During the 1870s and 1880s, a new generation of small arms ammunitions flooded the planet. Shot from a wide array of breechloading weapons, including rifles, pistols and repeat-action machine-guns, these metal-encased cartridges were sold in enormous quantities in the global market place by arms traders and manufacturers. Their ready accessibility made the power of death available to all. Despite appearing in different calibres and sizes, the new ammunitions all had the same basic design, including an exposed soft lead nose, which made these bullets extra destructive and lethal. As a result, they were often described as ‘man-stoppers’. This chapter explains how the rapid influx of ‘man-stopping’ ammunitions affected the life-and-death stakes of gun violence and altered how contemporaries assessed the norms at play. It shows how these new ammunitions were both celebrated and condemned for their power to wound and kill and how this wounding power was both hidden and made visible when it suited.