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Who shoots flintlocks?
madcaster
Member Posts: 8 ✭✭
Besides me?[^]
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I live in upstate New York, French & Indian War country..its kind of in the blood[:)]
Makes me want to get out there!
http://forums.gunbroker.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=353814
Joined a Rev War reenactment group in 74 and was made safety officer because I was the only member who had shot before. Shot at a few competitions with the smoothbore musket. And just this past year, after years of traipsing around the mountains of northern NH, carrying a relatively modern weapon, (my grandfather's 100 year old Remington model 8) got a 4 point buck (my first)in my backyard in Danvers Mass'tts with a 50 cal flint kentucky rifle. One shot thru the chest thru 40 yards of thick brush, and he dropped in his tracks. Reloaded by feel with an unpatched ball (thanks to my militia training) while keeping my eyes on him, and by the time he struggled back to his feet, I was ready to put him down for the count.
Do all my hunting now with the flintlocks. Make premeasured paper cartridges of shot for the musket just like the militias used so I can hunt rabbit or pheasant with the flint musket. Can post instructions to make them if anyone needs it. could even use shot cartridges in a rifle this way.
Have a friend with an inline percussion rifle with a scope, and I can shoot circles around him. finally convinced him to remove the scope: they're useless in the woods around here.
(go figure)
I
Am
Hooked
I took a doe the year before last with a neck shot at 70-80 yards, patched round ball.
The rifle will shoot as well as I can, sometimes better.
Sadly, there is such a lack of information about how to shoot traditional muzzleloading guns, both flintlocks and percussion guns, that the consumer is left with whatever is the newest fad, and whatever the clerk at the local Wal-Mart doesn't know about guns. Cap and ball guns are close enough to cartridge guns, and even to the in-line actions, that clerks can't steer you too far wrong if you choose to buy a modern rifle or double-barreled percussion shotgun.
But, put a flintlock on the shelf and no one knows how to make it go bang, beyond that you have to put this rock in the cock (hammer), and hope it sparks, and hope the sparks hit the powder in the priming pan, and then hope the main charge in the barrel is ignited. It all sounds like so much hard work that consumers just don't want the guns anymore.
With the new in-line actions, you use #209 shotgun primers, the same as used to reload modern shotgun shells. You use black powder substitutes like Triple Se7en and Pyrodex, and sometimes this comes in pre-measured pellets, so you don't have to measure any powder! Then we have plastic wads instead of cloth, and jacketed pistol bullets instead of round lead balls.
Because everything goes down the muzzle, we (properly) call them muzzle loaders, and pretend we are doing things the way Daniel Boone and Davie Crockett, or the men on the Lewis & Clark Expedition did it 200 years ago. Add to that bad legislation passed by Congress to give us a little more false security, which restricts how black powder is sold transported and stored, and even finding a store that carries black powder is a chore. Finding Flints? Where do you start to look? If you live on the West coast, you are a long way from Friendship, and even Arizona, where the NMLRA holds it winter matches and all the products you need are available, just like at mountain rendezvous in the 1820's.
Try it out at the range, if you have a friend that shoots one; or go to a rendezvous or black powder shoot: Those guys are a great bunch and always willing to let someone try a weapon, if they want to get into the sport.
Then IF you decide you're interested, look into a lefthand flintlock; there are some around. I THINK Dixie Gun Works may have one listed. trying to cock the hammer would be awkward for a leftie on a right hand weapon. May even find something on the Auction side here.
Have fun!