Why This Wood and Not That on 18th Century Rifles

[Stophel]

There is one early 19th century Lehigh region rifle that is SUPPOSEDLY stocked in persimmon.... so it is said. I have found that many people are pretty poor at identifying wood anyway, so I can't say if it's so or not.

I am told that persimmon is hard, but dead plain, and coarsely grained. It is also known to be pretty unstable wood, and will shrink and grow dramatically with humidity.

 

[BadDaditood]

Persimmon golf clubs were very common before “metal woods” took over
Even today I hear “you’re really hitting the Woods today” when my tee shot goes into the trees

 

[Bob McBride]

Has anyone ever seen one of these?

THE VIRGINIA GAZETTE 3
January 12, 1776
WILLIAMSBURG
ON the 6th of this instant was stolen, from a soldier of my company, a RIFLE GUN , her stock made of persimmon tree, iron mounted, has a pistol lock, the box lid lost, and her bore very small. Any person producing said gun to me, at this place, shall have two dollars reward, and no questions asked. William Campbell

Spence

The rest of that ad is just as interesting as the persimmon part. We have persimmons big enough to make a stock here on the farm. Barely.

 

[Hawken]

I've wondered about that. Local makers and DIYers making one offs would have had reasons to try something different, mainly for the same reasons we do today. I had a rifle with the stock made with Oregon Myrtlewood, something not likely available to eastern gunmakers back in the day, but the principle is the same.

Apart from cosmetic appearances, and ease of working, it would seem to me the really important thing would be dimensional stability. Maybe super-hard, heavy wood just wasn't, and isn't, considered necessary. I could imagine what we call Ironwood or Hophornbeam species might he interesting, or Black Locust. Osage orange?

Hickory is great for axe handles and tools, probably a royal &@$tch to make into a stock, inletting and such but it seems too like a sufficiently stubborn and dedicated gunsmith might have tried it. I dunno.

Quarter sawn wood often looks nice - a characteristic of now antique furniture made with white oak for example - because of the xylem rays display in the grain. Old growth lumber too. There was a practical reason for cutting it that way for it though, the boards have a much reduced tendency to warp over time when logs are cut this way. The tables are just as flat 150 years later. On the other hand the number of boards that can be cut from a log isn't nearly as great, more waste.

 

[1950DAVE]

The bowl on the bottom left , spalted persimmon. Thee was roughly two feet in diameter, biggest I had seen. Was in neighbors yard so she got first bowl. My lathe limits me to 12 " . I have never seen persimmon lumber thou ad a large tree is rare.

 

[appalichian hunter]

There are hedge apple trees where I live big enough to cut stock blanks from, A few years ago I helped a friend cut a log from one to use in making bows. Even helped him split staves from it.

 

[ohio ramrod]

Four factors are considered for suitable gun stock wood. Hardness, grain (fine or course), ease of working and brittleness. Walnut was used in the majority of military guns because of its easy of machining and ability to absorb the shock of recoil. Maple was often used for its beauty as well as ability to absorb the recoil inspite of the difficulty to machine. Chestnut is both a softer wood and courser grain which makes it easy to split which was nice for riving boards for building but not for holding up to recoil.

 

[Coot]

In my teens, I helped my father cut down two Persimmon trees in our yard - they were about 12" in diameter & we got rid of them due to all the fruit falling off & rotting - sticky stinky. I recall that Persimmon was a wood of choice for golf club heads back when drivers had wood heads - heavy & very impact resistant.

 

[Eterry]

There was a stock maker locally who used almost every imaginable local tree for stocks. Which made for some interesting stocked guns.

Also a good friend of my dad made a nice rifle stock from a mesquite fence post. It had great figure and light colored.

Maybe poor folks just used what was handy. The pro's used what people wanted.

 

[oldwood]

The hardest of all maple is rare , but is occasionally found in Central Pa. and somewhere in Ohio. All of it I've ever seen is a magnificent Tortoise shell figure. It's very dense grain , and heavy wood. The only place I've seen live samples of it is along one of the streets in the Grange Fair property , in Center Hall Pa. . The trees are old and the maintenance workers cut one down into fire wood size pieces. In todays wood market , the stock blanks would estimate to $400 or $500 Range. I bought some 30 + years ago and it made guns that were pretty , but heavy compared to curly medium grade red maple. I found it hard to work due to it's hardness. Young man's wood ..............oldwood

 

[Rudall]

Is/was beech not used in North America for gun stocks?

 

[Bob McBride]

Is/was beech not used in North America for gun stocks?

Beech was used on the imported Type G Trade gun. Probably. It’s a decent wood. Just ugly.

 

[XVIIc Wheelock]

Where I grew up Ash trees were trash trees..good for fast growing in a yard, but die very young.

 

[fire bear]

Is a maple the maple or an ash the ash. Acer saccharum (sugar or sometimes called rock maple) is the preferred gunstock wood with the Janka hardness scale of 1450, Acer rubrum (red maple) slides into the gunstock trade because it looks a lot like Acer saccharum but is closer to cherry (Prunus serotina) in hardness, and finally maples like Acer saccharinum (silver maple) and a few other maples make lousy stocks because their hardness is down in the Chestnut (Castanea dentata) range.

A good ash bat is made from Fraxinus americana (white ash), not Fraxinus pennsylvanica (green ash), Fraxinus nigra (black ash), or Fraxinus quadrangulata (blue ash).

Sorry for the rant but I don't want anyone to get stuck with a silver maple stock or a green ash bat.

 

[martin9]

I just finished up this rifle stocked in hickory...it was more work than maple for sure but not as bad as I thought it'd be.

 

[Hawken]

That looks fantastic.

 

[Cpt Flint]

The hickory stock is interesting. Is the cheekpiece a copy of an original?

 

[martin9]

No, not an original. The whole gun is an "inspired by" copy of Ken Netting's southern rifles. I say inspired by as I've never actually handled one so was just winging it with pics from here and ALR

 

[George]

The famous Swedish naturalist Peter Kalm, Travels in North America, 1748-1751:

June, 1749 at Albany
"We lodged with a gunsmith, who told us, that the best charcoals for the forge were made of the Black Pine. The next in goodness, in his opinion, were charcoals made of the Beech-tree.
"The best and dearest stocks for his muskets were made of the wood of the wild Cherry-tree; and next to these he valued those of the Red Maple most. They scarce make use of any other wood for this purpose. The black Walnut-tree affords excellent wood for stocks; but it does not grow in the neighbourhood of Albany."

The Pennsylvania Gazette
October 25, 1759
Paxton, Lancaster County, October 4, 1759. Borrowed or stolen, out of the House of John Harris, of Paxton Township, Lancaster County, a certain Gun, stocked with wild red Cherry Tree, about four Feet long in the Barrel,

Spence

 

[Canute Rex]

A friend of mine stocked a rifle with a piece of apple wood he had kept for years. It made a beautiful stock, but he said he had to sharpen his chisels about once a minute. He inquired with a professional barrel inletter about getting that done but when the man heard "apple" he said no. Apple is just splinters waiting to happen.

I'd also note that in colonial America there were laws in places that prohibited cutting and burning apple wood. Apple trees were so valuable as a crop that it was considered a crime to use them any other way.

Oh, and Spence10 does well by quoting Peter Kalm. If you haven't read his journals, do so. It is a detailed social, geographic, botanical, and political portrait of the colonies in the mid 18th century.