History In My Hands
 

Got a phone call from my sister this morning.

She said, “there’s a guy in my office with a gun you will want to see”.

Her office is only about five miles from my house. So, I grabbed my camera and tape measure and headed over there to spend the next hour holding history in my hands, taking pictures and thinking about long ago times.

Here are the pictures I took. When you get to the last one you will know how I felt.

WOW!! that would have been something to just hold. What caliber was that.. .40 or .45? The reason I ask is it looks like a special bore for shooting conical bullets. That is a great rifle. A real honor to just look at.

I didn't have anything but a standard tape measure with me. But as near as I could tell with the tape the land to land distance was 15/32" and groove to groove 9/16". But my measurement was by no means precise.

Beautiful piece of workmanship. A thrill just to look at it, never mind holding it.

Considering how old it is and where it was used (battle) it is in remarkably good condition. Very cool.

Awesome:cool15:

That is cool Semi.

Yes a very nice piece of History!
(BP)

semi

That is just awesome....

MAN...that would account for some awfully deep rifling!

9/16 groove depth (.562) - 15/32 land diameter (.468) = 3/32 (.094) rifling depth!

What the heck did they use for patch material... Rawhide?

I do not know this personally, but the gentlemen who showed me the gun said the curator of records at Chalmette Battlefield in Jean Lafitte National Park verified that Capt. Beal's Company of New Orleans Riflemen did indeed participate in the Battle of New Orleans, and company records list William Ross as a member.

The legend concerning the obliterated names on the patchbox is that the family fell on hard times and did not want the family name on the rifle when it was pawned. True or not, it's a good story.

A groove to groove measurement minus a land to land measurement will equal the depth of both grooves. That value divided in half is the rifling depth. So on that gun, it was about 0.047", not 0.094". Still, obvioulsy deep rifling.

Also, makes you wonder why someone would try to remove the inscribed names.

What you see at the muzzle is where the maker filed the grooves at the muzzle to make it easier to load a patched ball... A coned muzzle done by hand...Conicals weren't in common use until the time of the Civil War in the 1860's...This makes it appear as if the rifling is deeper than it actually is...

Very cool. Nice looking at pictures of such a beautiful gun.

A shame for such a family heirloom to be pawned. Still, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.

That is a beautiful well cared for gun.

Wow. What an incredible thing to hold. Looks like the ol' girl can still shoot fine, too. It's in remarkable condition for being 200 years old. I've seen 10-year-old guns in worse shape!
It would be soooooooooooooo interesting to fire it, and determine its accuracy. We hear so many stories about hitting British soldiers at 200 and 300 yards with these rifles. Be interesting to shoot it against a silhouette.
Aw heck, use lawyers for targets. They're the new enemy of America, anyway ... heh.

A very nice piece of history right there. Nice pictures also fine job.

Wow, that is too cool! I can envision Semi having to have a drool rag the entire time he was near that gun :D

Simply awesome!

Thanks for sharing.