History of the patch

[TerryK]

Cap and Ball channel on youtube had a really nice video of how Jeagers were used in Napoleon times. As I recall they had triangle shaped patches. Anyway it is a pretty neat video, and the guy seems to be pretty smart. I think I'll watch it again myself.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

New Principles of Gunnery: Containing the Determination of the Force of Gunpowder, and Investigation of the Difference in the Resisting Power of the Air to Swift Ad Slow Motions. ... By Benjamin Robins, ...

I don't know if any editing was done over the 6 decades between versions but here is the book in a 1742 edition
New Principles of Gunnery

LD

 

[Artificer]

These are additional documentation quotes I have saved that Forum Member Spence has provided:

A handbook for riflemen: by William Duane, 1812
"The rifleman must be made acquainted with the nature of sights, and the aim of the rifle; how to load with loose ball, to force it dextrously into the barrel, so that it shall lie close upon the powder without bruising the grains; he must be taught how to use the plaister, which is a piece of greased flannel, fustian, or soft leather, to facilitate the passage of the ball into the barrel, and clean it."

Scloppetaria: by Capt. Henry Beaufroy, 1808:
"By the patch is understood the small piece of greased leather, &c. which is put round the ball before driving it down, to fill up the interstices of the grooves, which would, without this precaution, occasion too great a windage."

An early Portuguese book, Espingarda Perfeyta, The Perfect Gun, Cesar Fiosconi & Jordam Guserio, 1718:
" "Others made barrels with rifling inside, some with more and others with less rifling, all of them deep and twisted in the form of a spiral. These were loaded by putting the bullet in a little piece of leather of a thin glove, folded only once, dipped in oil, and thus it was pushed down to the bottom in such a manner that the bullet may not lose its roundness:"

 

[Artificer]

Forum Member Elnathan provided the following quote.

James Audubon, c1810, describing his host preparing to go raccoon hunting:

"… He blows through his rifle to ascertain that it is clear, examines his flint, and thrusts a feather into the touch-hole. To a leathern bag swung at his side is attached a powder-horn; his sheath-knife is there also; below hangs a narrow strip of homespun linen. He takes from his bag a bullet, pulls with his teeth the wooden stopper from his powder-horn, lays the ball in one hand, and with the other pours the powder upon it until it is just overtopped. Raising the horn to his mouth, he again closes it with the stopper, and restores it to its place. He introduces the powder into the tube; springs the box of his gun, greases the "patch" over with some melted tallow, or damps it; then places it on the honey-combed muzzle of his piece. The bullet is placed on the patch over the bore, and pressed with the handle of the knife, which now trims the edge of the linen. The elastic hickory rod, held with both hands, smoothly pushes the ball to its bed; once, twice, thrice has it rebounded. The rifle leaps as it were into the hunters arms, the feather is drawn from the touch-hole, the powder fills the pan, which is closed. “Now I’m ready,” cries the woodsman….

Journals, Vol. 2, (1972 reprint), page 492.

 

[Artificer]

OK, where did the Frontiersman get the leather for his "plaister" or patching?


One of the best period resources detailing living on the American Frontier is:

Notes on the settlement and Indian wars of the western parts of Virginia and Pennsylvania, from 1763 to 1783, inclusive : together with a view of the state of society, and manners of the first settlers of the western country
by Doddridge, Joseph, 1769-1826

page 165

Every family tanned their own leather. The tan vat was a large trough sunk to the upper edge in the ground. A quantity of bark was easily obtained every spring, in clearing and fencing the land. This, after drying, was brought in and in wet days was shaved and pounded on a block of wood, with an axe or mallet. Ashes was used in place of lime for taking off the hair. Bears’ oil, hog’s lard and tallow, answered the place of fish oil. The leather, to be sure, was coarse ; but it was substantially good. The operation of currying was performed by a drawing knife with its edge turned, after the manner of a currying knife. The blacking for the leather was made of soot and hog’s lard.

Other parts of the same work talk about every family making their own cloth. Scraps of that cloth provided cloth patches.

For those interested, here is a link to where you can read the above work. You click on the right side to "turn" each page.

https://archive.org/details/notesonsettlemen00dodd_0/page/n9/mode/2up
Gus

 

[Artificer]

This one is an example from experimental archeology performed by Passed Forum Member Chuck Burrows, who was a professional trained leather worker and beloved member for years.

Years ago I asked about actually using leather as a patch and theorized ball diameters may/would be reduced from how tight we patch balls today.

Chuck used scrap pieces of historically correct brain tanned buckskin and soft vegetable tanned leathers for patching material. Even with the fairly thick brain tanned buckskin, Chuck reported he had no difficulty using it as a patch when greased or oiled with period materials and using balls from modern molds that gave ball sizes that were only .010" less than the true barrel diameter.

To me that is elegant proof proving the period accounts of using leather for patch material actually did and does work.

Gus

 

[vezePilot]

This is a great Thread, on a great interWeb site. I'm under the impression that most here prefer the outdoors. And yet here is a scholarly and polite discussion, with the need for hard-copy documentation, of how Americans truly once lived. Historical fact, properly researched.

While the rest of the cyberg space is going up in flames, this is a nice place to relax and ignore it.
My other similar site is the CorvetteForums ... but that is quite shallow, generally; compared to this.

 

[Artificer]

Please post a source for this info.

A GREAT place to look for period information on period guns, manufacture, usage, etc., etc, is in "An Essay on Shooting," by William Cleator but published by Tho. Cadell in 1789. For this inquiry, it is best to look in Chapter X of that book, “Of Rifle Barrels,”beginning on page 123.

Page 131 is the page we are looking for:

“Besides the method of loading, by driving down the ball with an Iron Rammer, there are several others which we shall mention. In Germany they sometimes charge them in the following manner; a piece of thin leather or fustian is cut of a circular shape, and is so large as to cover a little more than one half the ball; this piece is then greased on one side, and being placed over the muzzle, the ball is laid upon it, and both thrust down together; by this means the leather or fustian enters in the rifles, and the bullet being firmly embraced by it, acquires the proper rotary motion in its passage through the barrel. If this method be equally effectual, it is certainly more easy and expeditious than the method already described. “

You can go to the following to read the quote above:

An Essay on Shooting

Gus

 

[toot]

very interesting!

 

[Howard Pippin]

Forum Member Elnathan provided the following quote.

James Audubon, c1810, describing his host preparing to go raccoon hunting:

"… He blows through his rifle to ascertain that it is clear, examines his flint, and thrusts a feather into the touch-hole. To a leathern bag swung at his side is attached a powder-horn; his sheath-knife is there also; below hangs a narrow strip of homespun linen. He takes from his bag a bullet, pulls with his teeth the wooden stopper from his powder-horn, lays the ball in one hand, and with the other pours the powder upon it until it is just overtopped. Raising the horn to his mouth, he again closes it with the stopper, and restores it to its place. He introduces the powder into the tube; springs the box of his gun, greases the "patch" over with some melted tallow, or damps it; then places it on the honey-combed muzzle of his piece. The bullet is placed on the patch over the bore, and pressed with the handle of the knife, which now trims the edge of the linen. The elastic hickory rod, held with both hands, smoothly pushes the ball to its bed; once, twice, thrice has it rebounded. The rifle leaps as it were into the hunters arms, the feather is drawn from the touch-hole, the powder fills the pan, which is closed. “Now I’m ready,” cries the woodsman….

Journals, Vol. 2, (1972 reprint), page 492.

It had been quite a while since I tried this method of powder measurement, curiosity got the best of me so I went out To my loading shack and tried it, and then checked the weight of the powder charge. 3F varied from about 49 to 80 grains depending how high I held the powder above the ball, the higher the more powder. With a cupped hand 37 to 40 seemed about average. They all would've been safe, But next summer I'm going have to try shooting them and see what they do at 50 yards. Thanks for the reminder that, supposedly, this was a common method.
Squint

 

[Artificer]

It had been quite a while since I tried this method of powder measurement, curiosity got the best of me so I went out To my loading shack and tried it, and then checked the weight of the powder charge. 3F varied from about 49 to 80 grains depending how high I held the powder above the ball, the higher the more powder. With a cupped hand 37 to 40 seemed about average. They all would've been safe, But next summer I'm going have to try shooting them and see what they do at 50 yards. Thanks for the reminder that, supposedly, this was a common method.
Squint

I will be VERY interested to see the results from your 50 yard test.

You are most welcome.

Gus

 

[Loyalist Dave]

..., curiosity got the best of me so I went out To my loading shack and tried it, and then checked the weight of the powder charge...., With a cupped hand 37 to 40 seemed about average. They all would've been safe.....

One curious side note ....,

IF you ever get a chance to see John Wayne and Claire Trevor in Allegheney Uprising (1939) the movie deals with the 1765 "Black Boys Rebellion" lead by James Smith in and around the Conococheague Valley (Mercersburg PA)..., you see the group beginning the uprising going out at night, but first they must load their firearms. So you see one person doing the powder/ball in the hand method.

Which I found pretty amazing, as somebody in the prop department (Looks like they might have had a few original flintlock muskets) had to have coached the cast on how to do that. It's not intuitive.

LD

 

[Grenadier1758]

And in the movie Allegheny Uprising, during the trial scene, Claire Trevor is asked to load the rifle for a shot demonstration. She loads by placing the ball in her hand and pouring powder over the ball. Very deftly I might add. Would be an excellent video tutorial on how to measure powder.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

And in the movie Allegheny Uprising, during the trial scene, Claire Trevor is asked to load the rifle for a shot demonstration. She loads by placing the ball in her hand and pouring powder over the ball. Very deftly I might add. Would be an excellent video tutorial on how to measure powder.

Maybe that's what I'm remembering!

LD

 

[Artificer]

Smokey Plainsman said:
They used a metal corkscrew called a “worm” stuck one the end of a ramrod and wiped the bore with tow.

Please post a source for this info.

Just so everyone is on the same page. I thought I might illustrate some modern reproductions of these "Worms." They are listed as:

WORM-PR-L Patch puller, primitive corkscrew worm, large, steel, fits plain rod.
WORM-PR-S Patch puller, primitive corkscrew worm, small, steel, fits plain rod.
In this link:
https://www.trackofthewolf.com/List/Item.aspx/851/1
Though I have many source documents talking about such worms issued to the military and militiamen, most don't describe them. Actually a quick check of four other sources didn't describe them.

The book "Of Sorts for Provincials" by Jim Mullins actually shows a picture of two such original Gun Worms excavated at Fort Ticonderoga on page 38. This book is not available free to read online, but you may enjoy the "blogs" Jim has written by going to the link below. Oh, please note Jim has not taken the time to index the content of his blogs, so you just have to click the "year links" to see what was in the past blogs.

https://ofsortsforprovincials.blogspot.com/2017/
Many, if not most modern made wooden ramrods have brass or Iron "tips" with threaded holes to use "screw on" jags, worms, ball pullers, etc.

Some people today are making sheet iron tips brazed around what is in effect a round disc with a threaded hole in the end and calling them authentic to the period. I don't have documentation on these and have never even heard of any 18th century period documentation, though there may be some I don't know about.

However in the 18th century, there is almost NO documentation for these things on commercial smoothbores and rifle ramrods. Most original wooden ramrods that actually had tips, only had them on one end and the tips did not have threaded holes. Very late in the 18th century, there appeared on some wooden ramrods, a "pinned on" worm permanently attached to the rear end of a wooden ramrod, though. Below is a link that shows on a pistol rod:
http://www.cablesfarm.co.uk/ramrods-and-loading-rods/
So even though I don't believe I have ever seen an original "cork screw" worm (that winds onto a wooden ramrod end) identified to a particular 18th century smoothbore or rifled gun, I believe there is more than sufficient documentation for their use.

Hope this helps,

Gus

 

[tenngun]

Worms from the museum of the fur trade to fit on the rod, copies are available and work well with tow or patch. Sometimes I spin a strip of flannel on it.

 

[Artificer]

View attachment 50373Worms from the museum of the fur trade to fit on the rod, copies are available and work well with tow or patch. Sometimes I spin a strip of flannel on it.

Thanks Tenngun,

Dumb question if I may, as I have not used them. Were the larger diameter ends of these worms screwed onto the tapered ends of wood ramrods or vice versa?

Gus

 

[Grenadier1758]

When I twist up gun worms, the larger end are screwed onto the ramrod. I need to take some photographs.

 

[tenngun]

I can’t get enough ‘bite’ on the 3/8 + end to hold, I put mine on the tapered edge. Won’t fit a 7/16 at all

 

[Grenadier1758]

I make my gun worms from a section of coat hangar. My form is my ram rod or a scrap piece of ramrod with a few grooves cut thread like on the rod. These worms are so easy to make and quite effective.