Who Used Fowlers?

[George]

I’ve been known to call my squirrel rifle a “Squirreling Piece” from time to time.

The Pennsylvania Gazette
April 8, 1762
For sale....desk furniture, a parcel of neat cocking and squirrel pieces, bottle corks, &c. &c.

Spence

 

[Carbon 6]

a parcel of neat cocking

???

 

[Stophel]

???

I will presume "cocking pieces"... for hunting cocks of whatever variety.

 

[Carbon 6]

 

[George]

???

Cocking pieces are for shooting woodcock.

Doncha know nothin?

Spence

 

[Carbon 6]

Cocking pieces are for shooting woodcock.

Doncha know nothin?

Spence

I had a senior moment.

 

[Brokennock]

Brokennock,

I'm pretty sure the article to which Mr. Williams was referring was this one: 18th Century English Trade Guns in the South, or Carolina Guns, by Lee Burke. It is in a printable format, or I think you could probably download it.

For comparison there is also this one about Northwest guns in the same collection of monographs: Indian Trade Guns, by Charles Hanson.

Best regards,

Notchy Bob

Thank you.

 

[Britsmoothy]

No offense to our friends on the other side of the pond...






I wouldn't be too concerned about it.

IIRC, "fowling piece" is an English term. They have funny names for things.

They call these chips...

...and they call these things crisps...

...this is a boot...

...and this is a pigeon hole...

They don't have these vehicles over there, but if they did, they would probably call this a Cowboy Boot.

Here in America, I think it's all right to call that smoothbore gun a fowler.

That was funny and true except for the pigeon hole, that's a glove box. A pigeon hole is usually a series of holes say made of wood, possibly four or five inch fixed to a wall for placing such things as letters in a sorting office etc.

The vehicle with the cowboy boot () is a pickup, sometimes pickup truck.

You guys use wrenches where as we use spanners. When someone wrenches over here they are very ill!

 

[Smokey Plainsman]

That was funny and true except for the pigeon hole, that's a glove box. A pigeon hole is usually a series of holes say made of wood, possibly four or five inch fixed to a wall for placing such things as letters in a sorting office etc.

The vehicle with the cowboy boot () is a pickup, sometimes pickup truck.

You guys use wrenches where as we use spanners. When someone wrenches over here they are very ill!

So it isn’t a “pickup lorry”? I very much fancy a full English breakfast! Black pudding is not something that has yet caught on here, and that is a shame! Fried up with a side of tomatoes and Heinz beans, with some eggs and toast, it’s amazing!

 

[Britsmoothy]

So it isn’t a “pickup lorry”? I very much fancy a full English breakfast! Black pudding is not something that has yet caught on here, and that is a shame! Fried up with a side of tomatoes and Heinz beans, with some eggs and toast, it’s amazing!

Hate black pudding....pigs blood....yuk.
Lorry lol yeah. I mostly say wagon for a truck or lorry. Kids n' women mostly use the phrase lorry

 

[GREENSWLDE]

Surely "A FOWLER" was A water or wild bird shooter who carried a Fowling Piece ( normally a long barrelled gun of largish bore) to shoot Fowls (Flying Quarry) either on water or dry land ??.. OLD DOG..

 

[GREENSWLDE]

GRRW.We call it a Pick Up-- Not a Cow Boy Boot. Some People Have a custom top for these to keep the Dogs or Kids in and the guns and kit safe and dry..

 

[plmeek]

That was funny and true except for the pigeon hole, that's a glove box. A pigeon hole is usually a series of holes say made of wood, possibly four or five inch fixed to a wall for placing such things as letters in a sorting office etc.

The vehicle with the cowboy boot () is a pickup, sometimes pickup truck.

You guys use wrenches where as we use spanners. When someone wrenches over here they are very ill!

I'm glad you found some humor in it. That was my intention. I think we need a little humor now and then with all this stuff we're dealing with.

I lived in the UK for a little over 3 years back in the 90's and enjoyed my stay there very much. I couldn't recall seeing an American pickup over there then, but there were lorries of various types. Seems I remember seeing a TV program where after WW II a farmer put a bed on army surplus Willy and that was the beginning of Range Rover. My memory could be failing me, though, as it did with the glove box/pigeon hole.

On a more serious side, I think the term "fowler" for the gun is well ingrained in American muzzleloading culture. Tom Grinslade titled his book
FLINTLOCK FOWLERS, the First Guns Made in America and Jim Chambers calls his kit a Pennsylvania Fowler. Track of the Wolf seems to use "fowling gun" and "fowler" interchangeably. These are just a few examples. There are many more.

 

[George]

Who used fowling pieces....?

Graydon, Alexander. Memoirs of His Own Time, with Reminiscences of the Men and the Events of the Revolution. Edited by John Stockton Littrell. Philadelphia: Lindsay & Blakiston, 1846.

We find the members of this detachment described in Captain Graydon's
Memoirs as "...old-fashioned men, apparently beyond the meridian of life. They
were truely irregulars; and whether their cloathing, equipments or caparisons
were regarded, it would have been difficult to have discovered any
circumstance of uniformity. Instead of carbines and sabres, they generally
carried fowling pieces; some of them very long. and such as are used for
shooting ducks."

Spence

 

[rich pierce]

Location?

 

[Capt. Jas.]

Many words have been bastardized of late.
"Fitment" is similar in that it now is improperly used to describe how well something is fitted instead of a component of a larger something.

I don't think I will ever adjust to some terms just because some authors and sellers use them in a different manner than historical.
Otherwise I will be examining the "fitment" on my "early Virginia" and "fowler" while fitting out a "possibles bag" for each of them. My "Early VA" being a "flinter" and my "fowler" being a long "smoothie" and a "capper" : )

 

[Feltwad]

Shooting a 4 bore fowler at a Game and Country Fair
Feltwad

 

[Bob McBride]

Shooting a 4 bore fowler at a Game and Country Fair
FeltwadView attachment 30533

Like the hat Felt. I’ve never seen a pan flash look so puny.... Coupla hundred grains?

 

[Rudyard]

At the risk of sounding too phyosophic I think the language & how it evolves is to serve us , Not we it . Much as delight in Shakespearian English it had evolved from earlier usage & went onto to todays usage . Good or bad & how you view it. It evolved & doubtless will continue to do so . Rudyard

 

[Feltwad]

Like the hat Felt. I’ve never seen a pan flash look so puny.... Coupla hundred grains?

Bob maybe the pan flash seems puny but the gun is a percussion cap fowler not a flintlock , Birmingham proofed at 9 drams on black powder {27.1/2 grains to a drm and 6 oz of shot
Feltwad