The inventor of this rifle was a British Colonel named Patrick Ferguson. He raised an army of loyalists and provincials and went on a violent rampage throughout Western North and South Carolina.
American troops from VA, TN, SC, and NC surrounded his army on Kings Mountain in South Carolina. He was killed and his entire command wiped out.
Had he lived and allowed to produce this invention, the war might have gone another way.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferguson_rifle