Just like my Labrador retriever, my rifles and especially my 1776 50 cal. Pennsylvania flintlock, needs exercise.
So I took it out for a fun walk at the range recently to ensure all was clean and in working order.
The lock mechanism also needs to be regularly lubed and inspected for rust.
And the barrel needs to be periodically cleaned even if not used. The sulfur residue from black powder is hard to totally remove, and can cause weak sulfuric acid to form, resulting in rust in sufficient quantity to lose accuracy. Unfortunately, many of us learn that cleaning lesson the hard way, including me. I cleaned and swabbed my swamp barrel several times over a year leaving a coating of oil in the barrel. Thus far, I have put a pound of black powder through it, so the barrel, like a frying pan is cured.
Off to the range I went, .and bench rested two shots at 50 yards at 3/4 inch, below.
My Pennsylvania Flintlock amazes me every time. Several years ago, I created this rifle from a very high end Chambers Kit in honor of Jacob Dickert who was the the most prolific Lancaster, PA master rifle maker of the American Revolution.
Below a boar I took with this rifle a few years back.
Having the nerve to start this project, is a hump that I had to overcome. I assume you have to as well. Spending over one thousand dollars in rough hewn tiger maple and rough cast brass rifle parts can make one choke! Right? From these parts! A Jim Chambers Lancaster Kit. https://www.flintlocks.com/
To This! The finished work was worth the journey! My rifle is named Cricket like the brass one in the photo! And Cricket is very accurate!
If you have not read my article on my first and only Flintlock build then please do so below.
Would I do it again? If I failed, then yes I would do it again to get it right. I was highly successful with the help of video steps and cautionary notes. A wild boar below with my Pennsylvania Rifle also known as the Kentucky Rifle.
If you have worked with wood and metal before and know how to sand and file then you are in good shape to start. But pick up books and video’s on the building process and watch them very closely. They are the key to your success! Patience is a virtue. Measure twice, cut once. When I ran into a “build step” that I did not understand during the assembly, I went back to the video and books to find the area and reviewed it. I went back to video’s many times.
For me the toughest part was fitting the barrel and tang without gouging the wood. Keep those chisels razor sharp! The second, and nearly equal tough part, was fitting the lock and trigger. Tooling the scrollwork and patch box inlay came next. It was painstaking detail work that came out just stunning for a first timer! I sent the fancy scroll brass patch box to a Master Engraver to replicate the Lancaster Jacob Dickert style.
Nothing was easy! But the joy of completing each task gave me confidence to do the next, and the joy of that one fed the next. Soon, I had a long rifle (unstained raw wood below) to test at the range but then I had to make a leather sheath to care for all the work I put into it.
Just stained the stock below without any brass.
Carved the tang floral.
Removing wood with a file to install the brass butt plate.
Things you will need to build from a kit: Read and watch video’s before starting.
A Workbench with a Large Vise
Tools and storage at the bench.
Chisels, files, rasps, handsaws, and sand paper for wood and metal, punches. Sharpening devices for honing chisels. Electric Drill, Power Grinder. Stains, a small square and ruler/tape measure. Video’s and books.
Safety glasses, Apron and first aid kit are highly recommended.
For the next 100 or so build hours you will get to know your rifle for sure.
Why make an authentic Lancaster County Pennsylvania Rifle from a kit? The word Kit, some would infer, that it is a cheap knock off, and easy to put together. Nothing could be further from the truth as it pertains to authentic Pennsylvania Flintlock Rifles. Today’s kits are made of the finest woods, finest barrels and as accurate as all get out! Really!! To my eye, the Lancaster County Rifles from original makers such as Jacob Dickert and Isaac Haines among others are a thing of functional beauty. I built my rifle from a Jim Chambers Ltd Lancaster Rifle Kit with Tiger Maple stock, Siler Lock, 44 inch Rice Swamp Barrel. The kit looks like this… Granted the stock looks like it is ready for parts to be dropped in but its not. The stock is roughed out and the brass is sand cast with cast marks. Every part must be inlayed or chiseled into the stock.
A good kit will cost only around $1000 dollars like mine. But you will need an array of hand tools and carving chisels and sand paper that can run in $200 dollars or so. I know that is a lot of money but they don’t come cheap.
I am a student of history, In particular the American Revolution and the Pennsylvania Rifle was a key part of winning the Revolution because it had a rifled barrel and longer range. The Pennsylvania rifle, some know as the Kentucky Rifle was not as easy to load as the smooth bore Brown Bess musket (or French made Charleville). Bess had accuracy good to 50 yards but not much more. The Pennsylvania rifle earned its keep on the frontier for accurately dispatching wild game and as a sniper rifle at long distances to 200 or more yards in the hands of a Marksman.
Men like General Daniel Morgan and Morgan’s Rifleman were hired for their skill as woodsman and crack shots at long ranges. One such hero under Morgan was Tim Murphy who during the battle of Saratoga took out a horse riding British General beyond 200 yards, some say 300 yards.
The patch box on the stock was often made of wood however upscale Lancaster Pennsylvania models were lavishly embellished with brass and often a signature of its maker. My patch box below.
But if you want to purchase an authentic Pennsylvania rifle (not the kit) the cost can be significant. Often prices are in the $3000 to $5000 range. The art work is spectacular! See the brass patch-box below from this John Bivins Style Flintlock. http://www.custommuzzleloaders.com/bivins.html
I think the hardest part of making a Pennsylvania Flintlock rifle given that the barrel and lock is roughed-in already , is carving the stock and in-letting the barrel into the stock. Today’s kits have roughed-in the stock too so that this major hurdle is lessened to a great degree. If you are not good with your hands though, I do not recommend building from a kit. Trust me, it is not easy and it is fraught with danger of major errors using chisels to inlet the stock for barrel and trigger assembly. But if you are good with your hands,then this rifle can be your signature work to pass on.
My Jacob Dickert brass patchbox below was purchased with the daisy elsewhere. I spent hours just to cut, drill and chisel to inlay the patchbox flush with the wood, create the spring door lid.
I liked my finish inlay work so much that I hired a master engraver to copy Dickert’s design seen far below for the box and lock side plate.
Below is my first ever novice attempt at carving a double Rococo C scroll as Dickert would have done, before staining. I was very happy with it!
Below is the Dickert Floral I also carved at the Tang.
Watch the Sparks Fly from this Flintlock below. My slow motion clip displays the spark power to ignite the charge in the pan.
To make your build easier, better kits come with a DVD and take you step by step though the process. I needed the DVD, It was excellent.
Well, 3 years ago the Lancaster Kit below with tiger maple cost 950.00 The master engraving on the box and side plate cost me $300 more.
It took me more than 100 hours to carve, cut, and fit and stain, perhaps nearer to 150 hours. Thank God it shoots really well after all that effort!
Yesterday I took my rifle to the range and shot close range, to 25 yards. It was fun. See below. Shot number 1 Upper Hit clipped the dead center box. Shot number 2 lower right was nearly in the same spot. Shot number 3 was a off to the right a bit but I think that was me and not the rifle. I use 70 grains FFG powder and there is very little recoil. I was very pleased with the accuracy check. Good for hunting squirrels, rabbits and hares!
My Jacob Dickert Lancaster Pennsylvania Flintlock shoots flat to 75 yards and drops a few inches at 100 yards and 16 inches at 150 yards with 90 grains of FFG powder. For deer, I will stay within the 75 yards.
The 50 caliber Pennsylvania Flintlock I built, carved and tested is due to see the New Hampshire deer woods in hopes of me harvesting my first deer with it. I named the rifle “Cricket” like my rifle in the photo below.
I love my TC Encore Pro Hunter for its reliability but I must give my Flintlock some time too. I am good off hand to 50 yards with it. With a very steady rest I can go to 100 yards but in New Hampshire it is best to keep it close. I am shooting patch and round ball.
As most are aware that I have been shooting my “self built top-of-the-line kit” 50 cal. Jacob Dickert Lancaster Flintlock (from Jim Chambers Flintlocks Ltd.) of late for fun and experimentation to improve accuracy and reliability. I have named the rifle Cricket
Just prior to this article I had to open the flash hole a bit to 1/16th inch on Cricket to improve reliability of ignition in the deer woods. I now have 100% ignition. Heaven forbid a flash-in-the-pan and no bang and no deer! The accuracy of this rifle has been great but I wanted to experiment with a slightly thicker patch to get better spin on the 50 cal. 177 grain round ball to see if I can tighten the groups a tad. I was getting 4 inch groups at 75 yards with 0.015 Wonder Lube patches and 90 grains of FFG. I purchased some 0.018 Wonder Lube Patches a few weeks back and at 50 yards bench rest I cut the x on the target with my first shot. Yes Open sights that I created! I was so thrilled! My nephew said, looking through his scope that he couldn’t see the hole. He looked everywhere except the dead center. I stopped shooting so as not to jinx the next shots and helped him sight his Ruger M77 in 7 MM Rem Mag for a Texas Wild Pig Hunt. A week later I took the Flintlock back to the range and decided to go for 100 yards and then 150 if all worked out. There I met Vince Natale a club member that was just crazy about Flintlocks and their Revolutionary war history, just as much as I was. We talked and talked. Vince said; I will spot your 100 yard shot! My rifle kicked, and Vince shouts, great hit, high in the bullseye. I said, well I purposely aimed a bit high figuring for some bullet drop. Ok, lets move the silhouette target to 150 yards, I said eagerly. This for target only as it has insufficient energy for deer hunting at that range.
The 2 Shots struck the target low but grouped at 4 inches. Vince was very impressed. I needed more data.
UPDATED
Not enough for a real group, I went back and shot again this week with sunshine and little wind. My point of aim (See Below Target) was the upper bullseye at 150 yards and measured the drop at the lower edge of the bottom target at 17 inches at the lowest and average drop for the group was around 14 inches. I put the front sight level with the notch at the rear using 90 grains FFG and a .490 Hornady round ball patched with a .018 wonder lube patch (.45 to .499) patch diameter. The bullets were tight to load in the barrel than normal but achievable. The barrel was swabbed with a saliva spit patch and dry patch using both sides of the patch after each shot. I shot 4 shots for group and they look to be grouped about 6.5 inches apart in the lower left target. I adjusted the rear sight a tad to bring the bullets closer to center line and lifted the front sight just above rear sight and took a shot. You can see the bullet hit the lower target in the upper left quadrant about 2.5 inches left of center and 7.5 inches low. I drew a picture of what it looked like as I sighted the rifle.
I played with some assumptions using JBM Ballistics Software after finding some on line data (http://www.namlhunt.com/traditionalmldata1.html) for 50 cal Tennessee flintlock with a 41 inch barrel mine is 44 inches) and they chrono 1861 FPS Muzzle Velocity with the same round ball (est BC 0.068) and 90 grains black powder and a .015 patch. That bullet drops 12 inches at 150 yards says my JBM software and at 200 yards it drops 31.7 inches and has 276 ft-lbs of energy. At 300 yards the bullet drops 111 inches and has 188 ft-lbs of energy.
For hunting whitetail deer modern day experts suggest approximately 1000 ft-lb minimum as an energy guide for deer and with that said, I should limit shots at around 30 yards with the 50 cal round ball. Ridiculous! Of course we know that deer are taken out to 100 yards with round ball every year but data says the average shot here in New England is around 40 yards or so. At 50 yards most traditional muzzle loaders of the past achieve just over 800 ft-lbs at 50 yards yet these older muzzle loader flintlocks and caplocks have been cleanly killing deer size game beyond that 50 yard mark for centuries. Just use some common sense!
The ubiquitous Flash-in-the-pan or No-Flash-in-the-pan was coined perhaps around the time of the American Revolution or likely earlier. For me, as a hunter, this is intolerable. Here in New Hampshire, Deer are not as plentiful as our southeastern states, so having a flash- in-the-pan no fires in the deer woods is no fun!
But it need not be so!
My fix was simple after tons of internet research, changing my flint grip from leather to lead helped but it was to drill the touch hole to 1/16 inch or 0.0625. This is slightly larger than the original touch hole. See the website below. Also do not cover the touch hole with priming powder! My shot groups at 75 yards are around 4 inches with open sights. I don’t expect to exceed 50 yard in the local deer woods but a steady rest bipod or tree branch will help.
My Flintlock (Cricket) is a true Lancaster Pennsylvania Rifle of Jacob Dickert fame, some call it the Kentucky Rifle of Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett fame.
Here, after a shot it looks a bit dirty, like this but you can see the touch hole larger to 1/16 inch which appears to have cured the ignition problem. Others instruct to run a spit (spit saliva) patch after each shot and then a clean patch. That works for me. Black powder residue is very dirty and cruddy but works the best in a Flintlock and patched round ball. Save the Pyrodex for your in-line muzzleloader.
I built this rifle from a very high end kit from Jim Chambers Flintlocks Ltd. My Flintlock came with a threaded device called a threaded touch hole liner and named White Lightnin’ to improve ignition by which the flash of powder in the pan would ignite the main charge in the barrel. The original hole itself is smaller than 1/16 of an inch.
My Flintlock is basically new (70 rounds fired) and had as many ignitions as I did of flash pan misfires. Cleaning the barrel and vent hole was done at every shot and even then had misfires. If the hole itself if not placed correctly with the pan, it is a problem but can be resolved. My touch hole was placed correctly, as far as I can tell but still misfired so I drilled the hole to 1/16 inch and basically cured the ignition problem to a large extent. Every rifle is different. Some experts open the hole right away to 1/16 inch others shoot it till it widens over time. As a deer hunter I want it all the time. The touch hole can be opened further, see the website above but if too large will cause loss of pressure and slower ignition time, delaying the ignition. The great thing with a touch hole liner is that it can be replaced.
The American Revolution, from a New Hampshire perspective, was saved in part by the French made Charleville Musket?
The French invested muskets in the American Revolution with the 1763 Charleville Musket. It eventually became the most abundant battle weapon of New England Soldiers after the 1777 American win at the Battle of Saratoga. Many Brown Bess Muskets were owned by Minute Men (adult males as British law required), but as the war got under way there were not enough Brown Bess Muskets to go around in New Hampshire, especially for new recruits.
Note: The Pennsylvania Rifle saw little action here in New Hampshire but has its place of honor as a sniper/”over mountain man” rifle in many battles such as the Battle of Saratoga and the Battle of the Cowpens and my hero General Daniel Morgan.
It was in 1777 that quantities of the Charleville, with Lafayette’s assistance to General Washington, arrived in Portsmouth, NH via Ship from the Charleville Armory north of Paris, France. In total, in 1777, the Continental Army eventually received 25,000 of these muskets.
Like the Brown Bess, the Charleville shown below was a smooth bore. It was a 69 caliber vs the Brown Bess (Long Land Pattern) of 75 caliber and each could support a bayonet.
Its use, like the Brown Bess, was to directly engage the British who also used the Brown Bess, force on force on the battle field at short range. It had a similar firing rate of 3 rounds a minute.
Both the Charleville Musket and Brown Bess Musket are on display at the Independence Museum in Exeter, NH. https://www.independencemuseum.org/
The Brown Bess eventually fell out of favor as the Charleville was stronger and banded with metal rings vs pin’s and many say it had a better bayonet locking ring. It became the model for which the US Government copied at the Springfield Armory as the M1795.
Accordingly, here in New Hampshire we had the Charleville and Brown Bess. If you are interested In New Hampshire during the Revolution you can go to the website below and read more.
I am fascinated by the stories of the American Revolution and the rise of the common man to greatness in the face of Tyranny at that time. Perhaps you are as well!!
It was my undertaking to build a 1770 Revolutionary War Flintlock Rifle that I learned about Tim Murphy (1751 – 1818) and his marksman skills that aided greatly in winning the War.
Born in 1751 near Delaware Water Gap in northern Pennsylvania, Tim and his family relocated to Wyoming Valley of Northeast Pennsylvania now known as Scranton-Wilkes Barre metropolitan area, then it was frontier says the below website. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Murphy_(sniper)
On June 29, 1775, Timothy Murphy enlisted in the Northumberland County Riflemen, as part of Captain John Lowdon’s Company. This was a prestigious and select outfit of marksmen who had to prove themselves capable of long range shooting with a Pennsylvania flintlock rifle, patch and ball out to 250 yards.
According to accounts, To qualify, Murphy had to fire his Pennsylvania Flintlock Long-Rifle and repeatedly score hits on a seven inch target at 250 yards. Capt. Lowdon’s men and others were ordered to march to Boston under the command of Daniel Morgan, a legendary officer who again was pulled from the common men of the time. Morgan was a large man with “thick broad shoulders and arms like tree trunks” and a marksman in his own right (another story).
The men under command of Morgan were called Morgan’s Rifleman. They marched 600 miles to the Siege of Boston in 21 days. The Siege began on April 19th 1775 where New England Militiamen, some my cousins, and Morgans Rifleman and snipers like Tim Murphy boxed in the British Army in Boston forcing them to depart by ship to Nova Scotia where the British military were headquartered.
It was shortly after when Tim was ordered as part of Morgans Rifleman to march north to find General Burgoyne’s troops and snipe British artillery officers and gunners so successfully that they were ineffective at best at the first Battle of Saratoga. The followup, called the second Battle of Saratoga, equally call the Battle of Bemis Heights where Major General Benedict Arnold fearing a British flanking maneuver galloped up to Morgan and said that the British General Fraser, on horseback, was “worth an entire regiment.” Morgan then called for Sergeant Timothy Murphy, his finest sharpshooter (sniper) to climb a tree and kill the General from 300 yards, and some say as far as 500 yards, though 300 sounds more plausible. Shortly Fraser’s aide-de- camp would fall to Tim’s exacting fire.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Murphy_(sniper) quote; “Morgan called on Murphy and said: “That gallant officer is General Fraser. I admire him, but it is necessary that he should die, do your duty.” Murphy scaled a nearby tree, took careful aim at the extreme distance of 300 yards, and fired four times. The first shot was a close miss, the second grazed the General’s horse, and with the third, Fraser tumbled from his horse, shot through the stomach. General Fraser died that night. British Senior officer Sir Francis Clerke, General Burgoyne’s chief aide-de-camp, galloped onto the field with a message. Murphy’s fourth shot killed him instantly. Murphy also fought at the battle of the Middle Fort in 1780.)
Murphy, according to this fascinating article states https://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/history/item/4786 that Murphy continued fighting until the very end of the war. Further it quotes that; “He spent the winter of 1777-78 with the Continental Army at Valley Forge and survived the arctic temperatures and near- starvation of that winter camp.” In the spring, Murphy led small parties of rifleman in harassing attacks on British troops withdrawing from Philadelphia. Murphy’s crack shots dropped British soldiers from great distances and spread panic through the ranks.”
More on Tim and his Revolutionary sniper legacy. Photo from Wikipedia.
I thought this man, Tim Murphy, embodied each of us as the common mans Call to Duty for Freedom and worthy of your knowledge of him.
In my research on the Pennsylvania/Kentucky Rifle, (America’s first Sniper Rifle) I learned that Continental Congress leaders learned warfare tactics by Native Indians et. al. during the French and Indian war of 1756 also known in Europe as the Seven Years War.
“Riflemen played an important role in the French and Indian War and the American Revolution, wars characterized by irregular combat in woodland battlefields. By the eve of the latter conflict, several patriot leaders believed that American woodsmen armed with Pennsylvania Rifles could easily defeat stodgy, musket-wielding redcoats. In 1775 George Washington recruited rifle companies as the core of his new Continental Army. The Pennsylvania Rifle Regiment and units from southern colonies answered the call.”
The British had the 13 colonies and wanted expand north and west. The French had Canadian land in Quebec and wanted to expand south and west. It was the native Indians of different tribes that aided both sides in battle.
It was George Washington who learned battle tactics during this time frame.
And in New Hampshire, General John Stark learned his new colonial battle tactics under the New Hampshire Provincial Regiment led by Colonel Nathaniel Meserve under British leadership in the French and Indian War as well.
Accordingly, the British won the French and Indian war and concluded with the Treaty of Paris but because Britain’s Secretary of State William Pitt who managed the money, borrowed heavily to win. Accordingly the British taxed the colonist’s too heavily for it and resulted in rebellion. Thus making British leadership and its military unwelcome in the colonies and itching for a Revolution to kick the British and its King George driven monarchy out.
Meanwhile, the German trained, Pennsylvania gunsmiths such as Jacob Dickert, were busy making the Pennsylvania Rifle many know as the Kentucky Rifle (to settle Kentucky) with grooves (called rifling) in the barrel to spin the bullet. Thus making that rifle a superb long range rifle, out to 300 yards, in the hands of a marksman, hunter or soldier. General Washington created Rifle Regiments…and Brigadier General Daniel Morgan
A master of the Pennsylvania Rifle and one the most brilliant battlefield tacticians of the Revolution and trusted by General Washington.
And today we get to honor those men and reenact with that Rifle and Hunt with it.
Got my trusty flintlock rifle right? Flintlocks, despite all the movies that show them firing each and every time, need to be attended to in order to maximize the odds that the rifle will fire the charge in the barrel and send the round ball on its way.
I bought into that trusty stuff. Seeing a beautiful Longrifle can do that.
I have fired perhaps 60 rounds from my Lancaster Flintlock and a number of times the either the priming powder did not go off or when it did, the main charge did not. This was mostly my fault.
Since my rifle is new, it is likely my own newness too that needs adjustment.
Research on the internet has lots of advice. What I have done is located several sites that espouse the same things in the set-up of your lock in the deer woods. You only have one real chance to ensure the rifle fires and send the bullet on its way.
1. Keep your lock clean and lubricated.
2. Ensure your flint is tight in the clamp, clean and sharp and even (parallel) with the frizzen. If not you must knap the flint face with a brass rod to sharpen it and make it parallel with the frizzen face. If your leather wrap on the flint is too thick then the leather will absorb energy. Many, including me now use a lead wrap that you can hammer out of a lead round ball. The lead will conform to the flint and hold it in place just as the leather does but will not absorb the hammer energy. This delivers more energy of the flint to strike the frizzen and more sparks result.
On an empty gun, I observe the sparks from the flint to see that they are sent to the powder pan in quantity.
3. The rifle, most flintlock hunters say, needs to be shot just before the hunt and swabbed once without lubrication, maybe a little spit on a cleaning patch. This is like shooting with a seasoned barrel and the bullet will not encounter lubricant which can change the point of impact.
4. Use a pin to clean the touchhole shaft after you load a round.
5. Don’t over fill the clean pan with powder.
If you shoot to practice it is wise to run a spit cleaning patch after every shot. I have just adopted this clean after each shot method and I like it.
And you can end up shooting like this shot below at a paper deer at 50 yards. I used a large post like tree in the woods to brace the rifle. See the 50 cal Round Ball hole dead center in the lungs just above the heart. The other holes are from different caliber rifles in a previous year. I will try to use a monopod or bi-pod to shoot or find a good tree to brace.
This image of a deer was about 75% of life size. I do recommend buying these paper archery targets of deer and shooting them with no bullseye to focus on. I think that 40 to 50 yards is my limit without a bi-pod. This is the most common shooting distance encountered here in Northern New England and New Hampshire.
