unreal movies

After the ball game last night I started watching a film supposedly based on Hugh Glass. The actor shot an elk with a flintlock, reloaded by pouring some powder down the barrel right from the horn, put a ball in his mouth for a second, then dropped it down the barrel, banged the rifle butt on the ground a couple of times and headed into the bush. No patch, no priming, etc. I figured he deserved to get bit by a bear and went to bed. graybeard

Greybeard,...Are you talking about "Man in the Wilderness" with Richard Harris? I see that the movie was on cable again last night. Your right about all the things you mentioned wrong about the movie, but you have to remember that the movie was made back in the early seventies when demand for "authenticity" wasn't as important as the all mighty box offlice dollar. If you are talking about this movie. The characters called him Bass instead of Glass also!

The main thing to remember, is it was one of very few Mountainman type movies that we had out there and I generally watch a movie for entertainment. I know! My wife is always telling me to be quite during a movie, as she doesn't like my commentary about "they wouldn't of had this or that" etc...Go figure?

Rick

Yep, that's the movie. They called him "Zack" as I remember. I think Harris was better as King Arthur. He drew a sword with an authentic flourish. graybeard

I agree with that assessment. Sad to say lets not look a gift horse too harshly in the light! Its not like we a plethora of films to select from.

If wanna watch another silly one see "Sacred Ground" with Jack Elam in it! :thumbsup:

Davy

horner75 said:

Greybeard,...Are you talking about "Man in the Wilderness" with Richard Harris? I see that the movie was on cable again last night. Your right about all the things you mentioned wrong about the movie, but you have to remember that the movie was made back in the early seventies when demand for "authenticity" wasn't as important as the all mighty box offlice dollar. If you are talking about this movie. The characters called him Bass instead of Glass also!

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That is right, but he was also using a brown bess, and a smoothbore can be loaded and shot that way, I did it with mine to test the same scene from that movie...

Mind you, the accuracy is even less than normal, but it does work as long as the barrel is kept pointed in an somewhat elevated position (to prevent the ball from rolling forwards) and the flash hole is enlarged to allow the mail charge to prime the pan (providing you remembered to close the frizzen)...

Davy said:

If wanna watch another silly one see "Sacred Ground" with Jack Elam in it! :thumbsup:

Davy

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If you look closly at the muzzleloader Tim McIntire (Matt Colter) is carrying in Sacred Ground, it has a modern adjustible rear sight on it, (shown plainly on the river crossing scene) before he gets the Henry repeating rifle...

Not exactly a muzzleloading era movie, but one of my favorite Westerns is THE SEARCHERS with John Wayne. There's one seen in the movie that I have always gotten a chuckle out of. The "Duke" and Ward Bond along with their party have just been chased acrossed the river by hostiles and kneeling behind a large log and ready to make their stand. Ward Bond's pistol malfunctions and Wayne throws him a revolver and tells Bond not to shoot himself. The scene goes fast, but Bond cocks the Colt and before he even levels it to shoot. The gun goes off! They left the scene in the movie, but you can catch the surprised reaction on Ward Bonds face!....Love that scene and look for it everytime!....FUNNY! :rotf:

I'm glad someone else noticed that scene. I've never been sure if it was intentional or not! Great film!

Russ T Frizzen said:

I'm glad someone else noticed that scene. I've never been sure if it was intentional or not! Great film!

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From the look on Bond's face, I don't think it was intentional. Kind of like the final fight scene in "The Mountain Men" when Charleton Heston sprays Brian Keith's ear with the flinter flash. I doubt that was intentional either. :grin:

Your right!....When that happened to Keith I think that everybody who has had that happen to them felt it!....DAMN! I did! :shocked2:

One of the more pperiod correct movies for civil war era is the movie "Glory". It depicts alot of the facts the blacks regiments had to face. BUT midway thru the movie the 54th Mass. is marching through a twon and the slves/freemen come out and watch. If you look closely there is a young man who waves that is wearing a digital watch. :rotf:

Mike2005 said:

Russ T Frizzen said:

I'm glad someone else noticed that scene. I've never been sure if it was intentional or not! Great film!

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From the look on Bond's face, I don't think it was intentional. Kind of like the final fight scene in "The Mountain Men" when Charleton Heston sprays Brian Keith's ear with the flinter flash. I doubt that was intentional either. :grin:

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Lots of people miss that one! On purpose or not it adds a note of realism that a true muzzleloader has to love! :hats

The Brits used to load almost like that except they didn't put their balls in their mouth that I am aware of. You can get about 5 shots a minute for 15 or so shots until fouling gets so bad the ball won't go down. They also used grossly undersized balls to help with the fouling problem.

Watch the naked river crossing scene in Lonesome Dove. Editors missed some "things"

James

Here's a fun website for those that enjoy looking for accuracy...
www.moviemistakes.com

Poor Private said:

One of the more pperiod correct movies for civil war era is the movie "Glory". It depicts alot of the facts the blacks regiments had to face. BUT midway thru the movie the 54th Mass. is marching through a twon and the slves/freemen come out and watch. If you look closely there is a young man who waves that is wearing a digital watch. :rotf:

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lol I missed that one, during some of the battle scenes you can see that the bayonets are rubber and are a bit floppy when they run :haha:

graybeard said:

After the ball game last night I started watching a film supposedly based on Hugh Glass. The actor shot an elk with a flintlock, reloaded by pouring some powder down the barrel right from the horn, put a ball in his mouth for a second, then dropped it down the barrel, banged the rifle butt on the ground a couple of times and headed into the bush. No patch, no priming, etc. I figured he deserved to get bit by a bear and went to bed. graybeard

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Anyone doubting the validity of such a sequence of events will no doubt love the following excerpt from a book written by an author I know.

The following is a portion of what he sent to me about a man named Foster.


This may be of interest, from the book the book I'm co-authoring now which will be out by June. (Under an Adirondack Influence, The LIfe of A. L. Byron-Curtiss):

Though Byron-Curtiss had enthusiastically taken on the task of shoring up the faltering church, "never taking a single day’s break," as he wrote, visions of Forestport were never far from his mind’s eye.
"My thoughts were often of the mountains north of Rome." he wrote. "In a way I never returned at all. My heart stayed behind. I was caught up in the Adirondack wilderness. I admired the way folks overcame obstacles to carry on in the remote woods."

In June of 1894, a copy of Jeptha R. Simms’s Trappers and Hunters of Northern New York fell into B-C’s hands. It contained a biographical sketch of Nathaniel Foster. The account, he said, ignited within him "the flame of interest in the fabulous prowess of the old hunter that had been smoldering since the days of his youth when he had known Aaron Foster, a nephew of old Nat." Byron-Curtiss began jotting down the oral histories and first-hand accounts he heard about Foster with the idea of organizing them into a book.

He visited and interviewed many sources: Aaron Foster, Jemima and Daniel Edgerton, Thelma Edgerton, as well as other relatives of Foster who lived near the original family farm in Salisbury, N.Y.

Aaron Foster told a variety of tales about the "six-foot giant of the wilderness": "Uncle Nat could load and fire his special, muzzle-loading rifle six times in a minute . . . he was such a dead-shot that he could place a bullet anywhere he wanted . . . ."

He learned from Aaron how Nat Foster had bagged seventy-six deer and twenty-five wolves in one year and ninety-six bear in three seasons. There was a story about an incident at the end of the War of 1812, when a Captain Forsyth had offered Nat thirty dollars a month to join his riflemen, but Foster had refused the offer. Here is how one of the first-hand accounts developed, following an interview with Foster’s youngest brother, Shubael. The story of the "special, muzzle-loading rifle" went something like this:

A company of riflemen from South Carolina, commanded by Captain Forsyth, passed through the town of Salisbury, near Diamond Hill, two miles north of Salisbury Corners. The troops were on their way from the Mohawk Valley to the military lines between New York and Canada. They encamped at Manheim over one day for the purpose of washing their clothes. The celebrity of Foster as a rapid shooter and accurate marksman came to the ears of Captain Forsyth, and he sent for Foster and questioned him in regard to his ability to fulfill all the extraordinary stories told by his friends about him. Foster did not have much to say, merely telling the captain that he would wager that he could "put more balls into the bigness of a man in the space of one minute than any one in his command." Now, Captain Forsyth had in his company a most expert and rapid rifleman named Robinson, and so he immediately took Foster at his word and arranged to have him pitted against his crack marksman. The terms of the wager were agreed upon and the manner of the test settled. They were to shoot six times at targets ten rods away, each beginning with unloaded rifle at the same time. They took their places, with the company drawn up in line to witness, as they supposed the defeat of the lank and uncouth trapper. Foster had his six well pared rifle balls between his fingers, which were unobserved.

The signal was given and they began. Foster made things hum for a minute, while he poured the powder from his horn into the gun, mysteriously spread his fingers over the muzzle of his rifle, knocked the butt gently on the palm of his hand, and blazed away at his target, always putting a ball there, though where it came from none could imagine. He put the sixth ball in his target, having made a little circle of six holes in the piece of bark, while Robinson was still fumbling in his bullet pouch for his fourth bullet. A murmur of applause ran through the ranks, and Foster was at once a lion in the camp. Captain Forsyth was greatly surprised at finding so skillful and rapid a marksman on the frontier of New York, and anxious to secure his service, he offered him thirty dollars a month to join his company with the complimentary assurance that he might eat at his table. But as the war was regarded as nearly over, and Foster in common with many men of the interior, did not approve of the war anyway, he declined the offer.

--frm other research:

Jeptha R. Simms published an account of Nathaniel Foster, born about 1767 in Vermont, who became a much-noted hunter in the vicinity of Herkimer, New York, by the early 1790s. Foster is credited with an ability to fire six shots per minute with his rifle.

While hunting he usually wore three rifle balls between the fingers of each hand, and invariably thus in the left hand, if he had that number of balls with him. He had a large bony hand, and having worn such jewels a long time, they had made for themselves cavities in the flesh which concealed them almost as effectively as they were, when hid in the moulds in which they were run from the fused lead. The superficial observer would not have noticed them.
Foster's quick shooting was in the days of flintlocks. He had a powder flask with a charger, and with six well pared balls between his fingers, he would pour in the powder, drop in a ball that would just roll down without a patch, and striking the breech of his gun with his hand, it was primed; soon after which the bullet was speeding to its mark. These rapid discharges could only be made at a short distance, as to make long shots it became necessary to patch the balls and drive them down with a rod, the latter being dispensed with the former case.
--- He was remarkably expert at loading and firing his rifle. Particularly so if it was necessary to make several shots in hot haste and at short range. He was frequently known upon a wager to commence with his rifle unloaded and fire it off six times in one minute. The seems almost incredible, but nevertheless it is true. And we better understand it when we are told how he carried his bullets and loaded and fired on such occasions. He would place three well pared balls between the fingers of each hand; then from a powder horn provided with a charger, he would pour in the powder, drop in a ball which would just roll down the barrel without a patch, strike the butt of the gun with his hand, which primed it, and the next instant the bullet was speeding to its mark. Of course, this could be done only in firing at short range. To make long shots, it was necessary to patch the balls and drive them home with a ramrod. A flintlock rifle, of course, was used. His large bony hand aided him in retaining bullets between his fingers and as he began early to thus carry them, they formed for themselves cavities, the tissues of his fingers forming itself into almost the exact shape of a bullet mold, which nearly concealed the lead between his fingers. He was able to manipulate his gun, handle his knife or an ax without removing them. An ordinary observer, even in shaking hands with him, would not have noticed the strange jewelry he wore.

I would highly recomend the above book co-authored by Roy Reehil. I am fixin to buy it myself after reading another of the books based on a true story, Adirondack French Louis, that I found very very good reading.


In case anyone is interested in the above you can access the site at --- http://www.theforagerpress.com/


rabbit03

Here's a couple everyone will get a hoot out of. You ever notice that there is hardly if any recoil when the actors fired their rifles as well as the lack of smoke coming out of the barrel. Plus no matter if the firearm was buried, wet, or been through heck it still functioned perfectly.

The BBC Sharpe’s Rifles series with Sean Bean has the Brits loading like this quite a few times. Two scenes I thought were particularly memorable- when Richard Sharpe is training the South Essex to fire with more rapidity (three shots a minute, as if that’s a significant feat) by spitting the ball down the barrel and tapping the butt on the ground. A good scene with the exception of their rate of fire.

The second was even better- the Irish guy (with a Baker rifle) is loading quickly as a Frenchie is charging him- so quickly that he doesn’t have time to remove his ramrod and thus his rifle discharges and the rod goes right through the horseman’s body. The last Frenchie is galloping away and because the Irishman has fired his ramrod he proceeds to load in the aforementioned manner. From a fair distance (at least fifty/seventy-five yards) he either hits the man on the horse or knocks his hat off- I can’t remember.

I can see this loading procedure being sufficient with a bess, but what of a rifle??? I know Mark Baker is pretty sufficient at speed loading while running and I believe he uses this method. Is that correct???