle of Waterloo

For almost four hundred years weapons fired round projectiles made from lead or stone. There are three types of shot shown here – the larger ones are grapeshot and canister shot, while the smaller are musket balls.

The grapeshot and canister shot were collected by Sir Charles Bell, who volunteered to treat the wounded returning from the battle. Both kinds of ammunition would have been fired from a cannon and were found on the battlefield at Waterloo. Grapeshot was made up of lead balls like these joined together by rope or cloth. Canister shot consisted of many balls in a tin that exploded on firing, like a large shotgun cartridge.

The musket balls were collected by Professor John Thomson who was present in Brussels after the Battle of Waterloo and was the first Professor of Surgery at the College in 1804. You can see how some of the balls have become misshapen after hitting their target. Muskets were inaccurate at anything but fairly short distances.