Virginia Rifles

[Benedict]

What are the characteristics of a Virginia Rifle?  I keep seeing lots of rifles that are called Virginia Rifles and they all look different.  I realize that there are lots of regional styles but I have never seen any kind of a description of what a Virginia Rifle is much less a Winchester Rifle.  I would greatly appreciate if anyone could help me answer the question.  If you could list the characteristics of the regional styles that would be even better.

thanks a lot

Bruce

[skillman]

Bruce
Wallace Gussler will be at the Gunmakers Fair this year. I think thats one of the discussion topics.
Steve

[Dave B]

You know when I first started in this hobby I couldn't tell one school of gun making from the next. Over time with the constant study I started to see some similarities in some of the schools and can start to pick them out. Some are still yet unknown to me to where I can pick them out of a line up. I am better at identifying some now but still have a lot to learn. There are several schools of rifle making in Virginia. James Wisker has several books on the gunsmiths of Virginia as well as west Virginia. You go through those books a few times and  you will see some key themes that reoccur  again and again. Some styles of carving are easily identified. Some wire inlay work like that found on the Sheetz rifles.  What can be really confusing is when some one calls a particular style when they don't know what they are talking about.  I saw a description of a H. House rifle done in the classic woodbury school  early VA style and the description called it a Christian spring style rifle?? Who are they trying to kid? Maybe it was a inside joke but if I had not seen Herschel building this very same style rifle and call it a early Virginia rifle with captured lid and stylish beaver tail feature at  the tang of the rifle I wouldn't have know it for what it really was. I would say any time you can spend under Wallace Gusler when it comes to rifle building and the history of the early builders you should take him up on it.  I may be able to make it up for saturday.

[Ian Pratt]

http://www.flintriflesmith.com/WritingandResearch/WebArticles/VirginiaRifle.htm

[Birddog6]

Well, that is a good history lesson.  Unfortunately, it  beat all around the question & never did answer it.    I think most want to see a Example & someone state  THIS (photo) is what a Virginia should look like & these are the specific details that make it a Virginal rifle..

[rich pierce]

"Virginia rifle" is an over-generalization.  It's like asking what's a Pennsylvania rifle.  Is it a Lehigh or  Bucks County from 1790?  A 1770's Christians Spring rifle?  An 1820's rifle from Bedford or Chambersburg?  Lehman or Henry from 1840?  All those are Pennsylvania rifles, agreed?  So what's a Pennsylvania rifle?  Without having studied Virginia rifles as much, it seems to me that rifles from Virginia varied with location and timeframe.  "Virginia rifle" is a marketing term for builders who don't have or take the time to explain which rifle or rifles are the basis of their build.

[Jim Kibler]

Saying something is a Virginia rifle is about as generic as saying something is a Pennsylvania.  There's no easy answer to understanding the details that separate these rifles.  I would suggest obtaining all the reference material on the subject you can and plan on spending many hours studying it.  In addition, as has been previously mentioned, Wallace Gusler, Gary Brumfield  and some others have knowledge of the subject and are more than willing to help.  It's a simple name or category, but not something simple to describe or understand.  

Names, titles etc. are often thrown around pretty loosely.  To those who spend the time trying to understand this stuff, it really is kind of comical.  By and large, the information is available, it just requires the desire and effort to go and get it.

[Mike R]

Its sorta like carving a statue--the old joke that you cut away everything that doesn't look like the model...a Va rifle is what you have when you take away everything that looks like a Pa rifle--sorta.  There are books on Va rifles and I agree with Rich--alot of variability. You also need to ask--what period? Early vs late, etc...

[Ian Pratt]

 Bruce  - The only characteristic that would tie all Virginia rifles together would be the fact that they are made in Virginia. There is a tremendous variety of styles and types represented over long time period just as there would be in any other region. To put this into perspective, imagine if all Lancaster rifles, Lehigh Rifles, York rifles, Christian's Spring rifles, anything made by Bonewitz, Fordney, Fleeger, etc etc were cumulatively lumped together and simply referred to as "Pennsylvania rifles" without any further distinction. Gary's article might serve as an eye opener in this respect. As to images, there are books full of them - try RCA vol 2, Kentucky Rifles and Pistols 1750-1850, George Shumway's Longrifle Articles vol 2, also look further on Gary's web site for plenty more images and descriptions.
  Not trying to beat around the bush here, just trying to help you see that there are definitely answers if the question was more specific in regards to era, style and perhaps maker. Whole lot of guns made in Virginia!        

[G-Man]

I don't think anyone is trying to ignore the question, but you can't answer it with one set of characteristics - there were many styles geographically, and over time.  Plus, in Virginia, the gunsmith families tended to migrate a great deal between the F&I War era and the close of the 18th century.  It's about the same as trying to describe one example of what an "American Longrifle" should look like.  Southern guns in general have been overgeneralized for the most part in the past, and this has led to some of the wide misconceptions out there about features.  There were many guns made in Virginia, but no single "Virginia" style.  And in order to understand what styles fit where and when you need to understand the geography and history as Gary's writeup describes.  Vastly different styles were made in different regions and timeframes by different makers.

Look at some widely diverse guns from the region:

For a 2 good early examples believed to be from Virginia take a look at the brass barreled rifle and its companion piece by the same hand shown in RCA.  Wallace has displayed it at many shows in recent years.  Note the slight stepped wrist and slightly convex overall line of the comb, and the proportions of the guard (bow longer than rail.) These are features were there by the time of the Revolution that persisted on a group of guns made from Botetourt County all the way south and west down into Wythe and Pulaski counties all the way up into at least the 1840 era with the Honaker famlies.  The style was also carried west into Tennessee.

Or go to American Historic Services or "Kentucky Longrifles" websites and look at the Adam Haymaker rifle, which is pre-Rev.  Note the tall butt, large guard, sideplate shape, and general architecture.  Then check out the John Haymaker rifle (same family) in Wallace's article in Muzzle Blasts this month - vastly different in feel.

Of all of the features on Virginia made rifles that I find the most easily recognizable one is the graceful 4-petal flower finial on the patchbox, which became fairly ubiquitous on guns made in Winchester but also all up and down the Shenandoah Valley in the last quarter of the 18th century. Variations on this feature turn up on guns made in other parts of Virginia, and over into Tennessee, North Carollina and other areas as well.  On Winchester guns, as well as other areas  (i.e. take a look at guns made by Simon Lauck or some of the Sheets family) you will often also see the "C" scrolls behind the cheekpiece have small "leaf" or petal-like features carved along their borders.  Again, this feature typically points to Winchester or the Shenandoah Valley in general, but was used up into Pennsylvania as well.

[Ian Pratt]

Holy cow, a bunch of us had the same thought at the same time. We may have been just one man away from reaching critical mass and the whole thing would have blown up. There should be safeguards against this, people could have perished in the name of education this morning.

[JTR]

Describing a Virginia rifle is like describing a PA rifle, because the style was different through the state, and time period.

Go here;
http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=6321.0
to see a Henry Spitzer rifle, New Market, VA, made about 1800, more of less. There's also 2 other Spitzers in the library along with this one for comparison.
Then compare the Sheetz rifles made in W VA to Spitzers work.

On Spitzer work, notice the thickness of the wrist as it meets the comb, the barrel tang, the cheekpiece placement, patchbox release button and the patchbox design. The carving is very typical of VA rifles, and Spitzer in particular. Also notice the differences in side plates between the flint Spitzer and the percussion one.

The flint Spitzer in the link is a hefty sized gun. The barrel is 48" long, the buttstock large, the wrist pretty thick although everything is very well proportioned and the gun shoulders and points like a dream. If I remember correctly, it weighs about 11 pounds.

I think Whisker did 2 books on VA guns, and they show a lot of differences in design and architecture.

John

PS. Wow! A lot of posts since I started writing this one!

[flintriflesmith]

Well, that is a good history lesson.  Unfortunately, it  beat all around the question & never did answer it.    I think most want to see a Example & someone state  THIS (photo) is what a Virginia should look like & these are the specific details that make it a Virginal rifle..

Sorry that you felt I was beating around the bush in my article. I was attempting to be somewhat diplomatic by not saying straight out that "it ain't that d### simple!" Fortunately many of the responses have said that for me.
Gary

[Birddog6]

   I am not too diplomatic.  Not so da%%  simple I would have understood.       I have been asked this dozens of times & I can't give a specific   answer, as I have yet to see any kind of detailed or same  specific thing from Va rifle to VA rifle to tell them.  Except it is not a Lancaster, it is not a York, it is not a Bedford, it is not a Bucks, not a Lehigh, not a etc. etc. etc.........  so I guess it is a VA rifle ......  if it looks kinda  Virginiaish ?   

I'm sorry if I offended you, just trying to pin down something conrete. 

Keith Lisle

[rich pierce]

Maybe we can continue to use this discussion to talk about the characteristics of some Virginia rifles that are distinctive and a signature, like JTR, Dave B, and Guy have done above.  If I may be so bold as to post some excellent pictures of the Haymaker rifle from the American Historic Services website, maybe these will prompt some discussion.  

OK, from this view, there's nothing architecturally that tells me this was made in Virginia instead of by Bonewitz for example, except for greater depth to the buttstock.  The English lock may be one clue, may be more prevalent in Virginia rifles.  There is perhaps a sleekness or racy look to the guard that hints at something for me.  I am not sure the guard is iconic, like a Bucks County guard.



The tang carving on this rifle offers no distinctive regional signatures to me.



The buttstock from this side looks distinctive.  The cheekpiece is placed high on the buttstock.



Ther sideplate is unusual but I am not sure it's a regional characteristic or if this sideplate is new to this gun.  It looks modified from a previous build.  But the 3rd screw is unusual.  Is this a regional characteristic?

[Mike R]

One gets the impression that if an expert cannot pin the PA school down, he says: "southern gun"....

[flintriflesmith]

 I am not too diplomatic.  Not so da%%  simple I would have understood. ...so I guess it is a VA rifle ......  if it looks kinda  Virginiaish ?  
I'm sorry if I offended you, just trying to pin down something conrete.  
Keith Lisle

Keith,
I'm not that easily offended. Just a bit frustrated that this question comes up again and again—is answered again and again—and many folks, such as yourself, seem unwilling or unable to accept the answer. IT AIN’T A SIMPLE SUBJECT SO DON”T EXPECT A SIMPLE ANSWER!

Okay, that said, I'll give you a straight answer as best as I can without writing a book. There are more than twenty identifiable regional styles in Virginia longrifles in the flint period. There were dozens and dozens of shops/makers. Virginia, in the colonial period, was the largest, wealthiest, and most populated of all the colonies. Before the end of the flint era, longrifles were made from the eastern piedmont—see the published work of Frederick Kleete near Fredericksburg—to the far reaches of counties that are now separate states, like Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana.

It appears to me that you are asking for a simple answer to a complex question and are unwilling to accept the fact that there is no simple answer! In this post you mention several PA counties and seem to realize that they have distinct stylistic details between Lancaster, York, Bedford, etc. If you looked even closer at PA rifles you would discover that there are identifiable styles within Lancaster Co. alone. The published work of John Newcomer and Jacob Dickert are both examples of Lancaster rifles but I challenge anyone to come up with a description of a Lancaster rifle that would cover both makers. It ain’t that simple!

I guess I can’t see why are you willing and able to understand that PA has diversity in regional styles and still insist that someone should be able to give you a bullet list of details for a “Virginia Rifle.”  Where is the bullet list that defines a PA rifle, a Maryland rifle, a North Carolina rifle, or a TN rifle? As others have stated, the books with Virginia rifles in them are out there, the rifles are at regional shows and on web sites, and all you have to do is read, look, study, and ask more specific questions to find the answers.
 
Speaking of study, two sources that I’ve not seen mentioned in this thread are the volumes of the Journal of Historical Armsmaking Technology (JHAT, Vol 2 & 5) were rifles from both Rockbridge and Augusta Co. VA are disassembled and discussed in considerable detail and Wallace Gusler’s continuing series of articles in Muzzle Blasts which offer a preview of his upcoming book on Virginia rifles. Wallace began that series in 2003 but he began his study of Virginia rifles in about 1958. Back then even experienced collectors, like Joe Kindig, knew virtually nothing about the various “schools” of rifle making in Virginia. Today there is no real reason for someone with a serious interest in the subject to expect a “one size fits all” description of a VA rifle.

As several have said, the only characteristic that is universally shared by rifles from any state is their state of origin. They vary from county to county, town to town, shop to shop, apprentice to master even within the same shop and, more importantly, from year to year.

So, now I have probably offended you. And I have almost assuredly offended those dealers trying to sell a single style of rifle that they claim is the “Virginia rifle.” There is no such thing, anymore than there is one “Pennsylvania rifle.”

Gary,
student and builder of various Virginia rifles since 1962.

[Mike Brooks]

And I have almost assuredly offended those dealers trying to sell a single style of rifle that they claim is the “Virginia rifle.”

My favorite label is "Early Virginia".

[Ky-Flinter]

I am enjoying this thread and as a novice student of the long rifle, I'm finding it very educational.  And here I thought they were all Kentucky rifles!

-Ron

[Dr. Tim-Boone]

Very helpful thread.....Thanks to all and Gary, the rest of us in the Southern colonies appreciate your stand for diversity......Even in GA we have different regional/builder styles......

[flintriflesmith]

Bruce
Wallace Gussler will be at the Gunmakers Fair this year. I think thats one of the discussion topics.
Steve

Steve,
I looked at the schedule of seminars at Dixon's Fair and didn't see Wallace's name. Are you referring to the fair in Oregon? Just don't want anyone to expect something that is not happening.
Gary

[Birddog6]

Gary,

  Obviously, I don't study VA rifles.  But now & then someone asks me of them, & I can't tell them much & would like to know more of them.  That being said, when I hear someone speak of PA rifles, they usually break it down to a county or a school or area & you can see rifles from that area & similarities.  And when they are sold, they are usually listed as a specific school, county, or builder.

When I hear of Virginia  rifles, that is it.   It is Virginia or sometimes called a early Virginia.  No mention of the original builder, style, county, area, it's just listed as a Virginia rifle.  

  I guess I am looking for them to be broken down to dif schools like the PA rifles are, & them referred to as such.  So I guess it is not done this way on Va rifles ?  I have seen ? a dozen Va rifles for sale in the past year. Not a one had any type of mention of style, county, school, area, they just said  Virginia rifle.

Keith

[jwh1947]

Yep, honestly, as said before, the study of Virginia rifles is rich in early history and important schools.  My bet is that there were concurrent builders in both PA and VA at a very early date, and if someone were to call for a simple answer to the age-old question, I'd confess that logic would force me to conclude that maybe the first American gun was made in Jamestown.  

[Pete G.]

I am in the middle of a build of a Golden Age Valley of Virginia Rifle, and have done a lot of studying of the Whisker books, so I'll jump in here at the peril of exposing my ignorance as well as sharing any knowledge.

The Whisker books tend to focus on the early 19th century guns more than earlier styles.
Maybe because the early Pa. smiths were more prolific so there just were not as many guns
built in Virginia at the time. It does seem that there are few examples that would reflect the kit guns labeled as "Early Virginia". The most notable divergence is the iron furniture.
Anyway, the Golden Age guns tended to follow the same general architecture of the
Pennsylvania smiths in that the later guns were slimmed down and more graceful than the
earlier guns. Most followed the straight comb pattern, but a few from the far northern
region will show a slight roman nose profile. A lot of the Hampshire county guns could be
mistaken for a Lehigh.

As mentioned by someone before, quite a few of the valley guns had the four petaled flower patch box. Most patchbox releases are pretty much a reflection of what we would recognize as standard, with the exception of a curious style that uses a fake knuckle in the hinge as a release. I have never seen this style elsewhere.There are other patchbox styles similar to but not as elaborate as some from the York boxes.

Most locks are the English pattern trade lock (Ketland or something similar). Quite a few sideplates are similar to what is pretty much the standard Lancaster plate, but often with the horns on each side of the rear screw somewhat exaggerated.  The trigger guard is often a distinctive profile, long with the rail flowing into the bow without much of a transition between the two, sometimes with an extended rear spur. Most buttplates are similar to the Lancaster and York plates.

The carving seems to be more incised carving than relief, while the relief carving that does exist is usually not too elaborate.The carving behind the cheekpiece is a distinctive pattern that I have never seen on rifles elsewhere. It seems to be evolved from the Lancaster pattern with double C scrolls with a ruffle around the front lobe, an oval separating the two scrolls and something that looks sort of like a feather fan behind the oval. This particular theme shows up again and again in a multitude of variations, but is still recognizable as the same basic pattern.

The inlays are somewhat varied, with an acorn motif showing up rather often, and there seems to be much more use of wire inlay that in other schools of gunsmithing. There is sometimes a rather curious inlay of a hand with an extended forefinger that I have also seen on several old church steeples around the South. This symbol was also used on gravestones, pointing upward toward Heaven and signifying the one true way. It doesn't occur often, but is repeated on the works of several different smiths in the valley.

Nosecaps of some makers sometimes tend to be longer than what we would consider as normal, but most seem to be in the range of about 2" or maybe a little bit shorter.

One real problem that I have run across is trying to separate a lot of these rifles into schools. There a several instances where two different rifles attributed to the same general area and time have totally different architecture and furniture. I feel that this is probably due to the later time period where there were more people and more moving around and particular regions were not as isolated as in earlier times. The later period builders also seem to have started purchasing more standard parts rather than building everything themselves, castings in particular. Not a lot different from how we do things now. I think that these factors probably tend to blur the lines between different schools, so this adds to the difficulty in identifying a particular rifle as belonging to one school or another. Sometimes about the best you can do is to look at the history of the builder and you can determine where he worked and at what general time he worked. This helps, but if you do not know the builder, it can be very difficult to determine the origin of a piece by characteristics alone.

BTW Keith, North Alabama was settled mostly by folks that came from Virginia in the early 1800's. Thought you might find that interesting.

[Larry Pletcher]

I don't know if this will help or not as I struggle with regional styles.  In Mark Silver's booth at Friendship was a gun he finished recently.  I asked him about it and said that I saw some "Virginia" in the gun.  He replied that it was an Augusta Co gun.  From our discussion, I'm sure that Mark looks at Virginia guns in regional styles just as we think of in Penn guns.   I doubt I could say what made me think Virginia; it may be like Gary said on earlier occasions.  It may be that first short look that puts the style in your head - without a particular detail making the difference.  BTW the Silver gun also had a Lancaster flavor too.  Did styles follow the Great Wagon Road south?  I don't know.

Regards,
Pletch