Mountain Man shotgun

2)The Hellinghaus shotgun owned by Carson is dated by the Museum of the Fur Trade as circa 1840...

I think that comes from one of the Mountain man sketchbooks, which is kind of odd since the the original MFTQ article on that gun has the story of it being given to a soldier at the post where Carson died around the time of his death. Those sketchbooks had a lot of problems. To be honest, museum attributions are generally rather optimistic as to date and the Museum of the Fur Trade is no exception to that rule. History is also a work in progress and new info has come to light since they wrote those sketchbooks. For example, the southern flint rifle that they have in there actually dates to the 1850's or later.

I have not disputed that doubles were available or that the Hawken shop sold and repaired them with my posts above. My only intention was to say that they were much less common than NW guns in the West and more expensive than the trade rifles that they often went into debt to buy. A $12 trade rifle often went for $50 and up in the West. Fremont's purchase would have represented one of the more well-healed and the gun was purchased in St. Louis.

I have the Hanson book you mentioned and just unpacked it from a box. The earliest reference to a double gun being sold by the Hawkens that I can find in it is 1838 for a 'fine double barreled shotgun in case' on page 22. The list of advertisement you mentioned starts on page 73. The earliest mention of doubles is March 13, 1832 by Squire and Tyson of NY who list 'Flint and percussion fowling pieces and ducking guns of all kinds and prices, of single and double barrel.' There are several mentions of doubles in the list before 1840, but that does not change the fact that their are very few notations of double guns in western period literature and trade records.

There is nothing that says you can't carry one. However, if you portray a dirt poor company trapper or even a free trapper, they would be unlikely to be able to afford one during the period. They also would have been much more likely to trade their hard earned plews for a rifle.

Respectfully,

Sean

 

[Carteret Kid]

To sum it up , A double barrel would have been avalible to a well fiananced Mountain Man , but not common ' and Percussion guns came at the tail end of the era .
I believe the most common smooth bores would have been NW trade muskets because they were already stocked by the fur traders .

 

[crockett]

Thanks everybody for all the great info but I think Sean knows where I am coming from on this. I read the Hanson books and just figured double barrel shotguns were fairly common, or at least used to some extent by mountaineers guarding the horses and goods. I started all this by asking if anyone had any definite information on these shotguns, what they looked like? Who made them? etc.
I don't know where Hanson got his information. I don't see much on the inventory lists or in the journals, etc. Thanks to our discussion here I am going to re-think this issue, that they were perhaps NOT COMMON unless we get some kind of documentation. I don't have any.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Sean: I have seen and handled a DB shotgun, 12 gauge, made by the Tower Armory in London, stamped 1775, from a private collection. This is a double flint shotgun, so I can definitely say that these guns were made. However, this gun was obviously made for a high ranking officer, based on the workmanship, and the provision for military style sling, similar to that used on Brown Bess muskets. How this gun got to America, and with whom, I was not able to learn.

The son of the owner was a friend, and borrowed it from his dad's collection so I could get a scaled drawing of a full-sized, Musket-style large lock that was LHed. Both locks were finely made, with some evidence of filing where it did not matter. They were mirror images of each other as best we could tell. The gun had 36 inch barrels on it, balanced in the fore hand, a beaver tail style forestock, and a buttplate that was almost 3 inches wide. LOP was only 12 1/2", but the gun came to my shoulder well, and the down pitch was sufficient that I was looking right down the barrels over the rib the first time I shouldered the gun. The balance let the gun swing easily, and the weight of the gun was such that it stayed on the moving target through the swing. I did not remove the stock from the barrels, to check the proof marks on the bottom of the barrels, because I promised my friend that we would only remove the locks to do a machine drawing of the lockplate, the cock, and, possibly some of the internal parts. As it was, we did only the plate and the cock. We did not want to risk breaking anything to take the parts out of the lockplate. This all occurred almost 30 years ago.

Having said that, I do believe that while double flint guns were around, they were always expensive and only the aristorcracy could afford to have one made. This is not likely to be a common arm you would see taken by the common mountain man heading to the Rockies to spend the winter trapping. Those men hired by the fur companies often had to have their firearms, traps, and gear furnished to them by the company, and have the cost taken out of the profits at the end of the trapping season the next spring. Trade guns, muskets,(including any Brown Bess, or Charleyville musket one could lay hands on) would be what kind of smoothbores that were taken west, at least in the early days.

 

[Stony]

An interesting first hand account would be Edward Warren by William Drummond Stewart. Mr. Stewart was the Scottish Baron who traveled to several rendezvous and by most accounts spent at least one trapping season with Jim Bridger & company. He even took a suit of armour for Jim to one rendezvous!

 

[paulvallandigham]

Yes. Notice the TITLE he had-- " BARON "-- Indicating he had a lot of MONEY! As I said, aristocrats could afford such things as DB shotguns, as well as suits of armor to give away to famous Guides and Explorers. You didn't see common soldiers wearing suits of armor in battle, either.

 

[Ringel05]

I resurrected this thread because I'm doing research into just this question. What I've found so far is by 1822 double barrel, percussion shotgun "production" began in earnest when Alexander Forsyth's patent ran out. There are reports of percussion double barrels at the Battle of San Jacinto (Mirabeau Lamar carried a Richard Hollis Double barreled Percussion Shotgun) though by and large most double barrels in the west at this time were flintlock. There is also a reference to a painting in which "Sylvester is shown carrying a double-barreled shotgun on his back, ... and was lost during the Battle of San Jacinto."
Save Texas History
By 1825 firearms were starting to be built using percussion and by 1830 about half of all firearms made were percussion. The double barrel shotgun originated in England in the late 1700s and, again, by the mid 1820s most were being made with percussion ignition systems. Supposedly, (I haven't found the documentation to confirm the claim), shotguns were favored by many during the fur trade era for "guard" duty.
Mountain Men and the Fur Trade Virtual Museum

 

[Captjoel]

If you have access to the book "The Peacemakers Arms and Adventure In The American West" by R.L. Wilson, you will find pictures(photos) on page 55. One of Joe Meek sitting with a double barrel percussion gun. Next to this picture on the same page is a photo of Kit Carson's dbl barrel percussion shotgun made by Frederick Hellinghaus of St. Louis, Mo.

 

[Ringel05]

If you have access to the book "The Peacemakers Arms and Adventure In The American West" by R.L. Wilson, you will find pictures(photos) on page 55. One of Joe Meek sitting with a double barrel percussion gun. Next to this picture on the same page is a photo of Kit Carson's dbl barrel percussion shotgun made by Frederick Hellinghaus of St. Louis, Mo.

Kinda hard to have a pre-1850s photo of Meek, Kit Carson or anyone else for that matter. While the Daguerreotype process was available in France and the calotype process in England I'm not sure how readily available they would have been here pre-1850.

 

[Rod Lassey]

A couple of images of Meek:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/80/JosephMeek.jpg

http://www.co.washington.or.us/Sheriff/YourSheriff/history.cfm

A number of engravings have been done from the first image, the second has been heavily retouched. No idea when these were taken, obviously the first was fairly early, in the second Meek is wearing a percussion revolver, so that may help date it.

Rod

 

[LaBonte]

Rod - that first picture of Meek with the wolf fur hat was taken during Meek's trip to Washington, DC in 1848 after the Whitman Massacre as the "envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary from the Republic of Oregon to the Court of the United States".

IIRC the second image was taken when he sheriff and is definitely post 1850...

 

[nkbj]

You couldn't pack a better dose of medicine than a side by side.
There are some nice ones to see on display at the little Battle of Tippecanoe museum. We went by there after Christmas and I was glad to have the work camera along.

 

[crockett]

I'm glad this thread has come to life again, what I was originally thinking was that on the rifles- we have good detail. We can make a replica of a Hawken or a trade gun and have exact lines, shapes, etc of every part. BUT....the shotgun situation is in its infancy as far as I know, you can buy a side by side from Dixie Gun Works that really doesn't look much like an original. The only thing black powder about it is the locks, etc. My point being, I don't know of any plans or specs to follow if one wanted to make an accurate replica of a side by side shotgun used by a mountain man.
There is actually some sense to all this. I like shooting a rifle as much as the next guy but during deer season you must wear blaze orange. A side by side would allow one to hunt during small game season, camp out, etc and with re-enactment clothes and gear.

 

[Ringel05]

I'm glad this thread has come to life again, what I was originally thinking was that on the rifles- we have good detail. We can make a replica of a Hawken or a trade gun and have exact lines, shapes, etc of every part. BUT....the shotgun situation is in its infancy as far as I know, you can buy a side by side from Dixie Gun Works that really doesn't look much like an original. The only thing black powder about it is the locks, etc. My point being, I don't know of any plans or specs to follow if one wanted to make an accurate replica of a side by side shotgun used by a mountain man.
There is actually some sense to all this. I like shooting a rifle as much as the next guy but during deer season you must wear blaze orange. A side by side would allow one to hunt during small game season, camp out, etc and with re-enactment clothes and gear.

Joseph Manton, James Purdy, William Boss, Westley Richards & Co., Holland & Holland, E.J. Churchill, and John Rigby were some of the premier English shotgun makers with Manton believed to be the first side by side shotgun manufacturer.
Look up their originals online to study the pictures. Other than many being rather ornate there's not much difference that I can see between the basic originals and many of the reproductions.

 

[crockett]

I guess I'm being lazy. The Museum of the Fur Trade has some sketch books with full size plans for re-creating a trade rifle, etc. I guess I was looking for something like that but the photos are definately an option- good idea.

 

[LaBonte]

Keep your eye out for a good original shooter (even into the 1850's since styles didn't change that much - both back action and side locks would be PC for the 1830's) they can be had for less than the parts to make one...

 

[Ringel05]

Keep your eye out for a good original shooter (even into the 1850's since styles didn't change that much - both back action and side locks would be PC for the 1830's) they can be had for less than the parts to make one...

:thumbsup:

 

[Ringel05]

I guess I'm being lazy. The Museum of the Fur Trade has some sketch books with full size plans for re-creating a trade rifle, etc. I guess I was looking for something like that but the photos are definately an option- good idea.

Found this book at Track of the Wolf.

Recreating the Double Barrel Muzzleloading Shotgun, Second Edition

 

[LaBonte]

and another option, unless you're dead set on a double is to build a smooth bore NW trade gun - real common for the period and lots of parts and kits available and it would do you for what you want

 

[Ringel05]

and another option, unless you're dead set on a double is to build a smooth bore NW trade gun - real common for the period and lots of parts and kits available and it would do you for what you want

I already bought a SXS besides, I plan on doing a trader, not a trapper impression, not that SXS's weren't used by trappers.