unknown Punt shoulder gun?

[kaintuck]

;DI believe we have a shoulder/punt gun........
1" smooth-bore, SWAMPED barrel 54"~ In the Jaegar swamped fashion~ carvings, and BP is missing with some termite damage to toe area, the stock has been shortened, but it was full length originally, as there are 2 tenon cuts on the bottom on the barrel, there has been a sight blank, and the sight re-slotted back toward the tang, tang is almost straight. All brass furniture, Fowler BP missing completely....cap-lock works, but is rusty and slow, the bore has slight rust, but beefy enough to be re-bored~1-1/4"...probably 25#.
Any ideas fella's?

 

[hawkeye2]

A lot of punt guns were fairly crude firearms, just a functioning tool. That is quite fancy which would be unusual and I wonder if it might be a wall gun. Is there any evidence that it might have been a flint before?

 

[satx78247]

Some of the old-time BigGuns were strictly "functional" & some of them were quite NICE to look at like "THE WORLEY" for example. = The skill of the punt-gun maker & the depth of the buyer's pockets being the deciding factors I suspect.
(The Worley looks quite like a "fancy" wall-gun with about a 2" bore.)

yours, satx

 

[kaintuck]

I think it was....I need to re examine that area and trigger plate area.....
Ideas on price 500 to 10000?
Marc n tomtom

 

[TFoley]

A lot of punt guns were fairly crude firearms, just a functioning tool. That is quite fancy which would be unusual and I wonder if it might be a wall gun. Is there any evidence that it might have been a flint before?

That's what it looks like to me- images 6 and 7 show a nice clear hole in the trigger guard right under the centre of gravity and the breeching where the pintle for a wall may have been located.

Most punt guns of my acquaintance have rope-down trunnions to hold them in the punt.

tac

 

[satx78247]

The MAIN reason that I do NOT believe that it's a PUNT-GUN is how small the bore is.
(I've been studying the punt-guns for over 2 decades now, since I read THE WATERMEN by James Michener, which was published in 1979 & became fascinated with the waterfowl hunting culture of the Chesapeake Bay area, when I was stationed in B'more.)

Despite having examined dozens of punt-guns in museums & private collections, including having been "given access to" the Big-Guns at the Smithsonian's American History Museum, I've NOT yet seen any punt-gun that was smaller than 44MM bore, with most being greater than 60MM & some up to 140MM bore.
Further all the punt-guns that I have examined were either "roped-down" to the gunning-punt OR "spring-dampened", for recoil control.

Personal Note: My Big-Gun, when constructed OCONUS for waterfowling, will be 60MM bore, with a barrel of 200CM length & "rope-dampened".

Otoh, small-bore, privately-owned cannon of 1-4 pound size were relatively common in the USA & elsewhere from the Colonial period & up to TWBTS era. = I wonder if your "fancy one-pounder" may have been a watercraft-mounted swivel-gun.

 

[kaintuck]

sure wish there was a way to pin down the era it was made......I will review it again tonight, many thanks everyone....this is way outta my area of knowledge~ but I will look at that 'pin hole'....I wonder if it was a wall gun when I 1st knew about it.....maybe I need to look closer at the bore....or it was a 'smooth bore' wall gun?????
it CERTAINLY is a thick walled barrel.....a fella could load 500gr powder behind a handful of buckshot...... :shocked2: :shocked2: :shocked2:
or launch a small surface to surface missile...... :rotf:

 

[hawkeye2]

Punt guns were generally much larger and well secured to the punt so they did not need a buttstock and usually didn't have one. They saw extremely hard use and usually show that. Market hunting was not considered sporting by the gentry and punt gunners were well beneath them. Someone who could afford a gun with decoration as that one has would not have done any shooting from a punt.

A wall gun didn't necessarily have a means to secure it to anything as doing so would restrict it's mobility. It would have to be dismounted (possibly not difficult) to load and then returned to the same position making the gunner an easier target. Almost any way of mounting that gun using the wood alone would have resulted in damage to the stock over a little use.

 

[satx78247]

My only suggestion is to take the gun to a nearby museum that has a firearms collection & ask the curator of firearms what they believe that it is.
(IF it was mine, I would CAREFULLY clean the bore & see if it is smoothbore or rifled AND very carefully inspect it for "markings" with something like a 10X glass.)

I'll frankly say that I have NO clue about what it IS but I'm reasonably sure that it's NOT a punt-gun, though ANY firearm could have been used to shoot at most any game at some time or other.
(For example, an old army buddy of mine, who is now a property owner & "semi-professional waterman", uses a .22Short "gallery rifle" to assassinate "resident, non-migratory" geese & swans in MD, as those birds are utterly DESTROYING the tidal water-grass on his property on the CB. - David has a MD Depredation Permit, which allows that "hunting", 24/365.)

yours, satx

 

[smoothshooter]

Definitely not a punt gun - bore is wayyy too small.

Punt guns were well over 12 gauge / .75 caliber, and were meant for throwing very large quantities of shot into large flocks of waterfowl, preferably while still sitting on the water. The few I have seen or read about were in the single digit gauges, such as 6 or 4 gauge. Some were even larger with bore diameters of 1 3/4" to 2".
My vote is that it is a German or other eastern European wall gun that was originally rifled and flintlock, even though the bore seems small for that use. I does appear to be a little fancier with the raised carving than normal.
The architecture does appear to be Germanic.

Or maybe it was a target rifle.

 

[roadgrader]

Could it be a chuck gun? They where known to fancy. Stacey

 

[hawkeye2]

Roadgrader might you mean chunk gun? That would be quite a devastating gun for chucks. :grin: :v

 

[Nativearizonan]

That sounds a lot like a 4-bore elephant gun to me.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4_bore

 

[Nativearizonan]

Whatever it was used for originally, it will take 1/4 pound balls to shoot the thing. :shocked2: :grin:

 

[TFoley]

^
This.

Way too ornate for a punt gun, which, over here in UK, is about as plain as it is possible to be and totally devoid of any kind of ornamentation. A local old boy here still builds them, exactly like his GGGfather back in the 1840's did, only now he has taken on this new-fangled 'percussion' idea - seems to work, he notes.

Also, this here gun seems VERY short to me. Jake's guns are well over seven feet long, and have rope-down trunnions to hold them down in the punt.

BTW, here in UK we are restricted to a bore of 2" - trust me, when THAT goes off, you certainly know all about it.

tac

 

[satx78247]

Fwiw, I've corresponded with "Jake" about my "punt-gun" project. = NICE & HELPFUL GUY is he!!

MY Big-Gun, for OCONUS waterfowling, will have a flint lock & be 60MM bore with a barrel about 200CM long & YES it will be "roped-down" in the 1 by 6 meter gunning punt with gaff-sail, which I'm planning to build from the plans that I found at a museum.
(Oddly enough, a flinter is MORE effective in taking game than a percussion gun, as the "flash" tends to "flush" the ducks/geese off the water & into the shot-stream.)

Also, in the nation to which I'm retiring, flintlock firearms are completely UNREGULATED, while percussion firearms have SOME restrictions on their use for waterfowl hunting.
(Btw, that nation is "gun friendly", as long as one stay away from calibers that are considered "weapons of war": 9x18mm, 9x19mm, .45 ACP, 5.56NATO, .30-06, 7.62x51mm, 7x57mm, 8x57mm and breech-loading weapons, which have a larger than 19mm bore, require a SPECIAL LICENSE from the National Police or a court order to possess/use.)

yours, satx

 

[roadgrader]

Yes chunk gun sorry as usual my mind is working faster than my fingers.Stacey

 

[Artificer]

Is that an Iron/Steel band? Also, where is it located from the breech or muzzle of the barrel?

Gus

 

[Artificer]

The reason I ask is because it looks like there is a round flat spot on the bottom and perhaps what is left of some kind of a pintle joint. 'Course it could just be an optical illusion. Are there holes in the sides of the band, if it is Iron or Steel?

Gus

Edited to add: Due to the Caliber and Barrel Length, I think it is a Wall Gun as well. If that band is Iron or Steel, someone could have cut off the pintle some time in the past to allow for display or use other than a Wall Gun.

 

[Nativearizonan]

That link does not work for me.