French Trade Guns

[Sir Michael]

I've started this because it appears that it might benefit others if we discussed French Trade guns.  

What do they look like?  
What types of furniture were they made with?
Unique design features.
Materials
Dimensions
Classifications

[Sir Michael]

What got me started besides the direction the other thread was taking was a quick review of Museum of the Fur Trade Quarterlies and the Winter 97 Volume 34 Number 4 edition.

It includes a discussion and pictures of what it describes as the Last Type of French Trade Gun.  It was made between 1725 and 1756 based on a date on the lock and the date the French stopped making Trade Guns.  The thing that caught my eye first was its profile.  The butt stock from the trigger to the toe is straight.  All French Trade Guns I've seen to date had a concave curve to them.  Also the butt appears to be slightly concave with the heel rounded.  The butt plate also appears to be cast.

It is described as being similar to Hamilton's "Type D"

Any thoughts?

[James Kelly]

Someone indicated walnut stocks were not available from Caywood. Looking at "Flintlocks Available" I see:
English fowler with English walnut
Curly cherry (blank available, I think)
French type D with English walnut
Blonde curly English walnut blank available
Walnut English game gun. .50 cal

Most of their guns are maple, I suspect one either waits for walnut or lucks out by calling when they have some in stock.

Gordon's new three volume set has the best photos of Northwest guns available anywhere. For French guns I'd suggest "Colonial Frontier Guns" by T.M. Hamilton

[Mike R]

French trade guns were shipped over by the thousands and widely distributed through the Great Lakes region, down the Miss River and along the Gulf Coast--and traded inland from those areas.  This trade began in the 17th cent and by the late 1600s all were flintlock smoothbore long arms that broadly resembled each other except for details of hardware such as the designs of buttplates, sideplates, trigger guards, etc.  Most are known chielfy from archeological finds.  See Hamilton's book on colonial arms for the best single reference.  Many or most had straighter butt stocks than the "classic" Tulle fusil de chasse of the early 18th cent. The so-called "cow's foot" butt was perhaps not as common as assumed by most makers of French guns these days.  These various trade guns were made in St Etienne, Tulle, Liege and other europoean sites.  Long and gracefull and lighter than many of the English arms both in weight and ball size, they were widely used by native Americans.  Many made today are 20 gauge [.62] however originals also included many smaller gauges approximating 24 and 28 gauge and less.

[tg]

Mike pretty well summed it up, Lenk shows a mid 18th centurey gun that is much like Hamiltons drawing and a early 18th century gun that is fairly straiht as well I know a guy who has a couple of early French originals and they are much like the stock shaped offered by Davis, a bit straighter than those of TOW the C and D thing must be kept in their context as only designations to stylesof furniture seperated by shapes and time a trade gun built in the 1750's would be expected to have the D furniture  a gun before 1720 would have the C type but this was also a time when locks and barrels were changing so with what is availble today a gun with type C would be from the late C period, The C furniture would typical have the torch finial on the buttplate and the triggerguard and an open side plate vs the solid sideplate and non matching finials on the tg and buttplate on the "D"Lenks guns show an evolution of sorts in gun architecture thoughmost are high end guns they likely represnt the style or set the style for the time

[Sir Michael]

Anyone know or have an idea why the French stopped making Trade Guns with the Curved Butt Stock?

The straight stock versions of French Trade Guns look a lot like English Trade Guns with a cast Butt Plate in stead of the simple sheet brass plate of the English guns to me.  ( At a bit of a distance.  Close up there are a world of differences in the detials.)

[Mike R]

Anyone know or have an idea why the French stopped making Trade Guns with the Curved Butt Stock?

The straight stock versions of French Trade Guns look a lot like English Trade Guns with a cast Butt Plate in stead of the simple sheet brass plate of the English guns to me.  ( At a bit of a distance.  Close up there are a world of differences in the detials.)

I don't know that they did stop until they lost their footholds in N America after 1763.  I think the British were copying the French guns in part to satisfy the Indians used to the French guns rather than the other way around.

[tg]

They may well have contiued with this sytyle to some extent the N.America was not the only part of the world that the European powers were involved with I do not know the extent of trade in guns elsewhere but they would have supplied their own civilians with guns of some sort maybe like the "Tulle" which was not a trade gun as such ,though I believe similar shapes were made a other armouries.

[tg]

I found something that I could not recall where I had seen it after a lot of looking, it is in reference to the Petit Fusil De Chasse, we have surmised that they were scaled down Fusils, I ran across an old article by Kit Ravenshare and he mentioned the Grand Tulles and Petit Tulles and questioned as to whether they were longer/shorter barrels or larger/smaller bores I had not thought of this spin before any thoughts.

[Mike R]

I found something that I could not recall where I had seen it after a lot of looking, it is in reference to the Petit Fusil De Chasse, we have surmised that they were scaled down Fusils, I ran across an old article by Kit Ravenshare and he mentioned the Grand Tulles and Petit Tulles and questioned as to whether they were longer/shorter barrels or larger/smaller bores I had not thought of this spin before any thoughts.

my guess would be that those terms refer to bore size(?)...I have seen the term "demi-Tulle" apparently referring to a shortened version.  Bore sizes of Tulles ran from the standard military .69 down into the lower .50s.

[tg]

That was my thouight, though Okwaho pointed out a gun made with a small 5 1/2"lockplate marked Tulle and a 38" barrel .72 bore this is a parts gun circa 1755 and labled an Anerican fusil pg 146"Battle Weapons of the American Revolution" he was considering it as made from parts of a petit Tulle with the petit meaninhg short/scaled down but the more I look at it I wonder if that lock is just a French pistol lock it is marked Tulle as is the barrel , which may have been cut down 6" I can't tell from the pics. It does tend to lean toward petit  meaning shorter but I don't know how much to stake on a parts gun.

[James Kelly]

A French Fowler, not Trade Gun, is for sale on ambroseantiques.com  The 24 gage barrel is only 41" long, not 44". Cow-foot or whatever one calls that wierd buttstock style. Worth looking at his pictures, under flintlock long guns.

[tg]

There would be no precedent for the barrel to be 44+" long as that was a contract specification from the king to the armoury at Tulle during the first quarter or so of the 18th century, this is a very nice cilvilain ,(probably well to do dude) gun it is nicely engraved and built, it is a good representation that at most any time the trade guns or hunting guns , common fowlers or high end guns often shared the architecture/style of the time, the 24 gauge would fall within the bore sizes accepted to shoot a ball about .562
or 28 balls to the Livre (French)or 26 balls to the lb (Engish) the bore size for such a gun could be from .577-.623 approx.