Charleville Musket - Which One Used by Continentals?

From what I have read so far - the 1777's were typically carried by the French Army while the Continental Army used mainly 1763's and 1766's.

Do I have that right?

Rum River said:

From what I have read so far - the 1777's were typically carried by the French Army while the Continental Army used mainly 1763's and 1766's.

Do I have that right?

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I understand the French sent over 63,66s as they were ‘war surplus’ but I have heard, not prove that the rebels also had access to earlier French muskets captured during F and I as they were kept to arm militia

Had a glich and posted twice

I think there was alot of older models around, wether from France or left overs from the last war. I read about one battle i cant recall which but the continentals had majority model 1717 guns.

Would make sense for france to send older models like 1717, 1728, 1743. The 1763-66 types would be the new and current model until production of the 1777 caught up and replaced the older ones.

Thanks for the responses.

Where I'm going with this is to own an example of a common American military issue longarm for each of our major wars - Revolution, Civil War, Spanish American, etc.

Right now I need a Charleville, plus a '61 or '63 Springfield, plus either a '03 Springfield or a 1917 Enfield.

tenngun said:

I understand the French sent over 63,66s as they were ‘war surplus’ but I have heard, not prove that the rebels also had access to earlier French muskets captured during F and I as they were kept to arm militia

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They also sent over some outdated 1754 models, and some 1774 models as well, but nowhere near the number of 1766/68

Rum River said:

Thanks for the responses.

Where I'm going with this is to own an example of a common American military issue longarm for each of our major wars - Revolution, Civil War, Spanish American, etc.

Right now I need a Charleville, plus a '61 or '63 Springfield, plus either a '03 Springfield or a 1917 Enfield.

Click to expand...

Yeah, you have forgotten a war or four in there.

Clark Badgett said:

Yeah, you have forgotten a war or four in there.

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Some of them I have already.
An all original Model 1884 Trapdoor from 1889, all original Krag from 1901, a 1903A3 from March 1943, an M1A (pseudo M14) and an AR (pseudo M16/M4).

I go back and forth on a Garand. My hands are pretty poor and they can be difficult for me to operate. I've had some nice ones over the years but not currently.

Oh, and I have to be alert for a 1795 Springfield or 1803 Harper's Ferry for the war of 1812.

Rum River said:

Thanks for the responses.

Where I'm going with this is to own an example of a common American military issue longarm for each of our major wars - Revolution, Civil War, Spanish American, etc.

Right now I need a Charleville, plus a '61 or '63 Springfield, plus either a '03 Springfield or a 1917 Enfield.

Click to expand...

I went looking for a repro 1766 Charleville, a couple of years ago, to go with my 1777 Charleville pistol. They were hard to find used. Finally found one on a live auction, through Proxibid......an older Dixie Gun Works marked one. This lot lasted a whole 30seconds,during the auction and I won at $1,000.Don't comedown, too hard.......I sent it to a gunsmith in New York to have it reduced to carbine length........the stock was damaged toward the muzzle, anyway. It turned out pretty well, I think. Just have to keep looking. Photos show original length when purchased and some image re-working to get an idea of carbine length. The barrel is now 30".....see photo with pistol.

Rum River said:

From what I have read so far - the 1777's were typically carried by the French Army while the Continental Army used mainly 1763's and 1766's.

Do I have that right?

Click to expand...

Most of the charleville muskets used in the revolutionary war were of the heavy model 1763 and 1766 & 1768 patterns.
The french emptied nearly their entire arsenal of these muskets. Its possible some 1754’s came over but there isnt enough of them to say how significant. The models 1770-1776 muskets came over later in the war around 1778/79 in numbers smaller than the 66 and 68. There are many model 1774’s in private collections, one would consider the 1774 a significant pattern in the War and was essentially almost the same as a 1768 but with some minor modifications to the lock and hardware.

The 1777 musket has been found with US surcharges, however nobody is certain when they were used and where. It’s possible that Haitian troops in Savannah carries these as well as french troops in Rhode Island, the 1777 lock was essentially copied by the Americans for the 1816 musket.

Early in the war around 75/76 shipments of barrels and locks and hardware were sent to the USA in the thousands. Many of these parts never made it to the battlefield and were sold off as surplus. These would have been the models 1728 0 1754 with some 1717 locks and auxiliaries such as dragoon musket parts and wall gun parts. You will find a lot of these parts on COS muskets and american made muskets.

Some complete model 1717 - 1746 muskets would have been used in the earlier part of the war that were held over from the F&I War, these muskets would have exceeded their useful life by the time of the French and Indian war let alone the revolution so one could only speculate their condition.

Youngblood said:

I think there was alot of older models around, wether from France or left overs from the last war. I read about one battle i cant recall which but the continentals had majority model 1717 guns.

Would make sense for france to send older models like 1717, 1728, 1743. The 1763-66 types would be the new and current model until production of the 1777 caught up and replaced the older ones.

Click to expand...

You’ll certainly find a lot of 1717 -1754 parts on random american restocked guns, its not uncommon find muskets with per say for example a 1717 lock, and 1754 hardware such as bands and a steel rammer.

We also tend to view this from the perspective of infantry arms, when in-fact there were many types of french military arms in service in North America ranging from carbines to fusils to naval arms and marine muskets.

What many people often think is a 1717 musket is a 1724-1743 french marine musket, some of these have pan bridles and some do not, the difference is the slimmer proportions of the butt stock and longer octagon section of the breech 12” vs. 7” on an infantry arm. Many marine guns also had steel rammers and smaller bands, and this makes a lot of sense because the french admiralty was in charge of arming the Quebec colonies, the Tulle arsenals in France provided a lot of these muskets to the french Navy.

All of this is great info - thanks for all the responses.