During the War of Northern Aggression, the Confederacy bought a small number of very, very high tech expensive rifles from the Whitworth Co. In the 1860s, a Whitworth was the ultimate rifle. It cost far, far more than a regular rifle and was acknowledged to be among the most accurate rifles of the day and it still holds a mystique and reputation few rifles have every attained. In the hands of a talented marksman, lethal hits past 800yd were not only possible, but happened on more than one documented occasion, a general named Sedgewick comes to mind here. Of the rifles purchased by the Confederacy, no more than 250 made it through the Federal blockade and very few of those still survive to this day. The surviving Whitworths with Confederate provenance fetch well over $150,000. Of the surviving rifles, there are extremely few examples that still have the accoutraments and none have the original case.
So where does that figure in here? Well a friend of mine has a replica Whitworth and he was showing me the boxes and accoutraments that came with the Whitworth. He commented that he'd like a box for his rifle like the originals had. Well, I have a wood shop and I sorta know how to use a couple tools. Here's a picture of an original civlian Whitworth in an original case. This is a civilian model sold to the public in England. No actual Confederate military case survives as far as anyone knows.
And here's the one I just finished for my shooting buddy. Wood is red oak locally harvested. Partitions are poplar, also locally harvested. Inlay band is black walnut that is at least 150yrs old that came from an old NC tobacco barn. Shout out to PathfinderNC for doing the computer magic on the label to get it looking like a new one. And another shout out to David at Research Press in England for sending me a clean jpg file of an original label. Original box had no lining, but this one has a forest green felt lining.
So where does that figure in here? Well a friend of mine has a replica Whitworth and he was showing me the boxes and accoutraments that came with the Whitworth. He commented that he'd like a box for his rifle like the originals had. Well, I have a wood shop and I sorta know how to use a couple tools. Here's a picture of an original civlian Whitworth in an original case. This is a civilian model sold to the public in England. No actual Confederate military case survives as far as anyone knows.
And here's the one I just finished for my shooting buddy. Wood is red oak locally harvested. Partitions are poplar, also locally harvested. Inlay band is black walnut that is at least 150yrs old that came from an old NC tobacco barn. Shout out to PathfinderNC for doing the computer magic on the label to get it looking like a new one. And another shout out to David at Research Press in England for sending me a clean jpg file of an original label. Original box had no lining, but this one has a forest green felt lining.
