Alaskan Glen said:
So this rifle would be more "correct" than a flint lock Leman?
The TVM Fur Trade rifle is a fantasy rifle, so "correct" is a difficult word to use for it. To keep the cost down TVM had to make some compromises. A truely correct Henry Old English trade rifle wood cost 2 to 3 times what they are charging for their TVM Fur Trade rifle.
As the name implies, the "old" English pattern trade rifle was first made in England and imported into Canada, the Great Lakes Region, and the Spanish territories in what is now the southern States of the US. By the time of the War of 1812, a specific English pattern had evolved from the early Lancaster pattern. This is the pattern that J.J. Henry copied and made his first deliveries to the American Fur Company in 1827.
J.J. Henry and his son J. Henry made these Old English trade rifles for the AFC every year through 1842. They continued to supply them to Ewing & Ewing and Pierre Chouteau Jr. & Co. after the AFC sold out with the last documented order made in 1858.
With a little imagination, the TVM Fur Trade rifle is a facsimile of the type of rifle used in the fur trade from before the War of 1812 right up to the end of the 1850's.
A flint lock Leman is only marginally "correct" for the pre-1840 fur trade. Leman started his business in 1834. He sold some rifles to Indian traders in St. Louis in that first year. His first government contract for Indian rifles was in 1837. These were classic late Lancaster pattern rifles and not the later pattern we normally associate with him. No one is presently making a commercial version of this early Leman flintlock.
By 1840, Leman had developed his pattern rifle and continued to make them until he died in 1887. This is the style of Leman rifle that TVM, Track of the Wolf, and others make. Fur trade companies were still ordering some flintlock rifles from Leman as late as 1850, but most sales by that time were for percussion rifles.
The style of Leman rifle that TVM and Track make in flintlock would be most correct for the 1840's.
Phil Meek