Shot Pouch Question

[Capt. Jas.]

If someone asked to borrow my shot pouch, I wouldn't hand them my shooting bag.

I would, because I don't have a shooting bag, only a shot pouch. :wink:

Spence

Spence,

I VERY much appreciate your efforts to keep 18th century terminology alive and reminding us of period terms.

What terms did they use to describe a bag or pouch that held "small shot" for fowling? Was the term "Shot Snake" in use in the 18th century?

What term/s did they use to describe what we might call a ball bag or ball pouch, with or without a stopper sewn in?

Gus

Gus, I know the the term "snake belt" was in use by the English as early as the 1760s.
I also agree "shot bag" was a common term for the small pouch (not hooker sized shoulder bag) used in the 18th century. It was termed so and sized small because it mainly carried loose bullets and sometimes small shot if using a musket or othe smooth gun. When you reached in that small bag you pulled out projectiles and did not have to sift thru a bunch of junk. At most, some wadding or patching and a flinto or two but they probably wereally elsewhere, like the button trap or pocket.

 

[Artificer]

James,

Thank you. I had no idea the term "Snake Belt" was that early.

Gus

 

[Capt. Jas.]

I will try to give you a source citation later but I think it is from some early John Twigg papers

 

[Snakebite]

If someone asked to borrow my shot pouch, I wouldn't hand them my shooting bag.

I would, because I don't have a shooting bag, only a shot pouch. :wink:

Spence

Spence,

I VERY much appreciate your efforts to keep 18th century terminology alive and reminding us of period terms.

What terms did they use to describe a bag or pouch that held "small shot" for fowling? Was the term "Shot Snake" in use in the 18th century?

What term/s did they use to describe what we might call a ball bag or ball pouch, with or without a stopper sewn in?

Gus

Gus, I know the the term "snake belt" was in use by the English as early as the 1760s.
I also agree "shot bag" was a common term for the small pouch (not hooker sized shoulder bag) used in the 18th century. It was termed so and sized small because it mainly carried loose bullets and sometimes small shot if using a musket or othe smooth gun. When you reached in that small bag you pulled out projectiles and did not have to sift thru a bunch of junk. At most, some wadding or patching and a flinto or two but they probably wereally elsewhere, like the button trap or pocket.

Just don't call it a "possibles" bag, some people will have a stroke over that. :cursing:

 

[Claude Mathis]

Just don't call it a "possibles" bag, some people will have a stroke over that. :cursing:

My blood pressure went up just reading your warning. :haha:

 

[Claude Mathis]

Gus, I know the the term "snake belt" was in use by the English as early as the 1760s.
I also agree "shot bag" was a common term for the small pouch (not hooker sized shoulder bag) used in the 18th century. It was termed so and sized small because it mainly carried loose bullets and sometimes small shot if using a musket or othe smooth gun.

:thumbsup:

 

[George]

Details of the bags/pouches used for balls and shot are hard to come by, and I'm convinced we don't have an accurate picture of how they carried them in the 18th century.

They do mention flasks, I have a dozen references to them, but they are always powder flasks, not a single shot flask mentioned.

I've never found a reference which indicated balls or shot being kept in a separate container inside the shoulder bag. Like Capt. James, I keep thinking maybe they carried balls loose in the shot pouch/shooting bag. The military did, at least some of the time:

Second Virginia Orderly Book, Williamsburg, 1775
Oct, 11. "The Same Time Each Company is to Draw a suffcient Quantity of Dutch or Quisa Drilling To provide Each Solider with a Shott Pouch with a partition of Division in the Middle to keep Buck Shot and Bullets Sepperate."

John Knox writing of Roger's Rangers 1757-1760: "and a leathern, or seal's skin bag, buckled round their waist, which hangs down before, contains bullets, and a smaller shot of the size of full green peas:"

John Henry, on the march to Quebec with Arnold, 1775, wrote of swimming a mile in the current when his canoe capsized: ".... to be sure my horn, with a pound of powder, and my pouch, with seventy bullets, were unharmed by the water, though around my neck in the course of our swimming:"

From 1788, "Articles taken from the Indians: One rifle gun, 2 shot pouches, 19 balls in one and 12 in the other,"

I have a couple of references to balls spilling out of them.
May, 1788, tracking a wounded Indian: May, 1788 "...several of his bullets dropped from his shot pouch in his falls, and were picked up, and a great sign of blood found on his trail."

I've only collected one reference to a shot snake, I think, and even that is a bit confusing.

The South-Carolina GAZETTE
November 1, 1773
CHARLES-TOWN
.... Backgammon Tables, Playing Cards, Morocco Pocket Books, Snake Shot-Pouches with Chargers, Powder Flasks, Cortouch Boxes, Boot Strops, Fishing Reels, Snuff Boxes,"

I have collected no mention of anything else, flints, turnscrews, etc. being carried in the shott bag.

Spence

 

[jamieorr]

Just don't call it a "possibles" bag, some people will have a stroke over that. :cursing:

My blood pressure went up just reading your warning. :haha:

I'm not sure I should ask, but hope you'll take pity on the greenhorn. Why isn't it a possibles bag?

Jamie

 

[Claude Mathis]

I think there are two aspects to this (two different topics?).
1. What did people call something in the past.
2. What do people call them today.

Number 2 is important when we are communicating with only the written word and no images.

What would people today call "A" and "B"?

Would you call that a "Powder Horn" or a "Priming Horn"?

 

[Claude Mathis]

Just don't call it a "possibles" bag, some people will have a stroke over that. :cursing:

My blood pressure went up just reading your warning. :haha:

I'm not sure I should ask, but hope you'll take pity on the greenhorn. Why isn't it a possibles bag?

And why isn't it a Haversack or Purse? :wink:

 

[Claude Mathis]

What we call something does not change it's function. What's important is that we agree on a name for something to help us communicate. That's what language is all about - that's why we have different names for things. If you ordered chicken "stew" and they brought you a bowl of chicken "broth" would you care? I would.

 

[BrownBear]

If you ordered chicken "stew" and they brought you a bowl of chicken "broth" would you care? I would.

As distinct from "stewed chicken." That was the fate of all our old layers when I was a kid. Roosters were fryers and hens were stewers. Of course, add a few dumplings and you could call that old hen Heavenly! :grin:

On the subject of "possibles" bags, I refuse to call them that. I carry a shooting bag/shot bag for things only used in the act of shooting, and if I feel the need to carry anything else it goes in a haversack/purse. Just got blessedly sick and tired of all that folderol getting in the way when it's time to shoot.

As a result my bags have shrunk with each passing year. Kinda funny to contemplate a guy 6'4" and 220# with this tiny little 6"x6" bag hanging over his shoulder. Sure looks more like a purse than those big contraptions! :rotf:

 

[George]

Sure looks more like a purse than those big contraptions!

Do you mean those impossible bags? :haha:

Spence

 

[BrownBear]

...impossible bags....

Sure are impossible for quick loading unless you're on the range with a table handy for dropping carp to get it out of the way.

Hey, here's an idea! Build a fold-down table onto the sides of those big bags for ease of loading. :rotf:

 

[jon math]

Give them time and they will :surrender:

 

[Artificer]

Spence,

As always, the quotes you provide are fascinating. Thank you. :hatsoff:

John Knox writing of Roger's Rangers 1757-1760: "and a leathern, or seal's skin bag, buckled round their waist, which hangs down before, contains bullets, and a smaller shot of the size of full green peas:"

I found this very interesting. Perhaps this was the impetus for some British Army Infantry units carrying small belt pouches that also held “smaller shot of the size of full green peas" during the AWI and that in addition to the Cartridge Pouches they wore, which contained cartridges? The idea was they grabbed some of the pea size shot and added it to the ball from the cartridge.

I've only collected one reference to a shot snake, I think, and even that is a bit confusing.

The South-Carolina GAZETTE
November 1, 1773
CHARLES-TOWN
.... Backgammon Tables, Playing Cards, Morocco Pocket Books, Snake Shot-Pouches with Chargers, Powder Flasks, Cortouch Boxes, Boot Strops, Fishing Reels, Snuff Boxes,"

I have collected no mention of anything else, flints, turnscrews, etc. being carried in the shott bag.

Spence

That sounds to me like a rather apt description of what we call a Shot Snake with some kind of Charger on the end. Actually it sounds like the charger end throws a premeasured amount and would not be adjustable?

Thanks again,
Gus

 

[Artificer]

Oh, I recently ran across an opinion from Mark Elliot on whether or not most frontiersmen carried a turnscrew:

"A turn screw would not have normally been found in an original hunting pouch as a longhunter would most likely have used their knife to turn the screws on their gun. However, being a gunsmith, I just can’t bring myself to risk tearing up my screw heads like that."
http://www.markelliottva.com/wordpress/2011/07/early-va-shot-pouch-powder-horn-bag-10-horn-6/

Considering how the Screw Slots in many/most 18th century external screws were "V" notches rather than Square Notches, so a knife blade could have been used to tighten the Top Jaw Screw, etc. and considering the sometimes deplorable state of maintenance that has been reported some frontier weapons were in from original accounts; it seems likely most Frontiersmen did not carry Turnscrews.

Sounds like they SHOULD have carried Turnscrews and some other maintenance items, by the poor to inoperative condition reported on some guns. Perhaps it would have saved them at least some problems they experienced from not having basic maintenance Tools.

Gus

 

[Black Hand]

Sounds like a great way to screw up a knife in a hurry. Knives aren't made to withstand torsion on the blade edge.

 

[Stumpkiller]

I keep a small bag. Seperate strap on the horn. Only "dangle" is the measure on the horn. The accoutrements in the bag are what it takes to shoot and clean the flintlock - whether rifle or smoothbore.

 

[Artificer]

Sounds like a great way to screw up a knife in a hurry. Knives aren't made to withstand torsion on the blade edge.

Further, considering how period Trade Butchers and Scalpers were made of adequate, though not probably the best steel or in some cases Iron forged around an internal piece of steel, I wonder if it would have damaged those blades even more? Though the way some accounts talk about having/using files to sharpen them, perhaps those blades were just soft enough it would not have chipped the knife blade?

It doesn't surprise me at all the way many accounts talk about broken/inoperative rifles/guns. if they did not even have a Turnscrew that fit their Top Jaw Screw and Side Lock Screws.

Gus