Early Colonial Rifles ?

[LFord]

I want to start doing some research on pre-Pennsylvania style rifles that would have been used in the colonies in the 1740 to 1770 timeframe and I was hoping someone here could point me toward a good book or two to start out with. I figured Shumway's Rifles of Colonial America would be a good place to start but am not sure which one to buy and while I know it would be a great book to have I really want to start off with something that covers rifles made by the earlier American makers.

 

[AaronT]

I believe you are basically looking at Jaegers. RCA 1 has some along with some Ed Marshal/ Christian Springs rifles. Shumway also has a book just on the Jaegers.

 

[rich pierce]

RCA #1 has some European guns, then Reading rifles, Christian Springs rifles, Bucks County, Lehigh, and Lancaster rifles. RCA #2 has York, Lebanon, and undecided rifles, then Southern attributed rifles, then a few military guns and a Hudson Valley fowler as I recall. So the two books cover different "schools" of early rifles. Although completed in 1980, these books remain the best and most complete references for early rifles and rifle-built smoothbores from early America. They are particularly helpful for the builder because of the standardized views and all the measurements taken.

There is some question whether or not what we'd call "jaegers" were ever made in the colonies. Undoubtedly many such guns were re-stocked here with native woods. But, there are no "proven" examples of rifles scratch built from new parts, made here, that would qualify as a "jaeger" of the same proportions we are used to seeing from Germanic countries (21-26" barrels, etc.). There are so few signed pieces from early years before the Revolution that we likely will never know which guns were scratch-built and which were restocks.

This is important to me at least because a scratch-built gun (gunsmith decides to build a gun and collects or makes the parts) reflects the design in the guy's head, whereas re-stocks by definition cannot be very different from the parts set that came with the original gun.

 

:agree: with Rich. My own kit built jaeger has a curly maple stock to represent a restocked jaeger (this translates to,"I didn't research before I built") that was done to replace a walnut stock that was damaged beyond repair during it's 1748 trip from Europe to the New World. The German-born gunsmith who did the replacement work liked the new curly maple being used over here and gave it a try. I have never seen a photo of a jaeger that was known to have been built from the screws up here in the colonies. But then again I sure as heck don't know everything and I don't pretend to! :: I do know that plenty of jaegers found their way over here one way or another. I almost wished I had gone with an Edward Marshall kit to move my sights further away from each other but still retain the germanic look. Oh well, maybe next time.

 

During the time period you mention: 1740-1770 alot of changes probably took place in American arms. We have no dated pieces from before mid1750s and darn few from mid1750s-1760s, I can think of two offhand. Everyone is quick to point to Jaeger (Germanic)style rifles for the early period and that is safe, but rifled barrels are mentioned in period texts back to the late 1600s in the south where English influences were strong. Most likely in 1740 a person in the colonies would be armed with a smoothbore musket, fowler or fusil. Rifles became common during the F&I War (1750s-60s). By 1770 the American longrifle was well developed, although much "speciation" took place in the Golden Age. :m2c:

 

[Tom Curran]

I have been looking for materials on Jaegers, but there is no book published yet that i know of that deals solely with the Jaeger. It is rumored that sometime this year there will be such a book published.

I have Shumway's "The Jaeger Rifle", but it is photocopies of magazine articles. I am very disappointed in the quality of the photos, and since I can't read, the words don't do me much good.

I do have a few decent lockside Jaeger photos in some coffetable Compleat History of the Gun type of books. I can dig out the titles if you need 'em.

 

[Geoff Jones]

Greetings,
Books addressing that period are indeed rare. I would suggest finding a book by Hartzler and whisker, titled "Early American Flintlocks". I can't remember where I bought it, but it's a relatively new publication....2000 i think. Lots of really early guns....it's divided into regions, New England, PA, and Southern Guns. The text is excellent in content but full of typos and errors. Hopefully this was corrected in later editions. Now that I think about it...I think I found it at "Log Cabin Shoppe", in Lodi, Ohio.