early rifle charges

Zonie, those charts are great. Thanks for putting them out there.

Loyalist Dave said:

Claims to have killed 2000 deer, 400 bears and 50 panthers in 44 years. Must have known what he was doing.

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I've not gone through the book to count how many times he uses a butcher knife to finish off the bear. :wink:

LD

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Arkansas was once known at the 'Bear State'. Bear were so plentiful that hunting and selling the by-products, especially oil, was a major industry in the ca. 1800 era. There are/were many stories of hunters using their dogs to corner the bear then going in with a knife to finish off bruin. :bull: Great stories. But :shocked2: I simply do not believe them. :shake: A cornered bear, even a small blackie, would be a fearsome critter. Shooting much safer for the hunter.

Huzzah! Thanks for the charts, Zonie

Artificer said:

However, reducing the charge once they hit the point of too much recoil made/makes sense.

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But it wouldn't have anything to do with accuracy. When you go to sight in a rifle you don't call it good when you find the largest charge you can shoot with acceptable recoil. Or at least I don't.

Spence

Look folks, there have ALWAYS been three classes. Gun owners who basically know, usually, which end of a rifle the bullet comes out of, shooters who actually shoot now and then but who's skills are often so poor they usually can't shoot a decent group with a good rifle and load. See this on the range all the time with all classes of firearms. Then there are "riflemen" who have been called "rifle cranks" and such in recent times. These are the guys that kill British officers are 300 yards. Cause the British scouts to refuse to go in the woods. Kill off the officers and NCOs first.. From Breeds Hill to the end of the War of 1812 and beyond. When I was a kid almost anything I put in the rifle would kill a squirrel or a rabbit or a fox. But if you shoot against serious shooters on PAPER for score or for string measure you better do your home work. Shooting hit of miss steel plates is too easy. Clipping the edge 6" from center counts the same as a dead center shot. But that's why people like it
How many people here shoot a 10 shot group the REALLY prove a load? How many here have actually tried shooting at a silhouette at 300 yards to see where the rifleman who killed Fraser had to hold? With the hypothetical 1400 fps vs 1900 fps there is three feet difference in the drop. Then the accuracy thing. Have we tried wiping vs not wiping. Ever wonder why the old time riflemen tended to wipe every shot? Yeah bad powder, but the rifles shoot better unless using a water lube. How about low friction vs high friction patch lube? Linen vs cotton patches. Ever shoot well refined beef tallow as a patch lube? At 50 yards with no wind the rifle should cut the same hole every shot. If the shooter eyes are up to it.
Now if I were running buffalo horse back I would have little reason to shoot much powder. The range is in feet and all we need is penetration. If I am shooting at a Pronghorn at 200 as Parkman did, or Buffalo past 150 as his guide did? I might want a little more velocity. Has anyone READ the Oregon Trail by Parkman? What about in a tree 200-300 yards out shooting over a stockade or into a trench line? This was not a game it was not theoretical in the past. They had to get the job done.
I gotta run.

A cornered bear, even a small blackie, would be a fearsome critter. Shooting much safer for the hunter.

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While that's true, that doesn't necessarily discredit his claims on the practice, as there are a lot of things young men do today, that older, wiser heads look upon and shake their heads. :nono: There are no less than 8 Jackass movies, which are chalked full of young men doing very dumb, dangerous stuff. I've seen no evidence that young men in the flintlock era were any less rash. I remember a southern fort during the AWI where the young men were retrieving solid cannon shot fired at the fort by the British, to be fired back at the British..., and they had to be reminded to allow the ball to come to a complete rest before trying to pick them up. :shocked2:

Browning (iirc) also recalls a companion who spotted a bear following a trail coming toward him and Browning, who then took up a position adjacent to the trail (I think behind a large boulder) and when "cuffy" came around the boulder, the friend jumped out to scare the bear..., which then proceeded to maul the friend from fright. :shake:

So my point was if the bear was downed but still breathing, and Browning had to dispatch it, the Coup de Grace, with his butcher knife, maybe his load wasn't what it should be or his shot placement, or both. IF you think he's embellishing by claiming to dispatch the bruin with a butcher knife, then one must conclude his count of the number and variety of animals might also be heavily embellished. :shocked2:

LD

Spence,

Though I was serious about backing off from a charge that kicks too hard, I agree accuracy is more important than that.

Actually I got pretty excited when reading your quote from Hanger”¦”¦

George said:

They take the horn of a deer, make several trials with a ball, always on the powder, and when, by each time increasing the quantity of powder,

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Yes, YES I was thinking!! Finally a good 18th century description of trying different loads by increasing the powder until the best accuracy was found! Yaaaayyyyyyyyyy!!!

And then Hanger went on to write this”¦”¦”¦”¦”¦”¦.

George said:

they find the rifle rather throws back, that is to say, has a recoiling motion, they draw off a small quantity of the powder, cut the horn off, and use it for the actual service before an enemy.

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My jaw dropped”¦”¦”¦”¦”¦”¦ What kind of nonsense was that from a man who was described as being the best shot in the British Army at one time?!! AAARRRRGGGGGHHHHHHH !!!!!!!

But that was not all, something struck me in the next sentence he wrote and I emboldened, underlined and italicized it below”¦”¦.

George said:

From the weight of the barrels of ”˜their rifles being somewhat more, by a few ounces, than six pounds, and the balls so small as ”˜thirty-six to the pound,’ they will carry ”˜more than half’ the weight of the ball in powder."

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OK, I can normally figure out what is meant in period written English, but this time I am not so sure. Perhaps I am mistaken, but it seems to me that he meant ball sizes of American Rifles were larger than that and down to AS SMALL as 36 to the pound?

Wait a minute, that did not seem to jive with what he wrote the day he and Bannistre Tarleton were shot at and the American Rifleman hit the horse of the “Bugle Horn Man?” (I still get a real kick out of that description.) OK, so I went back and found what he wrote back then”¦..

“I never in my life saw better rifles (or men who shot better) than those made in America: they are chiefly made in Lancaster, and two or three neighboring towns in that vicinity, in Pennsylvania. The barrels weigh about six pounds two or three ounces,and carry a ball no larger than thirty-six to the pound; at least I never saw one of a larger caliber, and I have seen many hundreds and hundreds.”

I have already mentioned his exaggeration of supposedly having seen so many American Long Rifles, but it seems to me he corrected his estimation of the size balls in American Long Rifles in the quote you posted at the start of this thread and was written later than the quote the day he and Tarleton were shot at?

Gus

:rotf: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf:

Hate to tell you but he was wrong about the deer horns also. Deer don't have horns, they have antler's.

During the rut they tend to get pretty horny.

Great stuff Zonie, thanks!

I can't comment upon hunting bears with dogs but hunting wild boars with dogs continues here in France. Usually with them being driven onto guns but there are some who use the old way of exhausting the boar with dogs until he is cornered and then going in and killing him with a large knife (to reach far enough into him to kill him fast). I dare say that the bear hunting followed the same practice exported to the New World.

An acquaintance has just had his car written off by a wild boar running straight in front of his car at 90kph. Didn't do the boar any good either. Made me wonder about trying to stop a charging wild boar with a boar spear. I can imagine the boar continuing on waving a man on the end of a pole before him......

juice jaws said:

Hate to tell you but he was wrong about the deer horns also. Deer don't have horns, they have antler's.

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When I grew up in Iowa, deer tags were so hard to get that it was a lottery in the whole state and you had no pick of the county. Since we couldn't afford to hunt outside the county, we never went deer hunting.

I have been amazed since I moved here in 1973 that deer hunters so often, if not usually, use the term "deer horn" instead of deer antler.

I had no idea calling it "deer horn" or "horn" went so far back. It may have come from the fact that cow horn was used for so many things in colonial America that they also referred to them as "horn" instead of antler, because folks were used to the term?

Gus

Right up there with folks calling young horses "colts" and all cattle "cows."

Gonna happen, and the only thing the folks hurt is their own rep and cred in front of people who know better.

BrownBear said:

Right up there with folks calling young horses "colts" and all cattle "cows."

Gonna happen, and the only thing the folks hurt is their own rep and cred in front of people who know better.

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I know what you mean, but in this case SO MANY Virginia deer hunters who know better, still refer to them as "deer horn." So I have long suspected this went further back in history, but did not realize it went into the 18th century before Spence's quote.

My first Buck in Virginia was a 10 pointer (Eastern Count) as that is the way everyone in Virginia scores them. Most of them almost went into apoplexy when I was searching for a sharp hack saw to cut the antlers off, while we were butchering the deer that day. They could not imagine cutting the antlers off, even though I told them they were the perfect size for knife handles, powder measures and other things.

One guy even told me he had a garage full of "deer horn" he would gladly trade me all I wanted for the "head and horns" of my buck, to mount the whole head. I told him I wanted to use as much as my Buck as possible to honor the deer and many did not understand that either. So I saved not only the hide, but also the legs that were normally cut off and thrown away. Our Club had a lot of great guys, but there wasn't anyone else in the club who was into muzzle loading and living history.

Gus

Buddies dad in to alatatl and he makes his spear points outta elk leg bone. Made my son one outta his first bull. Im into using the whole animal but have not the skills to do so and all my ol people folks is passed :shake:

OK, I can normally figure out what is meant in period written English, but this time I am not so sure. Perhaps I am mistaken, but it seems to me that he meant ball sizes of American Rifles were larger than that and down to AS SMALL as 36 to the pound?


Don't think so. I think he meant that since American longrifles carried such a small ball (in comparison with other firearms) that they could load as much as 1/2 ball weight in powder, a ratio impractical with other, larger caliber firearms.

It seem's I read in the book " The Frontiersman" that to save powder and make less noise to alert the indians, Simon Kenton loaded very light loads to feed the fort, just enough powder to propel the ball.

Elnathan said:

OK, I can normally figure out what is meant in period written English, but this time I am not so sure. Perhaps I am mistaken, but it seems to me that he meant ball sizes of American Rifles were larger than that and down to AS SMALL as 36 to the pound?


Don't think so. I think he meant that since American longrifles carried such a small ball (in comparison with other firearms) that they could load as much as 1/2 ball weight in powder, a ratio impractical with other, larger caliber firearms.

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Hanger was known as having used rifles before he came on duty in America, so he may have meant in comparison to other arms, but here he still mentions 36 balls to the pound as the smallest caliber of a rifle - compared to that size being the largest caliber he mentioned in the other quote.

Gus

Artificer said:

Spence, neat info as always.

Haven't we discussed before that Duane's manual was a direct rip off/plagiarism of the English manual, except Duane added some rather unusual/strange/almost inexplicable stuff as well?

Gus

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It was the British Rifle and Light Infantry manual of 1805..maybe 03. I used to have it saved before a Computer crash as it's free. Duane plagiarized nearly word for word.

He did remove the Baker Rifle Mallet reference found in the original British Manual.

Some New England States used the British Manual out right. You'll see these New England/British manuals quoted in debates about Short Starters and mallets. In truth that was really Baker Rifle or Brit specific.