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It's a heck of a lot cheaper to shoot a rifle than a common smoothbore. Less lead by far and half the powder. Economics were the reason rifles were carried west of the seaboard in the first place. Hunting small game with shot unless absolutly neccesary was wasteful.
I disagree, the smoothbore was very common west of the American eastern seaboard, and there are numerous accounts to testify to that.
Economically the Smoothbore was cheaper to produce, in addition to the fact that there were already more of of them available second hand than new or used Rifles.
We should also remember that people in those days werent in the habit of casually shooting just for the hell of it, Powder and Lead were expensive and loads werent "high powered" as we expect nowadays.
Stalking game was considered essential to effective hunting, and long range shots werent usually acceptable, nothing like the Hollywood BS so prevalent today.
Additionally the Flintlock Smoothbore was versatile and adaptable as a Survival weapon, using both Ball, Shot and even a handful of pebbles if need be; if I was to have only 1 Firearm for Survival it would without hesitation be a Flintlock Smoothbore.
A Rifle needed careful cleaning and fouled too easily in a violent encounter, although a Meat getter was the priority in the wilderness, time wasted reloading in what could be a life or death situation would have been never far from mind, and the Smoothbore trumps a Rifle every time in that scenario.
Brown Bess like Fusils, and later North West style and French Trade gun Smoothbores dominated the scene particularly with the Indians right up until the mid 19th century, and there was no shortage of the Fur trade Mountain Men carrying Smoothbores.
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