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reddogge said:fw,
Here is a partial description from Charles Hanson's book "The Plains Rifle" p37 where he is paraphrasing a description of a typical Hawken rifle in a book by James Serven, "Early Western Rifles" (Muzzle Blasts, May 1945).
"Average new bore was .50 caliber or slightly larger,...Full stock rifles I have inspected average 9 1/2 pounds in weight and about 38 1/2" in barrel length. Barrels are octagon and of 1" outside dimensions."
It goes on but that should interest you about the barrels.
On page 41 Hanson mentions the barrels were about .53 caliber, slow twist, soft iron, and took 150-215 grains of powder as a charge. They would shoot almost flat to 150 yards and kill at 200 and 250 yards.
He also mentions they had two barrel keys, and most, if not all, were stocked in walnut stained maple.
Just a thought you may consider when reading the above statement is that in one paraphrase he is talking about fullstocks and the latter paraphrase he is talking about halfstocks. Also, many more Hawken rifles have been found and studied since Mr. Serven wrote that article. If he wrote that article today I believe his statement would be quite different. Tapered barrels were the norm and a average bore of .54 and the weight around 10 1/2 - 12 lbs. Fullstocks having three wedges and halfstocks having two wedges. Barrel lengths from 31" - 42" on halfstocks are extant. Walnut stocks are rare on halfstocks and are maple on 99.9% of surviving Hawken rifles whether they are half or fullstock or early or late.
Don