Unusual Hawken features found

[mountainman70]

Robert, do a search "Hawken" and settle in for a LOT of readin. You just touched upon a VERY popular subject here. 
Best regards, Dave F

[bptactical]

Great post and Thank You

[B.Barker]

 did the brass mounted rifle have keys hold the barrel to the stock?

[Dave B]

The brass mounted rifle looks like it has escution plates with wedges. I didnt get any shots of them up close only that one shot of the case with all the rifles. If you inlarge the pic. you can see what looks like the plates and wedges. They may have been Iron or brass. I think Iron looking at the picture

[rich pierce]

Here is a hooked breech I’ve been shaping to approximate a “conquistador helmet” style breech seen on some early J&S Hawken rifles. A work in progress.

[RAT]

What some call a "snail" is more appropriately called a "bolster". The later S. Hawken era style just happens to look like a snail leading people to call it that.

I think we need to get away from the idea that Jacob and Samuel were inventing these parts. They were clearly using commercially available parts. Identical parts show up on rifles by other makers from different areas of the country. The bolster on the MT historical society rifle looks essentially identical to one used on a pistol made by William Chance of England.

I have found no record of either Hawken brother operating a foundry in ST. Louis where they were producing steel castings. I'd love to see a full Tryon catalog. I'd bet money we'd see some familiar "Hawken" parts illustrated.

I'm not trying to take anything away from Jacob and Samuel. Clearly they were producing well made rifles in their own style. Some parts they produced themselves, especially the earlier rifles. The trigger guard and butt plate on the MT historical society rifle are clearly shop produced... not commercial castings. But they didn't make everything themselves in-house.

[Bob Roller]

What some call a "snail" is more appropriately called a "bolster". The later S. Hawken era style just happens to look like a snail leading people to call it that.

I think we need to get away from the idea that Jacob and Samuel were inventing these parts. They were clearly using commercially available parts. Identical parts show up on rifles by other makers from different areas of the country. The bolster on the MT historical society rifle looks essentially identical to one used on a pistol made by William Chance of England.

I have found no record of either Hawken brother operating a foundry in ST. Louis where they were producing steel castings. I'd love to see a full Tryon catalog. I'd bet money we'd see some familiar "Hawken" parts illustrated.

I'm not trying to take anything away from Jacob and Samuel. Clearly they were producing well made rifles in their own style. Some parts they produced themselves, especially the earlier rifles. The trigger guard and butt plate on the MT historical society rifle are clearly shop produced... not commercial castings. But they didn't make everything themselves in-house.

There was a foundry in St.Louis called Merrimac Iron Works that made butt plates and trigger guards that the Hawken
Shop used.

Bob Roller

[rich pierce]

I’m not thinking it is being proposed that the Hawken brothers invented anything. Like dozens to hundreds of makers at that time they knew how to forge and braze buttplates. They simply developed their own style of quality guns that later became famous for a variety of reasons.

I like re-creating originals or at least something close. I agree that the Hawken brothers used, at any given time, a variety of parts including hooked and integral patent breeches of different forms. It’s clear the same is true of locks. It would be convenient if a variety of different breech types they used were available. Meanwhile, we fabricate or modify parts we can find.

[Bob Roller]

WHEN did percussion caps as we know them today become common in guns?
I know Colt made small revolvers for them in 1836.They were not around in 1822 were they?
Bob Roller

[mr. no gold]

When Jedediah Smith came to California in 1828, his pistols were Philip Creamer percussion guns. The authorities sent him down to San Diego for a hearing and the alcalde took his weapons. They were not returned to Smith. Eventually he gained permission to leave California by the same route he came in, to the south. Once free, he and his company immediately went north. In Oregon they were almost wiped out by local Indians loyal to the Hudsons Bay Company. Curiously, the Company saved Smith and those of his group still alive.
These pistols were eventually given to, and kept, in the San Diego County Historical Society in the early 1900s. First one, and then the second disappeared. I saw one of them in 1953 before it left the building. Very odd looking pistol, but then Creamer made some 'different' looking guns. Not a clear answer to the question, but it gives some indication. Also an article some time back in "The Rocky Mountain Fur Trade Journal"  Volume 5, 2011 has a good paper on arms of the fur trade. Refer to pp 82-84 discussing the availability of percussion caps on the frontier, and hinterlands, especially in the 1830s.
Dick 

[Mtn Meek]

WHEN did percussion caps as we know them today become common in guns?
I know Colt made small revolvers for them in 1836.They were not around in 1822 were they?
Bob Roller

Bob,

The percussion cap as we know it was likely first thought of around 1815 in England, but because of Reverend Alexander Forsyth's patent on his percussion system and his lawsuits to prevent patent infringement, little commercial development occurred until after 1821 when his patent expired.  There was much experimentation in England to perfect the percussion cap in the early 1820's.  By 1825, many gun makers in England were producing percussion arms, and by 1830, nearly all sporting guns made for the English market were percussion.

Joshua Shaw, one of the claimants to have invented the percussion cap around 1815 and who emigrated from England to America in 1817, applied for and was granted a US patent for the copper percussion cap in 1822.  After that, the development of percussion arms in America quickly followed, if not paralleled, that in England.

Henry Deringer of Philadelphia was making percussion pistols as early as 1826.

From Henry Deringer Pistols from 1826 to 1870 by L.D. Eberhart


According to George Shumway in Pennsylvania Longrifles of Note, Deringer made this percussion rifle in 1829.  Note the “conquistador helmet” style breech bolster on the rifle.



Percussion guns were common on the East Coast by 1830.  Henry J. Kauffman in his The Pennsylvania Kentucky Rifle transcribed an advertisement in The Columbia Spy, June 23, 1830 for Jacob Fordney announcing his new shop.  The ad states in part, "Guns altered to the Percussion principle, and all other kinds of REPAIRING done in the best manner, and on the shortest notice."

In researching for his book, The Hawken Rifle: Its Place In History, Charles Hanson, Jr. found references and advertisements in St. Louis newspapers for percussion caps in quantity beginning in 1830.

The earliest record Hanson found for a mountain man purchasing a percussion Hawken rifle was Lucien Fontenelle who "ordered 500 percussion caps with his [Hawken] rifle in 1832." (Hanson, pg 21)

mr. no gold mentioned Jedediah Smith's percussion pistols.  It's often hard to separate fact from myth when it comes to the mountain men.  Garavaglia and Worman in Firearms of the American West 1803-1865 briefly mention the pair of percussion pistols that Jedediah Smith was carrying when he was killed by the Comanches in 1831.  Garavaglia and Worman included this picture of one of Jedediah's pistols.  This may be the same pistol that mr. no gold was thinking of as the caption to the picture below says it was stolen from a West Coast museum.



Bob, the answer would be about 1830 to your question, "WHEN did percussion caps as we know them today become common in guns?"  English gun makers were building guns for use with percussion caps as early as 1825 and American gun makers as early as 1826.  By 1830, percussion guns were dominate in England and common place in Eastern US and readily available in coastal cities such as New Orleans and Galveston, TX and at the gateway to the West in St. Louis.

Trapping Brigade leaders such as Jedediah Smith and Lucien Fontenelle are known to have percussion rifles and pistols in 1831 and 1832, respectively.

[mr. no gold]

Bingo, MM!!! That is the very pistol. It stood out to me at the time because the nipple was located directly into the barrel quarter flat. So, this would suggest that cap guns were made perhaps as early as 1825, but still being rather uncommon. My world view at the time (15 years old) was that if it didn't have a drum and nipple it wasn't a real cap lock. Also, Joseph
Manton in England is a claimant to the origination of the percussion cap. Seems to me he is as strong a contender as the others.
Dick

[RAT]

When we examined the "ETC" rifle in Helena we could find no indication of brazing. It appears to be forge welded. To be clear... the lock is not a converted flintlock. It uses a flintlock plate, but was built from the start as a percussion. Think of it this way... at the Tryon plant there was a bin full of lock plates that had been forged in the same die. They take one out and make it into a flintlock. Then they take another one out and make it into a percussion. The Tryon stamp on this lock dates to before 1836. In 1836 the stamp was changed when Tryon's son joined the company.

Personally, I don't believe the Hawken brothers made flintlocks after about 1830. They seem to be ahead of most American smiths in following new trends. This is probably one reason they were so well regarded in their time. They may have made some NW trade guns in flint after this date, but I don't believe they made and rifles or shotguns in flint after this.

By the way... has anyone seen a double shotgun made by the Hawken brothers? We know they made them from Hanson's book.

The earliest journal record I could find of a trapper with a percussion rifle in the west was 1829. I say that from memory. I'll have to check my records. By 1831 St. Louis stores were competing with each other in advertisements about how many caps they had in stock. Clearly conventional percussion caps were commonly available in St. Louis by that date. 

[mr. no gold]

Rat, Jed Smith came into CA in 1828 with some percussion arms, notably his personal pistols. There is a discussion of this subject on another thread.
Dick

[Mtn Meek]

Bingo, MM!!! That is the very pistol. It stood out to me at the time because the nipple was located directly into the barrel quarter flat. So, this would suggest that cap guns were made perhaps as early as 1825, but still being rather uncommon. My world view at the time (15 years old) was that if it didn't have a drum and nipple it wasn't a real cap lock...
Dick

mr. no gold, I'm sorry I didn't make myself clear enough in my post showing the Jedediah Smith percussion pistol.  That pistol is believed to be one of a pair that Smith had with him when he was killed in 1831.  It is not one Smith might have had in 1828.

With all due respect, I believe your recollections are faulty about Jedediah's travels in 1828.  He was never in San Diego in 1828.  On his second expedition to California in 1827-28, he intentionally avoided going to the either the San Gabriel Mission or San Diego, but instead headed north to the camp on the Stanislaus River where he had left his men from his first expedition to California.  It is doubtful he had any pistols with him at this time.  He and his men had been attacked by the Mohave Indians while crossing the Colorado River on their journey out, losing nine men, all his horses, most of his supplies, weapons, and ammunition.  The nine surviving members only had five rifles among them.

It was during his first expedition to California in 1826 that he was ordered to travel from the San Gabriel Mission to San Diego to appear before the Governor Echeandía.  He and his men had been asked to surrender their arms when they initially arrived at the San Gabriel Mission, so their is no evidence that he had taken his pistols with him to San Diego.  After about two weeks in San Diego, Smith finally convinced the Governor to let he and his men leave.  The Governor insisted that they leave California by the way they came and allowed them to buy necessary supplies and horses and take their arms with them.  Leaving the mission settlements of Mexican California, Jedediah turned north rather than going on to the Mohave Desert and eventually led his men into the San Joaquin Valley.  They traveled north on the western side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, trapping along the many rivers and streams that tumbled out of the mountains.  They reached the Stanislaus River as the trapping season ended and set up camp there.  Smith eventually found a way over the Sierra Nevada's and headed back across the Great Basin to the 1827 rendezvous, leaving most of his men and all his furs camped on the Stanislaus.

I only bother to correct you on this point so that one doesn't get the mistaken impression that Jedediah's percussion pistols were made much before 1831.  In all likelihood, he bought them in St. Louis between the time he returned in October, 1830 from his 5-year stay in the mountains and when he left for Santa Fe in April, 1831.  They support the other evidence that percussion firearms and caps were becoming common place in St. Louis by 1830.

[Dphariss]

So they are claiming an 1815-1822 mfg date for an S. Hawken marked rifle?

I think they will be correcting this error.

Dan

[Dphariss]

Rat, Jed Smith came into CA in 1828 with some percussion arms, notably his personal pistols. There is a discussion of this subject on another thread.
Dick

I would have to see some pretty iron clad documentation.

Dan

[mr. no gold]

Dan, the only evidence that may or may not exist by this time would be in the records of the San Diego County Historical Society. They had one pistol on display in the Presidio Museum in Old Town for decades and the data card with it stated that it had been owned by Jedediah Smith and surrendered by him to Governor Echeandia when Smith was summoned to the temporary capital of San Diego. Next time Smith came he appeared at Monterey the new capital. I do recall that the data card also said that the pistol was on of a pair but the location of the second was unknown. I saw the gun there in probably, 1953. Unfortunately it grew legs and walked out at some point in time. Smith's visit with Echeandia was on his first trip to California in 1825, and I believe that the pistol(s) were made by Philip Creamer of Kaskaskia, IL. Henry Deringer boasted that he was making percussion guns in 1825 and if this is true, there is no reason that the percussion system couldn't have found its way to St. Louis. It was a very important supply point for much of the western trade. I guess that we will never really know about the pistols by this time, with none to examine. It is highly unlikely that this gun was one of his brace of silver mounted KY pistols that the Indians took from him when they killed him. As I understand it his recovered property was sent back to his family in Ohio. The pistol in question here did not really fit the category of a 'high end' inlaid hand gun. That Smith had to turn his weapons over is not unusual given the paranoia that existed in the government of California at the time. The Spaniards and then the Mexicans were terrified that they would lose all or part of the province to invaders, and in fact they did lose most of it before the US War with Mexico.