Definately California Gold Rush. A Klodiker wore different clothes and firearms.
Right and left are usually screwed up in old photos - which is why a lot of folks think that Billy the kid was left handed. So I am going to say left and right as we see the picture.
It is a half stock gun on the left, but from the button tip on the rammer and style of flask (flasks?) I am guessing that it is a smoothbore. He carries a brace of single shot pistols, on on each side. I can't tell if he has holsters, or if the pistols are tucked into the pockets of the guta-percha raincoat.
The powder flask is holding up the flap of the holster for another pistol on the left. From the shape of the butt, and the thickness of the holster, I am guessing it to be a dragoon sized pepperbox.
There is a metal tipped knife sheath along with the carpenter's hatchet. But am not sure about the item on the center fron of the belt. The handle and the sheath look wrong for a knife. Could it be a spyglass?
Is the item in his hand to the right a long gun? To me it looks to be a blade. Perhaps a longknife, bayonet or a short sword?
This is the type of picture that many Argonauts had taken in St Louis or Independence after they had aquired their trappins. Then they sent the pictures back to the states to show their loved ones that they were indeed ready to take care of themselves in the wilds of the west. The clothes seem a bit too new and clean to have been taken out here.
There were a bunch of these photos in an exhibit a few years back. The website is still up at
Gold Rush!
