Why no patchboxes on fowlers?

[biliff]

So why is it that rifles and smoothrifles have patchboxes (at least some of them do) but we don't see 'em on fowlers at all? If part of the utility of the smooth bore is to shoot a ball then shouldn't they at least show up on a few of 'em?
(I'm having a really slow day today and the madeira is obviously affecting me.)

 

[wallgunner]

I've seen pictures of some early fowlers, clubutts, that had a wood sliding patchbox. But that is the only one I can think of. If the patchbox was actually used to hold patches, then maybe they didn't patch a ball in a fowler. Shot or bucksot would have been a common load. Kit Ravenshear used to say not patches on a round ball, but to seat the ball on a tuft of tow. Ramming the ball home, set the ball into the tow, so it surrounds it, causing a makshift patch that burns up as the gun is fired. Tow as very common, and you didn't need a patchbox to carry it in. I tried it in a smoothie I sold a few years ago, and it work fairly well.
Just a guess.

 

[tg]

It may be that the patchbox was a rifle thing from the germanic area and carried over on other rifle types but was not really a part of the fowling thing and did not develope or evolve on the fowlers.

 

[trent/OH]

Theory only, and worth every penny....
If hunting fowl, you're generally in a boat, so you have lots of space for all your shooting gear (same still applies today), so that extra 2 cubic inches isn't really needed.

 

[jethro224]

Here's another theory.
If you're hunting fowl without a boat, you'll be standing in the water a lot. How many times have you been out fetching a duck and another bunch of ducks comes in? You squat down and try to look like a clump of brush and end up dipping your butt (no pun intended) into the water.
Whatever was in the patchbox would have gotten wet. :hmm:

 

[Stophel]

While most (but not all) German rifles will have patchboxes (butt traps), it is VERY unusual to see a German smoothbore gun with one. German, and other European, smoothbore guns would have been used almost exclusively with shot. I think we today probably overdo the patched ball in a smoothbore..... For large game with a smoothbore, I believe probably the load of choice at the time was buckshot or "buck and ball", and not a patched ball. :winking:

 

[Zonie]

This is, of course, just my conjecture:

Many of the old drawings of bird hunters depict the hunter with a bag that looks more like a very large purse rather than the smaller possibles bags the rifle hunters carried.

This makes sense to me because they were often carrying a large amount of shot, wads or tow or hornet's nest etc for wadding and a shot measure in addition to the normal powder horn and flints.

Some of these bags look big enough to stuff a few ducks into so, given that the hunter had all of this storage space, he wouldn't find much use for a little patch box.

zonie

 

[mommicked]

We have a joke here that you could take the Queen Mary, empty, and put in just enough gear for a 1/2 day fishing trip for two, and still not have enough room! :haha: You'd just have to be here I guess.

What is tow? Is it like broom grass? Sure would scrub the barrel out on the way.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Tow is a plant fiber that was traditionally used in sealing the planks of wooden boats and ships. It was used to stuff in the cracks, and then sealed with tar. It is used in sealing the seams of iron pipe joings in sanitary piping with lead still today. Jainly it is jute, but it can be made from a number of plant fibers. It is used by shooters, particularly those who shoot fowlers or other smoothbore guns, for cleaning instead of using cloth patches. It can be washed out dried and used again. Some riflemen also use tow for cleaing, although the rifling is hard on the fibers, and it cannot be expected to last as long as being used in a smoothie. And, as indicated, there is some historical accounts of using Tow for wadding with a round ball. Since the Tow performs the same function as a cloth patch, this seems possible, although its hard to believe it would provide much of a seal against gases, by itself. Used in conjunction with wasp nest, or some other sealing substance, it should work fine.

The question always asked by practical historians is what did shooters use when they were far from a supply of cloth for patches? In the colonies, particularly in the early years( 1600s) the only cloth had to be shipped in from England, while clothe made here was homespun, and rather coarse by comparison. I have always suspected that the thin hide from small animals, like rabbit, squirrel, ground hog, etc. were the source of patching material in the boonies, but I have not found a historical reference to this yet. We know that even deer hide can make a good patch, and they are often reusable, no small factor for people living off the land.

 

[Many Klatch]

I have experimented with using deerskin for patching in my .54 rifle. I had to downsize the ball to .50 so it would fit. It didn't seem to affect the accuracy. It might have made a lot of sense to use deerskin patching instead of fabric for two reasons. One, there were always plenty of deer skins around and Two, your gun would use less lead, which was a lot harder to come by.

An interesting comment in James Fennimore Coopers book Last of the Mohicans got some of us to try out the leather patching. Cooper wrote about Hawkeye's "well greased leathern ball" when talking about the projectile from his rifle.

Many Klatch

 

[paulvallandigham]

Manny, as you know, deer hides can run from thick to thin. That is why I think they would have used the hides of animals they killed for food, but could not sell to any fur buyers for cash money. Squirrel and rabbit would have been available through out the Eastern US during the ML era, and scraping off the fur, and cleaning off the tissues on the inside of the pelt would be a brief few minutes work while dinner was cooking over a fire. Hank the hide to dry, and you would have rawhide, a perfect source of patches for your rifle. Of course, if they wanted to, they could wash it, and rub brains into it to tan it some, but why would you put that much work into a hide you are only going to cut for patches? Rawhide can be " broken " by wetting it a little, and then rubbing it over a stake or small tree stump. That breaks up the hard fibers in the cell walls, and makes the hide soft to use, tanned or raw. Again, when you are waiting for dinner to cook over a fire, you have the time to do these kinds of mindless chores, and have both dinner, and the animal's skin to use for several weeks as patching material.

 

[xxgrampa]

greetings mommicked,

tow is, the fibers of the flax plant. flax is the fiber of linen.

..ttfn..grampa..

 

[Stumpkiller]

Yep. Rough, raw flax fibers that, if further processed would be used to make linen. I get mine from a fabric specialty shop (Silver Shuttle in Memphis, TN) that caters to spinning and weaving. The individual fibers are about 18" long and it looks like a blond wig twisted into a hank.

 

[flintlockmdj]

Go back to the name of the gun "Fowler" a gun used to shoot fowl. Fowl are shot with shot not large round balls you don't use a patch with shot.
Is this rocket science?