Percussion caps in period

[CaptainKirk]

How practical were percussion caps for the plainsman of the old west? It seems towns, and visits to them for supplies, were few and far between for the average hunter/trapper. Even though caps are light and take up little room compared to powder or bullets, it seems that keeping adequate supplies on hand would be an issue for a nomadic hunter and trapper back in the day...yet most movies and documentaries show the caplock as the primary weapon used on trails west. What say you, history buffs?

 

[Kansas Jake]

In the past in other threads there have been posts of documentation of caps being shipped to the rendezvous etc. I suspect many of the trading posts and forts had them too as things got into the percussion era after 1835 or so. It would also be my speculation the average hunter/trapper shot less than we imagine. The exception may have been market hunters shooting bison. Even then he would only shoot what could be skinned in a timely manner. A tin or two of caps may have lasted a fairly long time. Your question is interesting and I wonder if there is any documentation on how after a hunter shot prior to 1850.

 

[CaptainKirk]

In the past in other threads there have been posts of documentation of caps being shipped to the rendezvous etc. I suspect many of the trading posts and forts had them too as things got into the percussion era after 1835 or so. It would also be my speculation the average hunter/trapper shot less than we imagine. The exception may have been market hunters shooting bison. Even then he would only shoot what could be skinned in a timely manner. A tin or two of caps may have lasted a fairly long time. Your question is interesting and I wonder if there is any documentation on how after a hunter shot prior to 1850.

I'm very curious as to how this would have affected the trailblazers and wagon trains heading west to places like Oregon and the Pacific Northwest, California, and the American Southwest where there would not likely have been any rendezvous activity and probably few, if any, settlements once they reached their destination. Seems to me like a pocket full of flints would have been much more of a sure thing to those pilgrims.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Seems to me like a pocket full of flints would have been much more of a sure thing to those pilgrims.

 

[mooman76]

I'm sure they thought of this and either had spare guns that were flint or they just stuck with flint if they thought it would be difficult to obtain. After all they had to think about powder availability also.

 

[Kansas Jake]

Fort Kearney on the Oregon trail was established in 1848. Fort Laramie earlier in 1834. Hudson Bay was in Oregon much earlier.Those are just a few locations on the Oregon trail. The There were other trading posts on the plains along with in major places like Taos and Sante Fe. I suspect those places had caps fairly early on.

Rifleman 1776 I agree on the flintlock.

 

[Zonie]

It wouldn't surprise me at all to find that the people going West and armed with a percussion gun would have bought thousands of percussion caps to take with them before they left.
They weren't dummies and they would have known that percussion caps were necessary for their gun and caps would not be easily found once they arrived in Washington, Oregon or California.

It would be interesting to find some original documentation about this. I know if I was going on one of these trips, I would take at least 5000 caps with me. Maybe even 10,000 caps if I could find them.

 

[tenngun]

We know flints were shipped well past the WBTS.
La Vern has another thread listing issues to French officers, about one flint for every sixteen shots.
I’ve had fifty shot flints and twenty shot flints. But if you think in terms of storage. Twelve hundred caps take up very little room for a thousand shots, compared to a bag of flints for the same number of shots.
In 1859 an officer wrote a guidebook to trails west. This is less then twenty years after the last rendezvous and reflects what this man had learned in a decade previously to publishing.
When I read it I was surprised how much chances to resupply one had moving west.
In KC no there is the wreck of the Arabia, a steam boat going west. It’s chocked full of stuff, including about 20% of its cargo that was luxury stuff.
When you walk through it’s like an old time hardware store and well stocked one. The sobering thing was knowing a few days ahead of Arabia was another one. And one just a day or two behind. Ever day the river was opened to traffic that year.
Its surprising how much was moving in to the ‘uncivilized west’
Reading the history of the war of 1812 I was likewise surprised by the shear volume of trade. At sea, and too how much ran down the Ohio to New Orleans. Unlike the the pictures of an axe and the woods and little more then a mule load, people were pretty well supplied on the frontier.

 

[Old Hawkeye]

I'm very curious as to how this would have affected the trailblazers and wagon trains heading west to places like Oregon and the Pacific Northwest, California, and the American Southwest where there would not likely have been any rendezvous activity and probably few, if any, settlements once they reached their destination. Seems to me like a pocket full of flints would have been much more of a sure thing to those pilgrims.

A dozen flints would be heavier & take up more room than a thousand caps & only give you a few hundred sparks. Like others have said, those people weren't stupid & carrying enough caps would have not been either a burden or a logistical problem at all. They also wanted to take the best technology with them, just like we would today. I know if I was going in harms way, like they were, I would pick the cap over the flint in a heartbeat!! Remember, caps were an IMPROVEMENT!

 

[FishDFly]

There were quite a few traders who made the rounds trading with the settlers and the various friendly Indian tribes. Lewis and Clark ran into the Traders, they are mentioned in Gass's book. Traders also came from the Pacific area going east, again in Gass's book.

I would imagine along with powder at the various forts/trading posts, they would have caps as well.

The Indians preferred flint guns, that was they were not dependent on traders.

 

[Carbon 6]

The percussion cap ignition system as we know it was developed around 1818 and came into universal use on private arms in 1826. It was adopted on military arms by the 1830's.

In 1827 Wm. Goulding advertised percussion caps for sale in Portland Maine. On July, 20th, 1830 the Missouri Republican listed an advertisement by F.L. & C.P. Billon for percussion caps, pistols, powder horns and flasks, shot and game bags. From that time forward the St. Louis merchants advertised hundreds of thousands of percussion caps available from England, Germany, and France.

The earliest Hawken rifle known to be used in the Rocky Mountains was purchased by William Ashley in 1823. This was a special order heavy rifle. It had a 42 inch long barrel and was bored for a one ounce ball (about .68 caliber). On the return trip from the mountains Ashley reported killing a buffalo from a very long distance with a single shot from this rifle. In 1832 Lucien Fontenelle purchased a Hawken rifle and 500 percussion caps. Andrew Drips bought a Hawken rifle and a spare lock. Etienne Papin and James Jackson each purchased Hawken rifles that year as well. Although the Hawken rifle was not the most common rifle in use during the rendezvous period, existing account records list no fewer than 44 mountain men who purchased Hawken rifles between 1831 and 1840.


The pinnacle in popularity of the Hawken rifle was during the post 1840 period of the Santa Fe Trail, and the gold rush periods of 1849 and 1859. Rifles of this type were made by dozens of St. Louis rifle makers such as; H. E. Dimick, Reno Beauvais, T. Albright, and others. The Hawken rifle remained popular until the American Civil War when advancements in metallic cartridge rifles rendered them nearly obsolete.

The Hawken percussion rifle was available in limited numbers during the latter years of the rendezvous period and there is evidence of a few mountain men owning them. However, the most popular and common rifle in use by the mountain man and trapper was the flintlock Lancaster rifle.

 

[Kansas Jake]

Lead probably would have been a bigger issue if one was shooting alot. It is heavier and with a plains rifle with a large bore would have much more weight. 1000 caps isn't much weight, but 1000 balls or the lead to cast them is.

 

[megasupermagnum]

A dozen flints would be heavier & take up more room than a thousand caps & only give you a few hundred sparks. Like others have said, those people weren't stupid & carrying enough caps would have not been either a burden or a logistical problem at all. They also wanted to take the best technology with them, just like we would today. I know if I was going in harms way, like they were, I would pick the cap over the flint in a heartbeat!! Remember, caps were an IMPROVEMENT!

I'm not going to weigh anything, but I can assure you 12 flints is no where near the size of 1000 caps. A dozen flints is like a roll of quarters, and likely only weights a few ounces. 1000 caps, even loosely bagged is going to take up a bag at least the size of a fist, something like 6 times the size of the flints, and would likely weigh a couple pounds.

 

[Carbon 6]

Flints seem to make more sense for a mountain man, but the majority of people on the plains weren't mountain men. They were eastern city folk headed west and a percussion gun was a whole lot easier to operate.
I also suspect a percussion gun and/or caps would have a much higher trade value too. Should you encounter someone with something worth trading.

 

[mooman76]

I would imagine like today, the majority of people would want the latest new fangled gizmos whether they were better or not and then you also have the old farts like us refusing to change.

 

[smoothshooter]

How practical were percussion caps for the plainsman of the old west? It seems towns, and visits to them for supplies, were few and far between for the average hunter/trapper. Even though caps are light and take up little room compared to powder or bullets, it seems that keeping adequate supplies on hand would be an issue for a nomadic hunter and trapper back in the day...yet most movies and documentaries show the caplock as the primary weapon used on trails west. What say you, history buffs?

I would think keeping caps dry would be a percussion shooter’s biggest problem.

Only a very, very small percentage of the general population in the West lived on the real frontier, or on the edges of civilization where supplies were hard to buy as needed.

 

[Stantheman86]

US Army Infantrymen fought the Mexican Army in the Mexican War armed primarily with Flintlock smoothbore Muskets for this very same reason.....the US Army Ordnance Dept felt that relying on logistical supply for a then "new" technology was unnecessary when Soldiers were already armed with flintlocks that worked just fine.

Percussion rifles like the .54 "Mississippi " were more or less for Elite specialty troops. The average Line Grunt was issued a 1795 or 1816, etc Flintlock Springfield.

Likely because the Army had barrels and barrels of flints in storage and no sure way to guarantee percussion caps could be issued.

A single Flint would last an entire engagement, making sure each man had 30-50 caps is a different story.

We don't often think of it today but imagine an entire Division of Infantry rendered combat ineffective because caps couldn't be made available. If your guns don't go Boom you can't fight.

 

[Carbon 6]

A single Flint would last an entire engagement, making sure each man had 30-50 caps is a different story.

That sounds "logical", but history plays out differently.

 

[plmeek]

CaptainKirk,

You start out asking about "nomadic hunter and trapper back in the day" and end up talking about "wagon trains heading west to places like Oregon and the Pacific Northwest, California, and the American Southwest where there would not likely have been any rendezvous activity and probably few, if any, settlements once they reached their destination." Those cover two different periods. The mountain men period was pretty much pre-1840 and Oregon Trail and California Trail post-1840.

Kansas Jake's responses to both, though general in nature, are correct.

The earliest documented use of a percussion arm by a mountain man is Lucien Fontenelle who purchased 500 caps with his J&S Hawken rifle in 1832. At the time, Lucien Fontenelle was a brigade leader for the American Fur Co. who led supply caravans to the mountains as well as trapping parties during the trapping seasons.

The idea of lone free trappers scouring the mountains and streams for beaver is largely a Hollywood perpetuated myth. Most trappers were part of a brigade that was outfitted with pack animals, camp tenders, hunters, and blacksmith/gunsmith. The trappers might split off from the main brigade for short periods to trap the various streams in a drainage, but would re-join the brigade when it was time to move to another drainage. The brigades would usually come together when the streams froze over to spend the winter at one location. Then move out for the spring hunt and meet up again for the summer rendezvous.

The brigades brought everything that would be needed for a full year in the mountains. They had the pack animals to haul everything and the numbers to keep everything safe. There would be no problem with bringing an adequate supply of caps for those few men, whether brigade leaders, hunters, or trappers that wanted to carry a percussion rifle.

The 1836 rendezvous supplies included the following:

2000	Gun Flints
500	Rifle Flints
2 dz	Gun locks
6	Rifle locks
4 pairs	Pistols Iron
2	Am Rifle
7	Am Rifle
8	Hawkin Rifle
84	N. W. Guns
30	N. W. Guns
2	Rifles Hawkin
10	Boxes Percussion Caps
1/2 dz	Gun & Rifle locks
2	Rifles Hawkens

I'm not certain how many caps were in a "box", but these are wholesale or bulk lists so I assume a 1,000 caps per box or 10,000 caps total. This compares to 500 Rifle flints. The 2,000 Gun flints would be larger flints for NW trade guns. Note that the list includes spare rifle and gun locks so the blacksmith/gunsmith could make repairs to the rifles and trade guns in the mountains.

A supply of 10,000 caps suggest a significant number of percussion rifles and pistols were being carried by members of the brigade.

By 1840, percussion arms were very common. The folks headed for Oregon or California by wagon train would have no problem carrying an adequate supply of percussion caps if they chose to. Once in Oregon or California, they could be resupplied by the annual wagon trains, but more likely by the many ships that operated up and down the coast for the fur trade and the local economy. As the population grew in the 1840's and 1850's, the port towns/cities in Oregon and California would have had all the merchandise that places like New Orleans, Galveston, and St. Louis had, mostly supplied by ships.

The descendents of the mountain man James Clyman still have his full stock J&S Hawken. It is a percussion rifle. Clyman was a trapper with Ashley's men in the mountains from 1823 to 1827. The rifle(s) he carried in that period would have been flintlocks. He decided to travel the Oregon trail in 1844. He then traveled from Oregon to California the next year. He returned to St. Louis from California in 1846. His surviving percussion Hawken rifle was likely carried on these travels in the mid-1840's. Clyman traveled with wagons and pack animals. The point is that he didn't seem to have any trouble carrying or getting re-supplied with percussion caps for the more than two years he spent away from St. Louis in the West.

 

[Carbon 6]

I would think keeping caps dry would be a percussion shooter’s biggest problem.

Here again, history and my own personal experience tell a different story.
If you can keep your powder, surely you can keep your caps dry.