Use of fine shot in colonial America

[Billy-by-gosh]

Some northern tribes made a sieve by piercing birch bark, then pouring molten lead thru that into water. The result was some fairly decent small shot. Pretty simple yet ingenious device that saved the labor of cutting lead strips, although that was no doubt used as well.

 

[Ohio Rusty]

Shot was used in the 18th century. The PDF :
Highways to History: The Archaeology of Connecticut’s
18th-Century Lifeways
There were excavations of several 18th century homesteads in Connecticut. This PDF has some great pics of artifacts. On page 67 of the PDF, it shows pics of round ball and two different types of shot that was found both round shot and cut shot.. On page 75 of the PDF, it talks about all the different sizes of shot that would have been used for hunting different game animals. The whole PDF is a really interesting read with all the stuff that was dug up on the different 18th century sites. Here is the link to the PDF:
https://portal.ct.gov/-/media/dot/highwaystohistorypdf.pdf

Ohio Rusty ><>

 

[French Colonial]

According to Hamilton "Colonial Frontier Guns" 1987 the French in 1734 alone shipped 28,000 Livres (30,212 lbs) of shot to the French colonies.

One must assume the English were doing similar in the English colonies

 

[Jay Templin]

I don’t think it was generally available and so was rarely used.
Safe bet that even most waterfowl was killed with rifles or smooth rifles or regular smoothbores loaded with a few buckshot/Rupert shot.

Small shot was absolutely widely available:
“At first, single shot was used for target-shooting and four-footed game; by the 1540s multiple shot was also used, at this date cut from lead sheet. By the end of his life Henry possessed 41 such “Haile Shotte peics”, clearly used for birds. These were obviously pretty deadly, as an Act of 1548 at-tempted to ban the “shoting of hayle-shot wherby an infinite sort of fowle is killed and much gaym therby distroyed” and lamented their uselessness to military training. These weapons, loaded with shot, can be regarded as the remote ancestors of the modern shotgun.” https://www.thefield.co.uk/shooting/history-shotgun-shooting-26590

“In 1686, Richard Blome’s “The Gentleman’s Recreation” became the first English publication portraying the shooting of flying birds. By the early 18th century, overhead shots were becoming a fairly common practice.

In 1776, the first recorded use of the term “shotgun” arose in a Kentucky publication called “Frontier Language of the West” by James Fenimore Cooper. This term separated the smoothbore shotgun from the rifled musket as advancements in technology greatly changed firearm barrel designs.” https://blog.gritrsports.com/the-history-of-the-shotgun/

Jay

 

[Ohio Rusty]

Dan'l Boone wrote in is autobiography a memory that one time when he was away from his Kentucky camp, the indians visited and stole a shotgun.
Ohio Rusty ><>

 

[smoothshooter]

I don’t think it was generally available and so was rarely used.
Safe bet that even most waterfowl was killed with rifles or smooth rifles or regular smoothbores loaded with a few buckshot/Rupert shot.

I should add that I was thinking out of habit more of what we would call #4 though #8 nicely uniformed shot. I knew about the square, Rupert, and swan shot.

 

[Tumbledown]

I don’t think it was generally available and so was rarely used.
Safe bet that even most waterfowl was killed with rifles or smooth rifles or regular smoothbores loaded with a few buckshot/Rupert shot.

Shot and rifles don't work together well, and colonial rifles were a relatively small bore compared to militia muskets, so no, it's not a safe bet.

 

[Trigger]

There's allot of game that can be taken without the use of a Shotgun or rifle..
Back then. If it mattered to conserve ammunition and time..
There hunting wasn't always all sporting like. That's all.

Just poachers. They were.

 

[Trigger]

Just an example..

Without a season for duck..

Come spring time.. a piece or bread and a throw net.. that's like 4 ducks in one shot

 

[Trigger]

Would they call in a turkey and all..

Or shoot the thing off its roost with a round ball.

 

[Brokennock]

Shot and rifles don't work together well, and colonial rifles were a relatively small bore compared to militia muskets, so no, it's not a safe bet.

But rifles also weren't nearly as common throughout the colonies as smoothbores of various types.

 

[Sparkitoff]

I have a collection of antique English sporting memorabilia and accessories related to wing-shooting. Among the items is a Bill of Laden that shows one of the line items "Shot 7 - 450 k" with the destination of New Boston, N. America. I always wondered if this was bags, a barrel or what. That's a heavy container if it's one. Anyway, someone was buying it in the U.S.A. There's no other detail, nor shotgunning related items on this Bill of Laden. I guess it's size 7 shot and 450 Kilograms? There are other items, like "Leaf 200 - Brn. 100" that I cannot figure out what it refers to. Then there's "Shaft 100, 160". That is assumed to be like shovel handles of English hardwood, 160 mm in length. "Cooper, She., Radc. Dist." is the addressee. I was told this was a distributor, or drygoods store Cooper, Sheath, Radcliffe Distributors. To store 450 kg of #7 shot for sale they had to have a location that would have buyers interested in it.

 

[flconch53]

I have a collection of antique English sporting memorabilia and accessories related to wing-shooting. Among the items is a Bill of Laden that shows one of the line items "Shot 7 - 450 k" with the destination of New Boston, N. America. I always wondered if this was bags, a barrel or what. That's a heavy container if it's one. Anyway, someone was buying it in the U.S.A. There's no other detail, nor shotgunning related items on this Bill of Laden. I guess it's size 7 shot and 450 Kilograms? There are other items, like "Leaf 200 - Brn. 100" that I cannot figure out what it refers to. Then there's "Shaft 100, 160". That is assumed to be like shovel handles of English hardwood, 160 mm in length. "Cooper, She., Radc. Dist." is the addressee. I was told this was a distributor, or drygoods store Cooper, Sheath, Radcliffe Distributors. To store 450 kg of #7 shot for sale they had to have a location that would have buyers interested in it.

If the are using metric weights it is not that old. The English used pounds feet and miles. Today they still mix metric and English to some extant

 

[smoothshooter]

Shot and rifles don't work together well, and colonial rifles were a relatively small bore compared to militia muskets, so no, it's not a safe bet.

What I meant was that a lot of waterfowl were killed with rifles firing single bullets.
I know it works because I have done it myself years ago.
In the old days there were no game laws and no one carrying a rifle would have passed up a shot at a duck or a goose just because they didn’t have a smoothbore of some sort loaded with small shot.

 

[French Colonial]

What I meant was that a lot of waterfowl were killed with rifles firing single bullets.
I know it works because I have done it myself years ago.
In the old days there were no game laws and no one carrying a rifle would have passed up a shot at a duck or a goose just because they didn’t have a smoothbore of some sort loaded with small shot.

Wild Sports in the Far West by Friedrich Gerstacker, lots of references to shooting wildfowl with a rifle.

Different sensibility toward shooting sitting game back then.

 

[smoothshooter]

Wild Sports in the Far West by Friedrich Gerstacker, lots of references to shooting wildfowl with a rifle.

Different sensibility toward shooting sitting game back then.

True. But when you get down to it, what is the difference between shooting a hopping squirrel, standing deer, etc., and shooting a duck swimming on a pond?

 

[smoothshooter]

I have a collection of antique English sporting memorabilia and accessories related to wing-shooting. Among the items is a Bill of Laden that shows one of the line items "Shot 7 - 450 k" with the destination of New Boston, N. America. I always wondered if this was bags, a barrel or what. That's a heavy container if it's one. Anyway, someone was buying it in the U.S.A. There's no other detail, nor shotgunning related items on this Bill of Laden. I guess it's size 7 shot and 450 Kilograms? There are other items, like "Leaf 200 - Brn. 100" that I cannot figure out what it refers to. Then there's "Shaft 100, 160". That is assumed to be like shovel handles of English hardwood, 160 mm in length. "Cooper, She., Radc. Dist." is the addressee. I was told this was a distributor, or drygoods store Cooper, Sheath, Radcliffe Distributors. To store 450 kg of #7 shot for sale they had to have a location that would have buyers interested in it.

That would be “Bill of Lading”

 

[SOLANCO]

This would be a good place to start your research on the subject.

https://www.minnesotatrap.com/history-in-the-making/shot-towers-page-1.htm

 

[Sparkitoff]

If the are using metric weights it is not that old

I am not sure if those #'s are weights.

That would be “Bill of Lading”

Agreed, but this one says "Laden"

So many abbreviations, it would have been hard for anyone to decipher in my opinion.

I'm pretty sure it is bird shot being shipped though, based on Shot 7. I can't figure out what else would be coming from England that would be referred to as such. The 450 "k" might be an H. I am not certain what the 450 refers to - someone said H could mean hampers, which was a certain sized shipping container. Then I wonder how big is a hamper that there's 450 of them? I'm not sure. Only that Shot 7 got sent to the US in 1865.

 

[andy52]

The title of this thread was "Use of Fine Shot in Colonial America" I'm just assuming that "Fine" would not include swan shot or cut shot.