mels dad, getting older but still feelin good. Thanks to all for the kind comments.
My opinion on this is that if you try to copy something exactly that you don't have in your hand, you wind up with a Chinese copy. Better, I think, to work in the style and change a few things on purpose as if it were something the gunmaker did shortly before or after. In this case, I tried to make the head of the patchbox more gracefull and tried to balance out the carving a little better on the wrist on the lock side.
Check out the one by Allen Martin on his site. A very close copy except he completely changed to head of the patchboz to one commonly used in Kreps' area.
There's nothing wrong, however, with copying one exactly if you have it right there. This can be very challenging.
