Another NE fowler

[JV Puleo]

Rather than hijack the NE fowler thread I'll start a new one. This is the wrecked fowler I mentioned. The stock appears to be cherry, the barrel is 48-1/4 inches long. The entry pipe and one of the other pipes appear to be from the original gun while the other two appear to have been made of sheet metal. The odd two-piece side plate seems out of place, not as sophisticated as the remains of the other mounts or of the stock making. The gentleman who gave it to me had a very early French lock, probably from a 1717 musket, that fit the mortice almost perfectly although it's clear that it was converted to percussion at some time.

My apologies for taking the pictures on a fire[proof safe in my yard...it isn't all that easy to find a place to lay something this long out.

[alex e.]

The triggerguard and cheek rest suggests  rifle like qualites

[whetrock]

Years ago Wallace Gusler pointed out the concept of a "smooth rifle", which was a rifle-like gun built with a smooth bore. His point was that not every rifle-like gun with a smooth bore is just a rifled gun that later got bored out when the rifling wore out. Some were built with a smooth bore. He was describing pieces which, architecturally, were more like rifles, in that they were built with cheek pieces, grip rails, a rear sight, sometimes a box. These details contrast with the stereotypical architecture of fowlers.

[rich pierce]

Wes White’s book on Historic Arms of Early New York has a section on “Shot Guns, Bullet Guns, and Rifles” and shoes some interesting smooth bore guns with rifle characteristics. This looks like it would fit into that category with the cheekpiece and guard.

[JV Puleo]

I've had "smooth rifles"... We call them "buck & ball" guns here in NE. I'm sure this was a fowler as it's clearly a fowler barrel. The stock appears to be cherry but I don't pretend to be a wood authority and I suspect many "wood attributions" are questionable. Were it not for the stock wood and the crude side plate treatment I would assume it is a European, probably French fowler. As it is, I think it could be a souvenir from the Seven Years War (the F&I War) restocked in New England. Cheek pieces were common on French fowlers and I've run into many muskets and other guns made from early, scavenged French parts that pre-date the Revolution. Keep in mind, a huge percentage of the male population between the ages of about 18 and 30 served in that war...a larger percentage than served in the Revolution. A lot of stuff came back.