Rifleman1776 said:
Yes, interesting thread.
Ye said:
I also doubt they ever kept a single rifle for ten years.
That is another interesting issue. No doubt the frontiersman didn't have nearby Bass Pro Shops to trade in his rifle every couple years. How long did they keep their guns? :idunno: Methinks, just an opinion, they kept them a very long time. Goods were not easy come by. Items like fabric and cooking utensils probably had priority with the household budget. Jes thinkin' :hmm:
At least during the Rocky Mtn Fur Trade era there is plenty of documentation for guns being used up quickly and while there was no Bass Pro Shops there were other sources of supply that didn't take months to reach.
Osborne Russell for instance used up/lost/or had stolen at least a half dozen guns in his 9 years. And that's just one example. IIRC the average life span for long guns at that time (1807 -1840's) was around two years.
The L & C expedition is another instance of how hard guns were used up there's a letter from one of the leaders noting that if they had not had a gunsmith along with them their guns would have been mostly out of use timehe tiem they reached the Mandans in the first few months. Zeb Pike also notes how fast their guns went out of order.
As for re-supply - one common misconception is that during the RMFT ers that the only source of supply, was the yearly rendezvous, but in fact by the early 1830's there were several forts/posts in existence all over the north and central Rockies. Another source of re-supply was the brigades which apparently based on the period documentation carried extras of everything - in the mid-1830's Tom Fitzpatrick's brigade of the RMFCo had all their goods stolen by the Crows. He then tracked down another brigade under Bridger's command to re-outfit.
re: patching - as noted cloth was a major trade article (in fact it was THE major article and on the trade list that note what was actually purchased by the trapper it is the number one article and often in small enough amounts to at least suggest it's use for something besides clothing) and that was not the only source - cloth clothing such as shirts, which were very common in the RMFT era, wore out quickly and the remains would/could have been used as a source for cleaning and/or shooting patches.
As for leather - antelope aka pronghorn makes excellent patching material - it's both thin and strong and readily available.
For smooth bores, blanket wadding is mentioned in period sources.
Tow sounds good/logical and was most likely used fairly often in the east, but as others have noted it does not show up on any of the published RMFT trade lists other than a few references to tow sheeting ie linen sheeting.
