CRUDE gun finish

[okieboy]

 Here is a crude one you!

[axelp]

interesting. Seems to me, the evidence shows that on the eastern frontier, there were plenty of skilled folk around that could repair and/or build solid guns. The need may not have been great or very common at all for the lone frontiersman to cobble together a crude, pocket knife whittled stock. Fantasy?? In the case of Daniel Boone, his account seems to be a rare exception. I would still like to see a stick whittled and rawhide tied gun at an event…I cannot imagine it would be very accurate, but maybe better than starving to death in the middle of nowhere.  

It seems like many of the fur companies and trading forts in the west had blacksmiths and skilled support for trappers and hunters as well as stores of guns available to replace guns broken beyond what is easily repaired.

K

[Pete G.]

Some speculate #136 is a revival gun not made in the original flint era but made later from old parts. Hard to know on a gun like that. Either way it was made by somebody sometime. I'm not sure when the idea it was made by a blacksmith became an accepted certainty. One of many possibilities.

I used the term "blacksmith" in the generic sense to indicate someone "not a gunsmith". Sorry for any confusion.

[axelp]

Boone's stick gun… I can imagine it probably was not a full-stock… all the wood would have to do is to help keep the lock up against the barrel/vent hole, have a place for a rough pinned trigger, be long enough to fit against the shoulder, and be wired or tied a bit at the forearm area to secure the barrel? I bet the first time shot was done gingerly!!  He might have been better off fashioning a bow and some arrows… I have always wondered about this story and if it was true or just a tall tale.

K

[Hungry Horse]

 Salvaged parts guns, build with mismatched, ungainly parts, and architecture, are often called blacksmiths guns, out here on the West Coast. Many guns suffered damage getting here, in the old days. the wood usually was long gone when the owner took the metal work to the local blacksmith, to barter for something he needed. The parts languished under the bench, until the smith found time to assemble a gun. These gun could rarely be confused with an original manufactured rifle by a trained gunsmith, due to their odd stock shapes, and mismatched parts. I've seen literally hundreds of them. Some with rare parts included in the mish mash of their new life as a working gun.

                Hungry Horse

[Dphariss]

I'm pretty sure that Daniel Boone made a gun out of a branch. It came out good enough that he bragged about it later! He had managed to scrounge some parts during his captivity and made the gun once he had escaped. Too bad that thing didn't get saved.

Good luck on your project, I think it is a pretty cool idea.

The Boone's came from a gunsmithing family and Squire was a trained gunsmith. So thinking that there were no gunmsmiths on the frontiers is just silly. I seriously doubt that the west coast settlements of the 1840s were without gunsmiths.  Especially if near any of the existing posts or forts. What Boone cobbled together to escape likely did not have a buttplate or TG. I sure would not have bothered under those circumstances. But this is not a normal situation.
Finish? Wipe on some raw or BLO, let it soak in or not and the rifle is ready to go as soon as the excess is wiped off. Can be done in a couple of minutes.
So far as the crude guns... There are butchered up guns from all eras, 18th, early and late 19th and 20th c. Some, even "modern" bolt guns and such, look like they were made by a Chimp attending a high school shop class, some are a little better. I see stuff on the Contemporary makers site that I would save only some of the metal parts and burn the stock. But someone will see it as "cool".  There are examples of this in all art forms, dog @#$%/!! on a stick ceramic art for example http://www.damnmagazine.net/en/article/anne-marie-laureys-ceramic-works. I see no reason to recreate such things. To me they are too far from the spirit of the ML rifle in America. Its like painting a Mona Lisa copy using... Well ... You know.
Dan

[axelp]

I would put the odd duck cobbled guns of the West Coast 1800s into the "folk art" genre. Same as the less than attractive poorly executed carving and engraving of some eastern long rifles. It is an acquired taste to be sure. I like most folk art-- When you hold it in your hands you can almost feel the heartbeat of the maker and the previous users, and you wish the piece could talk. I think its often harder to recreate this whimsical "shoddy" worn/repaired work than it is to create the clean stuff. It is why its so hard to recreate honest age, wear and tear by artificial means. Like an adult trying to copy a child's drawing-- it hardly ever looks "right" for some reason.

The elegant and beautifully executed refined carving and engraving of the true masters give off a totally different feel--equally wonderful and warm and appreciated, just different.

K

[shortbarrel]

I got a curt email from this site, because I told a builder to look up the word CRUDE in the dictionary. So I want make any comments here, that was about 3 or 4 years ago I think. Things seem to have changed since then on this site.

[FL-Flintlock]

And 200 years from now people will think that everyone hunted with a Purdey, Hofer, H&H, Drillings, William & Son, Merkel, Fabbri, etc. because with all these fine professional manufacturers, there's no way anyone would buy a JC Higgins, Hi-Point, Wards Western Field, Mossberg, Marlin, etc.