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Early Russian American rifles

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BrownBear

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Does anyone have links to good sources on the rifles brought to Alaska by the Russians in the 18th century? I'm assuming they were Tula's, since that armory started operation in 1712 near as I can figure, and for quite a while their guns were quite well regarded. The Russians were here from 1741 to 1864 or so.

Checking museums around here I have found parts in the collections and even a few rifles, but I wouldn't know a Tula from a Threela if it bit me on the backside.

Since I'm in Alaska, it might be real interesting to try to put something together, but I need a good place to start.
 
One scanty reference I found lists a smoothbore, 65 caliber, 42" barrel, 57" LOA, just under 7 pounds. It sounds like a sporting rifle, not only based on weight but also references to engraving.

Pretty skimpy diggins so far.
 
Brown Bear, They left in 1864? Don't tell my wife that! Or the other 5,000 Russian families in my home town! LOL Last year I went to Moscow to visit my inlaws and while ther I stopped in the Kremlin to see Putin, he was not there so I amused myself in the museum they have there. You could look at the most beautifull muzzleloaders you have ever seen for hours! One flinty caught my eye as it had a stock stained almost black with the finest silver inlays I ever saw! This was NOT a good spot to shoplift as I hear the Russian prisons have no TV or superbowl sunday! I wish I was better with puters so I could post photos (I'm Hopeless). At any rate it would be some great research and on my next visit I'll look into purchasing one, hey they sell thier nuclear submarines if you have the rubles! Let us know how your research goes B&B
 
It's kind of an interesting area for research. The earliest explorers and later the Russian American Company had strong ties to the czar, so I'm assuming the earliest arms were mostly military. Over time lots of the early traders "went local" and stayed, though I bet they used the guns they brought or got their updates exclusively from the RAC. The two pistols I've seen might well be French, but even that is in doubt.

Lots of info on the web about the Crimean war from within that time span, but for some reason it's all presented from the English perspective. I wonder why? :grin:
 
I've been working with the local museums and accessing the main ones on the web. The web info isn't particularly good, so you're right. It's probably going to take a visit or a call. I'm trying to exaust web resources for now, just so I'll know a little something about it before plugging into the curators.

Thanks!
 
The Rifle Shoppe has parts available for Russian military rifles and muskets. Their site also has some illustrations.
[url] http://www.therifleshoppe.com/Catalog.htm[/url]

Scroll down to Russian Arms and click. As far as civilian arms, that will be hard to find. Like most of the rest of the world, they copied the state of the art French military weapons but by the end of the period they were starting to copy some English features like the forearm and bands on the illustrated M1856 Rifle that still has a French style lock. During the 18th Century the smoothbored muskets will predominate with rifles probably being rare to nonesitant.
 
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You might also contact Gail Potter down at the Museum of the Fur Trade--I'm sure they have some Russian arms in the collections there.

I have an interesting old military musket that I bought a number of years ago--it has a non-matching TYLA lock on an otherwise matching Prussian or Germanic gun. I contacted the late Kit Ravenshear about it--he confirmed that the lock was Russian, and the rest of the gun was either Prussian or one of the other German principalities. It's interesting that the lock fit well enough to work in the musket, it shows how close to stadardization on the French "Charleville" pattern the rest of Europe was.

By the way, the musket came out of Canada, and Kit speculated that it may have been cobbled together and sent over during the Late Unpleasantries--the Confederacy was scrambling about scouring the European armouries for any old musket that would fire, and shipping them over via Canada. He noted that a number of such have turned up there.

Rod
 
Say hey BrownBear, next time your in town stop by the shop and I'll show you a library on muzzleloaders like you've never seen. I have many,, long out of print museum books from most all major countries that produced firearms from the 16th century to the present. They are one of my passions and are used as some of my inspirations for knife decorating. I have a book specically on the firearms of Tula, and also a few books on firearms from the Suhl in Germany. I'm almost always home so stop in anytime.
vikingsword
 
You're on Wes! A very generous offer. The thought of putting together the first style of rifle to arrive up here is starting to tickle my curiosity bone.

I made the drive yesterday, but didn't allow enough time for what needed to be done. I'm getting pretty good at only coming to town once every two weeks, but getting worse about getting everything done while I'm there.

If you venture out the road, watchyerbackside. There's just enough snow on top of the ice, it's kinda like dance wax on a stainless steel dance floor.
 
The only rifle I have seen pictures of was very different from people are used to seeing. It was a snaplock, not a flintlock, with a cheekstock and a bipod, an octogonal barrel about 40" long, about .40 caliber, I believe. Sliding wooden box on the bottom of the stock. The Rifle Shoppe shows a similar one on their catalog, pictured here, top rifle, right picture. I believe it was intended to be shot prone.

That is the only documented rifle I know of used by the Russkies in Alaska...

Edited to add: The Russian snaplock is listed (without picture) under "Snaplocks," not under "Russian Arms."
 
Thanks Elnathan. I had missed that on the first read through the site. It's useful for my thinking and understanding. I've been reading through Russian journals from that era (translations of course), and the only references I have found to shoulder arms create the impression of military arms since they were talking about battles.

At one point Shelikof had a "new" gun and wanted to test it. I don't remember the #'s exactly, but he stood up something like a dozen locals belly to butt and shot the one in front. Killed nine before the ball stopped. Nice guy that Shelikof, and that was one of his more cheritable days.
 
You are welcome. The book I saw the original in has long been missing from the library, but I think it was Firearms of the American West, 1803-1865. The cover was different from the one pictured, but the title and the authors' names ring a bell.

The Russian military was based on Western models from Peter the Great's reign on, as was Russian high society. Accordingly, military weapons and civilian weapons made for the nobility seem to have followed western models. The serfs, on the other hand, don't seem to have changed much culturally from Peter's reforms. I don't know much about Russian weapons, but I suspect that what few lower-class weapons there were snaplocks, especially in Siberia (Siberia = everything east of the Urals). I do know that small-bore snaplocks w/ cheekstocks had a very long history in Scandinavia. Scandinavians used .40 and smaller calibers for moose! Knowing the use of quite similar weapons in both 18th century Alaska and Scandinavia, and the intensively conservative nature of the Russian peasant, I think we can conclude that snaplocks were probably typical of the weapons used by professional hunters in Russia, possibly into the 19th century.

Another bit of trivia, since I am on the topic and enjoying myself - Siberian hunters considered the moose (called an Elk in Europe, BTW) to be a more dangerous quarry than the Brown Bear (our grizzly). Neither could be stopped by a bullet when charging, but it was possible to defend oneself with a knife from a bear, but not from an enraged moose!
 
As I understand it, the relatively-small caliber cheek stock snaplock guns were normal for the Russian fur hunters in North America. They're not nearly as attractive as the Scandinavian snaplock guns.
 
A huge portion of the fur hunting in Alaska was done by conscripted natives and eskimos who used traditional hunting methods, while the Russians stayed behind and held their families hostage until the men returned to hand over the furs.

The vast majority of the Russians were employees of the Russian American Company with its close ties to the czar. In all the accounts I have been able to drag up so far, the only reference is to military arms. Kinda makes sense when you recognize they spent most of their time with reluctant natives rather than fleet fur bearers, doesn't it!
 
Hey, Stophel. Do you know any good sources for either Russian or Scandinavian snaplocks? I have found a few pictures here and there (mostly in The Dictionary of Firearms and Weapons: A Visual History of Arms and Armor), but would appreciate a better source.

Brown Bear,
Just to clarify, are you talking about rifles, or shoulder arms in general?
 
No, I don't really. You just have to scrounge up photos whereever you can. I have "The" book on Swedish guns, "Svenska Gevaers Smeder" (I don't have it in front of me, so I'm not certain of the spelling, but I think that's correct). It is HARD to find. Thanks to a fellow board member, I got one! Not too many snaplock guns in it, though. I can copy off some for you if you want. PM me. :wink:

I've been wanting to build a Swedish style snaplock rifle. I'm not entirely certain just how the lock functions. I don't have a good picture/diagram of one, except for the later late 17th/early 18th century type with the round face that rather resemble the ordinary flintlock. They don't work quite the same as far as I can tell.
 
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