Flintlock and capbox

[Chris_B]

I have this old gun with rifle features such as sights, cheekpiece and a long, heavy
octagon barrel. The barrel is smooth and I think it was from the start.
It also has a little round brass capbox, what makes little sense if you go by that word,
since it is a flintlock gun.
It is the only one in my collection with this combination, but surely there are others.
I wonder if this box was installed more for practical or decorative reasons?   

[Hungry Horse]

Occasionally you find a flint era gun with a small brass patchbox on it. I believe often this is the results of someone in the guns later life, either adding it to make it more appealing for sales purposes, or to cover an existing grease hole.

  Hungry Horse

[Mike Brooks]

I have this old gun with rifle features such as sights, cheekpiece and a long, heavy
octagon barrel. The barrel is smooth and I think it was from the start.
It also has a little round brass capbox, what makes little sense if you go by that word,
since it is a flintlock gun.
It is the only one in my collection with this combination, but surely there are others.
I wonder if this box was installed more for practical or decorative reasons?

It may have been made as a caplock and was later "restored" to flintlock, which it never was. Happened all the time several decades ago.

[Tanselman]

It is not possible to accurately discuss your rifle without pictures that include a half length front view showing the front side from butt to several inches past the lock plate area, plus a corresponding view of the same area of the rear side of the gun to see the side plate or washers and number of lock bolts. The two most probable explanations for your rifle are: 1) as already stated, it may be a percussion rifle later turned into a flint rifle in the modern era; 2) if an original flint gun, it may have had a capbox added later in its working life...or even after its working life. However, the combination of a flint lock ignition with a capbox doesn't sound like an original construction of an American Kentucky rifle. Again, only a couple of good photographs of the rifle will allow an accurate determination of the rifle's originality. Shelby Gallien

[Chris_B]

Some pics (unfortunately not very good ones...):

[James Wilson Everett]

Guys,

From the appearance of the current flintlock, I believe that this gun was a caplock that was improperly converted to a flintlock fairly recently.  Perhaps a good idea is to re-re-convert back to a caplock.

Jim

[Hlbly]

That lockplate certainly looks like a percussion plate. I know some antique gun dealers used to believe all fullstocks were supposed to be flint, and they were arrogant about their belief. They proceeded to do a poor conversion, much like you see here. I would check with some of the restorers for a proper hammer and drum and nipple, there are lots of them available.

[Longknife]

I would leave it alone unless you can actually confirm it was made as an original percussion. What does the touch hole look like? how about a pic if the inside of the plate?……...Ed

[Eric Kettenburg]

That simply screams "reconversion."  Or I should say, "conversion."

[Hlbly]

And a POOR job at that.

[rich pierce]

Lots of guns, plain and otherwise, got changed to flintlock back in the day, and not as much was known about late flintlocks and parts were not as available as now. I’d leave it as is and consider it a working gun with a long history.

[Hlbly]

We put flintlocks back like they were, why not put a percussion gun back like it was?

[Mike Brooks]

We put flintlocks back like they were, why not put a percussion gun back like it was?

I've never assumed putting flint guns back the "way they were" has ever been the right thing to do. In this particular case I don't think it makes much difference.

[hanshi]

All longrifles look better a flintlocks.  IMHO.

[bgf]

About all I could say for sure is that it was probably cap lock at some point early in it's use...

That lock could have been made as Flint, converted to percussion, then converted back, in which case the cap box was added in the second phase.  To me, the single lockbolt and flat plate don't mean it couldn't have been a late flintlock, as the styles changed.

I wouldn't change anything unless someone way more expert than I could really tell you what happened .  And even if they could tell you it was a caplock, how would you know what the original caplock and breech were?

[poppy]

this rifle resemble,s  a leman rifle what do you all think.       chris popp.

[Tanselman]

The lock plate fits the mortise well with good margins of wood around plate, so it may be the original plate. However, the current "flintlock" is a rebuilt lock with modern parts. The color and shape of the parts appear modern, but the most telling details are the screws which are modern made with machined flat bottomed slots, all with clean undamaged edges. Also note the cock screw has a flat tip, almost always an indication of a modern screw. There is a color mismatch between the plate and the parts, i.e. the cock, steel, & frizen spring are darker and all seem to have traces of a modern blue finish present between the rust spots. There also seems to be a stylistic issue between the cock and pan. The cock seems to stop on the top of the pan's rear shield rather than the top edge of the lock plate, in the style of a double-throat cock, while this is a single throat cock. I have never seen an original flintlock with these particular parts.

I believe this gun was an original percussion rifle and the current lock was inappropriately modified into a flint style lock using vintage reproduction parts from some years ago before they were as accurately reproduced as they are today. It is also possible the lock plate is not original, despite its good fit into the mortise...which if true would suggest it was close in size and shape and had only some fine reshaping/tweaking to properly fit it into the old mortise...which was a great idea so the original mortise wasn't badly chewed up.  Shelby Gallien

[Chris_B]

I see the opinions what to do with this gun differ a lot.
I am pretty sure now that it was original built as a caplock and someone changed it to look like
an original flinter, who did a poor job.
Lacking the experience I did not see that clearly myself when I purchased the gun some time ago,
but I liked it then and I still do now.
Since there are not many restorers around here who know how to handle American rifles and I could
not do it myself, I guess I will leave it as it is, at least for the time being.
It was neither expensive nor is it from a well known gunsmith, so there will be no big deal if it stays in
a rather poor condition, but complete and without material damages.