Lancaster style rifle with "A ALBRECHT" signed barrel aka RCA 46

[smart dog]

Hi Scott,
You asked if I had evidence that customers specified stock designs and I do not for the trade in America.  There is quite a bit of evidence in the British gun trade.  For example, customers wanting a rifle or fowler made in the "German" or "Spanish" or "French" fashion meaning the stock styling, barrel style, decoration, and even the lock. I find it hard to accept the idea that customers of guns in the 18th century cared no more about what they bought than when buying a book.  The gun cost much more and was a tool the owner may have used for recreation but also as a tool to earn a living, to defend themselves, and to feed themselves.  Moreover, one gun style or dimensions do not fit everyone and unlike a book, the fit of the gun matters to the shooter.  Evidence for specific customer input may not survive except in day books.  As you wrote, we need to find some to address a lot of questions about the trade. 

dave

[spgordon]

Dave,

Of course I never said or would ever have thought that "customers of guns in the 18th century cared no more about what they bought than when buying a book." I did not say, at any point or in any fashion, that customers did not care about the gun that they bought. I wrote an article, for God's sake, about a customer who specified quite particularly the features he wanted on his rifle! I've said, repeatedly, that they would have cared about the difference between a common and a high-end rifle; many might have requested particular features (as Baer seems to have); they might certainly have negotiated about many things with a gunsmith; and of course they would have wanted a gun that "fit" them physically. Not sure why that isn't clear.

All I have said, repeatedly, is that I do not believe that customers cared at all about the stock profiles (Lancaster v. Northampton, for instance) that some of us think are so obvious. That is all I have said.

My point is that those things were not visible or significant to eighteenth-century American customers. There is no evidence that anybody noticed them.

If, in the British gun trade, customers requested German or Spanish or French fashions, then I guess the differences between those things were more noticeable than the difference between a Lancaster County and a Lehigh County gun.


****

The reason whether people noticed stock profiles matters is because this is how people have explained the signed Albrecht rifle. It has a Lancaster profile because he had to adjust his practice to tailor it to the Lancaster clientele. I don't believe that, because I don't think any customer would have cared a whit about a stock profile.

[WESTbury]

Everybody in Lititz who refused to take the oath continued working in their trades--and Albrecht could have, too. If he was producing arms and the county or province wanted them, he could have continued to supply them. He does not seem to have objected to supplying arms in 1776 (though I suppose he could have been forced to do so), so I don't think he would have felt scrupulous about doing so in 1777 or 1778.

Well sure, that's what any good businessman would do.

Appreciate all of your insight into these subjects Scott. It funny, I did not pick up on the pipe bowels the first couple of times I read your paper on Albrecht. Of course he had many other talents such as a musician and teacher. Certainly a very well rounded individual that may have an interesting person to have a conversation with. I wonder if my distant cousins, the Graeff brothers were ever acquainted with Albrecht.