Calibers used in the fur trade era

[Dillon W.]

Just out of curiosity, was there any particular calibers that were favorited my the mountain men? Is that even something that would have been discussed or documented in say journal entries? Just pondering out loud

 

[Magungo1066]

.54 was considered on the lower end. It is what Lewis and Clark choose to arm their men with when they went West and still they complained about sometimes taking as many as a dozen or more shots to kill Grizzly bears. Grizzly bears had a near mythic status and on some level were probably in the back (or front) of every mountain-man's mind. Several famous mountain men were at least partially, or fatally mauled by Grizzly bears. But I suspect, that even though larger calibers were preferred, just about every sort of gun got into the hands of mountain men. Some of these men were paid by companies or enterprises that supplied or advanced them a rifle while some were self employed and very poor. But it can probably be generalized that mountain-men of American origin mainly preferred rifles, in .54 or larger if they could get them.

 

[Dillon W.]

I’ll throw a disclaimer out there, I don’t know jack squat about grizzly bears or bears in general for that matter, we don’t have them in south Arkansas period. But if a 54 can fell a moose I would think it would take a grizz with ease. Maybe not. Hmm

 

[leadhoarder]

There is a difference in killing an animal and stopping it from attacking you when it's survival instinct kicks in.

 

[Magungo1066]

I’ll throw a disclaimer out there, I don’t know jack squat about grizzly bears or bears in general for that matter, we don’t have them in south Arkansas period. But if a 54 can fell a moose I would think it would take a grizz with ease. Maybe not. Hmm

Exactly as lead hoarder said. Inflicting a fatal wound is different than an immediately disabling wound on a Grizzly. The first wound, if not immediately or near immediately fatal, is an invitation for you or one of your buddies to be mauled. They have an incredibly tough hide and a huge muscle structure. Couple that with roundball ballistics and it's a tricky game.

 

[Dillon W.]

Makes sense. It also sounds terrifying lol.

 

[tenngun]

You have to have a time in mind.
Fur trade covers a lot of ground.
Talking about the western Rocky Mountain and Great Plains we still have a long span
Land C rifles are thought to be the ‘92 or ‘97, these were about .48 cal.
American Fur and later Rocky Mountian fur bought a lot of Pennsylvanian guns and .50 seems about average early on 1810-1825 period. Larger bore became popular to .54 later the 30-40.
Most early know ‘classic Hawkins were .50, they too became .53 on average later. Bigger were seen plains guns from .66 to .75 are known.
A .54 , .58,.62 or more might be plenty for grizz but if ever I went after one I would like some back up, as a dyeing bear can kill you.
I think Land C did have trouble with bear because of a lighter rifle, but I’ve often wondered if tge .54 became popular because of two ball to the ounce.

 

[The Crisco Kid]

Weight was always an important component. A pound of 75 caliber balls yielded 12 shots. A pound of 54 caliber balls yielded around 30 shots. When they were months away from any resupply it was always a compromise as to what to carry. Not much different in that regard than what to carry today.

 

[Snydly]

I’ll throw a disclaimer out there, I don’t know jack squat about grizzly bears or bears in general for that matter, we don’t have them in south Arkansas period. But if a 54 can fell a moose I would think it would take a grizz with ease. Maybe not. Hmm

Speaking from personal experience.... Moose and Grizzly are worlds apart when it comes to getting one down and out.

 

[plmeek]

There is a lot of anecdotal data in period writings that suggest a significant range of calibers were used in the Mountain Man period.

William Clark recorded in his journals that he took his personal .36 caliber squirrel rifle with him on the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Sam Hawken in his 1882 newspaper interview said he made a rifle for William Ashley that carried an ounce ball (.67 caliber rifle). But these extreme caliber sizes were not common.

The only non-anecdotal and statistically significant hard data that I know of come from the surviving American Fur Company documents in several museums and historical societies archives and the Henry Papers in the Hagley Museum and Library in Wilmington, Delaware .

Charles E. Hanson researched the AFC documents and tabulated the trade rifles that were ordered from JJ Henry and his son, J Henry, destined for St. Louis and the Rocky Mountains and Upper Missouri. Below is a summary of that data.

This hard data suggests that over 90% of the rifles used by the trappers and traders would have been between .50 and .54 caliber and that as many as two-thirds of the rifles would have been close to .54 caliber.

I should point out that manufacturing tolerances for these rifles were not very stringent. Orders were often placed for rifles to be made within a bore-size range. Barrels prior to the Civil War were forge welded around a mandrel, then bored out (reamed) to close to the desired bore size. It was cheaper for the fur companies to order rifles with some significant tolerance in bore size. To accommodate this, each rifle was ordered with its own ball mold of the correct size to match the rifle's bore.

It's also worth noting that a lot of the data reported in modern publications on bore size of rifles and smooth bore guns is likely in error. Many museums and collectors use a modern shotgun bore gauge to measure the bore size. These don't work because many antique guns have enlarged bores at the muzzle due to rod wear or intentional "coning" of the muzzle to "thumb start" the patched round ball. The modern shotgun bore gauge also doesn't accurately measure rifles with an odd number of grooves and lands.

 

[Dillon W.]

That’s excellent information there meek. That had never occurred to me about the tolerances makes perfect sense.