Buffalo Runner

[Bob McBride]

Bob,
Interesting read.

Don't know if I missed it in this thread, but Blanket gun was a real item.
It came in, in the reservation period.  A short gun that could be carried concealed under a blanket.

Here’s one that might be of interest on that subject, a bit earlier than the reservation period (1760’s). Not to hijack Eric’s thread but it is a reference to the type of gun that is the subject of his thread.

[Pukka Bundook]

Bob,
Another good read!
Maybe one of the first times laws against "Concealed carry " were enforced!  ;-)

[Eric Kettenburg]

I don't think it's "hijacked" at all - this is all very interesting stuff, especially since it is somewhat difficult to track down period information or documentation regarding short utility pieces such as this.

I remember years ago when engaged in quite a bit of research involving Northampton Co. during the War, I came across a reference to the Moravians at Bethlehem desiring one of their "agents" (not sure if that's the right word, but he was in Philadelphia at the time I believe) to acquire a number of blunderbusses for the defense of the town.  I'd have to assume that they wanted such shorties for close-quarter engagement.

[Bob McBride]

I don't think it's "hijacked" at all - this is all very interesting stuff, especially since it is somewhat difficult to track down period information or documentation regarding short utility pieces such as this.

I remember years ago when engaged in quite a bit of research involving Northampton Co. during the War, I came across a reference to the Moravians at Bethlehem desiring one of their "agents" (not sure if that's the right word, but he was in Philadelphia at the time I believe) to acquire a number of blunderbusses for the defense of the town.  I'd have to assume that they wanted such shorties for close-quarter engagement.

I would think that would be why they would order that type gun. Urban combat against an enemy that might at some time be bunched up. A dozen pistol balls sounds pretty convincing....

I've read where a blunderbuss is described as a 'short gun with a wide bore', 'a carbine is a short gun used by horsemen', etc. I've read where the blunderbuss or short gun was carried by the night watch, stories of confrontations with robbers by homeowners in their houses using a blunderbuss or short gun, and lots of stories of the blunderbuss or short gun used for concealment, ie "talking the blunderbuss from beneath my cloak" or "his short gun appeared suddenly". It makes it a bit tough to determine whether a the short gun in any instance was a blunderbuss, purpose made or a cut off gun, but it's fairly obvious they were used just like we would use them today, for concealment, close in work, and for ease of reload in certain scenarios, and that they were well known, understood, and ubiquitous.

[rich pierce]

Short guns purpose made that way interest me. I’m planning a military carbine based on one in “Of Sorts for Provincials” by Jim Mullins.

I’m not sure short guns were ubiquitous in the mid 1700s through the fur trade era. In that time frame they don’t rise to the level of commonality of long guns. Blunderbusses though fascinating seem rather rare. I’ve yet to see one made here in America or find one in a list of trade items, etc.

Buffalo running and blanket guns seem to be phenomena of the mid to late1800s.

Of course in the mid 1800s short guns - double barreled shotguns with 26-32” barrels - were ubiquitous.

[Bob McBride]

Short guns purpose made that way interest me. I’m planning a military carbine based on one in “Of Sorts for Provincials” by Jim Mullins.

I’m not sure short guns were ubiquitous in the mid 1700s through the fur trade era. In that time frame they don’t rise to the level of commonality of long guns. Blunderbusses though fascinating seem rather rare. I’ve yet to see one made here in America or find one in a list of trade items, etc.

Buffalo running and blanket guns seem to be phenomena of the mid to late1800s.

Of course in the mid 1800s short guns - double barreled shotguns with 26-32” barrels - were ubiquitous.

I didn't mean to insinuate they were ubiquitous in the sense that a gun of musket length was but that they were well known enough not to draw attention when seen. I have been searching google books using a timeframe of 1700-1850 and I am seeing hundreds of references to 'short guns' in the hands of Indians from 1700-1780 and how they are described paints a picture of them not being entirely unusual. It seems as the references pass about 1820 they appear more often in a hunting context than the earlier concealment/close in fighting context.

[rich pierce]

Bob, good documentation. I guess we can’t be sure that what was called a short gun in some of these records doesn’t have a 30-36” barrel. In days when trade guns typically had barrels up to 48” long, a 30-36” barrel might be considered “short”.  I think many of us raised on unmentionable guns with 18-22” barrels think a gun with a 42” barrel is a “long” gun. Back then it’s possible that was considered an “average length gun”.
A lot depends on what happens in our brains when we see “short gun” versus what happened in their brains when they wrote or thought of “short guns”.

[Bob McBride]

Bob, good documentation. I guess we can’t be sure that what was called a short gun in some of these records doesn’t have a 30-36” barrel. In days when trade guns typically had barrels up to 48” long, a 30-36” barrel might be considered “short”.  I think many of us raised on unmentionable guns with 18-22” barrels think a gun with a 42” barrel is a “long” gun. Back then it’s possible that was considered an “average length gun”.
A lot depends on what happens in our brains when we see “short gun” versus what happened in their brains when they wrote or thought of “short guns”.

I agree, and it didn't take long for my searching for mentions of 'short guns' to turn into trying to define what was meant by 'short gun'. I found references, including dictionaries of terms, over the entire 18th century that defined a blunderbuss as "a short gun of wide bore" and a Carbine as "a short gun used by horsemen" so I think it was a vague generality just as it is today. I see things like "the short gun suddenly appeared from beneath his greatcoat" or "the company was refitted with muskets in preference of their old short guns" which seems to be describing a gun like Eric's in length and a carbine of something like 30-36". The context usually tells the tale but I have come to the conclusion that what Eric built would have been called a 'short gun' in the period.

[Bob McBride]

Thanks Eric for the fantastic gun and for inspiring the conversation. Any further references I find interesting I'll put on it's own thread entitled 'Short Guns'.

[rich pierce]

No doubt, what Eric made is short!

[Oil Derek]

Plus, if I remember correctly, short doesn't necessarily equate to expedience or efficiency. In a later American conflict it appeared that many CSA cavalry preferred the 2 band Enfield to the carbine! A middle ground solution for Horse Soldiers it appears, that "just" worked.

[Panzerschwein]

Plus, if I remember correctly, short doesn't necessarily equate to expedience or efficiency. In a later American conflict it appeared that many CSA cavalry preferred the 2 band Enfield to the carbine! A middle ground solution for Horse Soldiers it appears, that "just" worked.

The 2 band jobber had a great rep for accurate shooting, too!

[Notchy Bob]

I think Bob McBride's excellent research has provided us with an appropriate and historically correct name for firearms of this type:  short gun

I seem to recall reading about "canoe guns" (sorry, Mike Brooks.  I had to say it...) in Mike Nesbitt's column in MUZZLELOADER magazine a few years ago.  If I remember correctly, a customer asked Matt Denison, then the proprietor of North Star West, to build a short trade gun that the customer would use while canoeing.  I think this was in the 1990's or early 2000's.  In any event, either Matt or his customer started calling it a canoe gun, and orders for these started coming in to NSW asking for them.  I'll need to go back through my back issues and look for the article, but that's the way I remember it.  So, canoe gun joins plains rifle, tow worm, throwing hawk, and possibles bag, and likely a bunch of other terms, as late 20th - early 21st century entries into the muzzleloading shooter's lexicon.

I think we have pretty well established that short guns existed.  Just to get this out of the way, we can mention that some were purpose built, like this German boar rifle from the 18th century:



I think the barrel on this rifle is less than a foot long.  It was intended for hunting on horseback.  You can link to a video of the Cap & Ball guy test-firing it via Pedersoli's blog:  Shooting An Original 18th Century Short Rifle

However, I think this thread is more concerned with trade guns and "frontier" short guns, assembled from parts.  Samuel Hearne (1745-1792) was an employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, and he traveled all over Canada with native bands in the years between 1769 and 1772.  He wrote extensively about his experiences, and his writing was published in a book, A Journey to the Northern Ocean, as early as 1796, or possibly earlier.  I found this interesting passage in his memoir, discussing the Indians' methods of hunting moose, and the use of cut-down trade muskets:






The pertinent passage is near the top of the second page:  "...I never knew any of them take a gun [moose hunting] unless such as had been blown or bursted, and the barrels cut quite short, which, when reduced to the least possible size to be capable of doing any service..."  Taken as a whole, the statement from Hearne suggests (to me) that cut-down guns were made in an attempt to salvage a damaged weapon.  They were useful in some situations, but the native people had other options for weaponry in that particular methof of hunting.

I looked through James Gooding's book, Trade Guns of the Hudson's Bay Company, 1670-1970, and found a good discussion of standard barrel lengths.  He said detailed data start in 1680, and "for the first decade or so, guns of 5 feet, 4-1/2 feet, and 4 feet were standard" (p.62).  Over the next few years, guns of 3-1/2 feet were added and guns of 5 feet were removed.  In 1693, there was one order for guns of 5-1/2 feet.  The last order for guns of 4-1/2 feet was in 1705.  Barrel lengths of 3 feet were first ordered in 1688, dropped five years later, then added on again in 1731.  By 1841, guns of 2-1/2 feet were added.  So, between 1680 and 1841, standard barrel lengths of trade guns gradually decreased, but at no point did Mr. Gooding indicate that new guns were offered in barrel lengths shorter than 2-1/2 feet (thirty inches).

Isaac Cowie (1848-1917) was a well-educted Shetland Islander who entered the employ of the Hudson's Bay Company in 1867 and stayed on until 1891.  He was initially placed at Qu'Appelle, to work as a clerk.  Trading was primarily with the Assiniboine, Cree, and Metis people.  He wrote a wonderful memoir entitled The Company of Adventurers.  Cowie was an accomplished marksman and a capable hunter, but he was also a shrewd trader and politician.  He was very familiar with trade guns.  Here are a few of his comments about them:





I apologize if that's more than you want to read, but I thought some folks might find it interesting.  The really pertinent comments with regard to "short guns" are on the second page:  "The shorter ones, two and one-half feet, were those most in use on the prairies, and these were usually still further shortened by the Indians, for lightness, as well as concealment under the robes or blankets they wore, and because in running buffalo with a good horse the hunter got so close as to singe the buffalo when he fired."  So, Cowie's comments suggest that guns were intentionally shortened for specific purposes.

As a final thought, have you wondered how the Indians cut those barrels off?  I read... somewhere... that this was done by cutting and then deepening a groove around the barrel with a three-cornered file, which was available from the traders.  One of Bob McBride's submissions (above) appears to support this.

Best regards,

Notchy Bob

[Bob McBride]

Thanks Bob! Some would have been purpose built like the (am I allowed to say this?) 'boar gun', and some cut down willy nilly as (I think you are referring to this exerpt) this shows. Interesting someone would cut down a gun for a single 'robbery'. He must've known he could acquire another easily enough...

 

[Panzerschwein]

I like these:

[jbigley]

Interesting thread. I have to add my .02 to the discussion.
There were probably very few --if any--purpose built for the trade "canoe guns" back in the day. But there were short guns, or blanket guns, which were shortened, either for concealment, or in order  to salvage damaged guns. I myself have shortened TWO muskets, a Navy Arms "Charleville" and an Armi Sport M1842--due to damaged muzzles. And while it is not "period" documentation, Allen Eckert's book, The Conquerors, has a very good example of hostile tribes shortening the barrels of their flintlocks in order to smuggle them into several British forts -- I forget which ones exactly--to attack them during Pontiac's war, in 1763, I believe.
Again, as someone here said, "short gun" could mean one with a 42" barrel (like the Short Land Pattern Brown Bess), or it could mean Short Gun, like a canoe gun or blanket gun. It's all terminology anyway, and we live in the 21st C, not the 18th or 19th, so it seems that we can call'em whatever we want.
As for carbines, I don't know what to think. Again, Terminology.
Newman's book, Weapons of the American Revolution, describes carbines as being shoulder weapons of smaller caliber than the standard musket, IIRC. There are pictures of .65 cal English "carbines" in the book with 42" barrels, which is not what we "moderns" tend to think of as a short barrel, or a carbine (a short, lightweight shoulder weapon). Yet, Bob McBride has found references to short barrelled carbines. It's pretty obvious, to me anyway, that terminology has changed over the years --and centuries. We know that short barrelled guns exist(ed).
I think it comes down to personal preference. I read an article by Mike Nesbitt which recounted a duck hunt in which he used a short barrelled "canoe gun,"  Little Tacky. Mike certainly doesn't need a short barreled gun--he's 6'5"-- but he must just like them.
I personally prefer "shorter" barrels: 36" to 40". They are easier to fit into my vehicles, and besides, I like'm.
Seems I've rambled enough. Like I said, just my .02 --JB

[Mike Brooks]

Mike Nesbitt is the reason I haven't subscribed to "Muzzle-loader" since the early 80's

[Bob McBride]

Interesting thread. I have to add my .02 to the discussion.
There were probably very few --if any--purpose built for the trade "canoe guns" back in the day. But there were short guns, or blanket guns, which were shortened, either for concealment, or in order  to salvage damaged guns. I myself have shortened TWO muskets, a Navy Arms "Charleville" and an Armi Sport M1842--due to damaged muzzles. And while it is not "period" documentation, Allen Eckert's book, The Conquerors, has a very good example of hostile tribes shortening the barrels of their flintlocks in order to smuggle them into several British forts -- I forget which ones exactly--to attack them during Pontiac's war, in 1763, I believe.
Again, as someone here said, "short gun" could mean one with a 42" barrel (like the Short Land Pattern Brown Bess), or it could mean Short Gun, like a canoe gun or blanket gun. It's all terminology anyway, and we live in the 21st C, not the 18th or 19th, so it seems that we can call'em whatever we want.
As for carbines, I don't know what to think. Again, Terminology.
Newman's book, Weapons of the American Revolution, describes carbines as being shoulder weapons of smaller caliber than the standard musket, IIRC. There are pictures of .65 cal English "carbines" in the book with 42" barrels, which is not what we "moderns" tend to think of as a short barrel, or a carbine (a short, lightweight shoulder weapon). Yet, Bob McBride has found references to short barrelled carbines. It's pretty obvious, to me anyway, that terminology has changed over the years --and centuries. We know that short barrelled guns exist(ed).
I think it comes down to personal preference. I read an article by Mike Nesbitt which recounted a duck hunt in which he used a short barrelled "canoe gun,"  Little Tacky. Mike certainly doesn't need a short barreled gun--he's 6'5"-- but he must just like them.
I personally prefer "shorter" barrels: 36" to 40". They are easier to fit into my vehicles, and besides, I like'm.
Seems I've rambled enough. Like I said, just my .02 --JB

I don't think there were any purpose built canoe guns or we would have some sort of documentation, my argument was just that there were 'short guns', purposefully made, for one reason or another, that were if not commonly seen, then at least commonly understood, from Colonial times through the westward expansion, until today. Would I love to find a reference such as "so I cut my gun down so it would not be seen in the canoe as we approached the...." Yep. Do I expect to? Nope.

[jbigley]

Bob--I completely agree with you, but perhaps didn't adequately make that clear in my post. --JB

[Bob McBride]

Bob--I completely agree with you, but perhaps didn't adequately make that clear in my post. --JB

You did make it clear, I was just sort of talking at the computer I guess.... 

[Panzerschwein]

I wonder, then, what the ballistics of the round ball so discharged forth from these “short guns” would entail?

I see the Hungarian man Capandball has the video about a European (very) short barreled piece that looks hardly longer in the barrel than some horseman’s pistols, yet was claimed to hunt boars with?

[Mike Brooks]

I wonder, then, what the ballistics of the round ball so discharged forth from these “short guns” would entail?

I see the Hungarian man Capandball has the video about a European (very) short barreled piece that looks hardly longer in the barrel than some horseman’s pistols, yet was claimed to hunt boards with?

I have heard of those pieces normally called Alpine Jeagers. They probably didn't see much time in a canoe. Short guns in Europe are exceptionally common. As far as ballistics go, Euro powders were far superior to what was available in the Colonies.. Probably the difference between a BANG and a poot.

[oldtravler61]

  CANOE gun is just a modern term. Some people like the word
an some don't.  But stalking whitetail in a thick swamp. I'll take my 24 inch barred short gun. Every time...   Oldtravler

[jrb]

There's this one to check out. Talking on the phone isn't one of my strong points though.
I think the original Poster, Karl, is a gentleman who's worked at Fort Michilimackinac for years.

[Notchy Bob]

This popped up today while I was looking for something else:



This is in the Buffalo Bill Center of the West Collection, and was described as a "flintlock trade rifle;  Indian used, from the Remington Studio collection."  Obviously, it's not a rifle, it's a Northwest gun.  Looking at the yardstick positioned above it, the barrel appears to extend from about the 34 inch mark at the muzzle to about the 9 inch mark at the breech, indicating a barrel about 25" long, and I don't see a front sight.  The shortest Northwest guns I remember seeing documented had 30" barrels, and Northwest guns in general had rudimentary front sights, so we assume this one was cut down.


However, the ramrod ferrules, of which there are two, appear to be spaced about right for the barrel as it is.  If the barrel had been cut back, I would think the ramrod ferrule nearest the muzzle would have been sacrificed, or would at least be a lot closer to the muzzle.  I'm not sure what to make of this gun.  I sure do like it, though.

Notchy Bob