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Something I have been wondering about for some time is if there has ever been a "deep dive" study of the firearms employed on the Oregon Trail and Latter-day Saint Pioneer Trek (also known as the Mormon Trail in some literature and sources). I would imagine there has to be extant journals, letters, sales records, painted depictions, et al., that gives some insight into the commonly used firearms for hunting and defense.

Anyway, just curious if anyone has ever come across said and/or did their own primary research. Thank you. :)
 
I have a "History of the Mormon Battalion" during the Mexican American War...all first person accounts.
Lots of famous names are in it.

In any event due to time period I would say the for rifles
There were many J.Henry Trade Rifles and Leman Trade Rifles present.
Hawken rifles are mentioned by some sources...
Lots of other St. Louis Rifles are talked of....not by name...Just where they were made.
I have little doubt that the Model 1841 rifle and 1812 / 1814 rifles were there...
Along with the 1842 pattern and earlier muskets....all followed along as well.

I'll take a look at what I have book wise for you.
Andy
 
Double barrel shotguns and single barrel fowlers would be a popular and useful choice ...
Those are mentioned in many Journals.

Parkman in his work The Oregon Trail says his rifle is from St. Louis and weighed 15 LBS...
His guide and Hunter Henry Chatillon made good use of it.

Below is my St. Louis Rifle....
It would be of this time Period and could have easily gone on the trail.
Andy
DSC06619 (1).jpg
 
Well a quick look at my books shows lots of useful :rolleyes: terms like these :
Rifle..
Gun...
Shotgun....
Fowling piece...

Every once in awhile you see something like :
A St. Louis rifle...
Or a Lancaster rifle...
American Rifle...
English Rifle...

This is about par for course...not a lot detail with most mentioning of firearms .
I'll keep looking ....
Andy
 
As Andy covered the firearms I'll put in my two bits about the trail. For the most part the trail tapered off quite a bit in 1855 when the railroad across Panama was completed and almost DONE soon after the transcontinental Railroad was completed Granted for some time to get from the railroad to the Willamette Valley you would still have to hoof it one way or the other. But the trip across the bulk of the country now took 7 days by rail and cost about $65.00 SO balancing that against 4 to 6 months on the trail with Cholera dysentery Measles Hypothermia and the then of course interactions with your unfriendly neighborhood indians The trail was still in use into the 1880's and even some into the 1890's so most likely to some degree everything from Flintlock Squirrel rifles to Winchester model 1886's and Colt Peace makers made the trip in one degree or another.
 
Reprinted from The Tombstone Epitaph, The Daily Jeffersonian (Cambridge, Ohio), and The Bridgeport News-Blade (Bridgeport, Nebraska).

G.W. Thissel described some of the types of guns, "… there were firearms of all descriptions – double and single-barreled shotguns and smoothbore and double-twisted rifles. The favorite gun was the old Kentucky rifle, with a barrel three feet long, that carried sixty balls to the pound."

Possession of firearms did not necessarily imply proficiency in their use, nor much understanding of the capabilities of a particular weapon. The result, with frightening frequency, was firearms accidents – a danger of the trip west usually underemphasized.

Sometimes the result could be humorous, as was the case with would-be buffalo hunter Jim Stoakes. He owned a "blunderbuss of the War of 1812" which was "short, light, and handy. It was a dangerous looking gun. It looked as if it would kill everything it was pointed at. It was a smooth bore and carried a half-ounce ball." Jim became impatient to try his gun, and turned it loose on the buffalo. They were not one-fourth of a mile away.

Jim got under the bank of a creek and crept up to within fifty yards of them. He took sight with both eyes open, and, shaking like a trembling aspen leaf, he pulled the trigger. It was a flint lock, and it misfired. Jim picked the flint and took aim once more, expecting to blow a hole clear through that buffalo. There was a roar, then a crash, and Jim landed in the bed of the creek, while the gun lay on the opposite bank. When the smoke cleared away, Jim looked for his buffalo, and was just in time to see the herd go over the hill a mile away. Not a hair on their hide had been hurt.

Through a lack of proper care or because of faulty equipment, occasionally a gun would burst upon firing. Sometimes the physical, if not the psychological, effect of the accident was slight, but there was always the possibility of a serious wound. Benjamin Cory provides an illustration of the former – "A rifle was burst but did no damage except slightly bruising one man."

A much more serious accident was described by Pierson Barton Reading. "One of the hunters, McIntosh, and a half breed Cherokee Indian was badly wounded in the thigh and arm by the bursting of his gun." But most firearms accidents were caused by careless handling.

The image of the sharp-shooting "long rifle from Kentucky" is deeply ingrained in America's mythic memory. And splendid rifle-men there indeed were! Prior to the Civil War, however, a surprising number of emigrants obviously had little, if any, sophistication in their use of weapons. The result, though tragic, is not surprising. Overlanders shot each other and themselves with astonishing regularity!

Near the Big Blue River, William Johnston received a report "giving information that at this place . . . John Fuller had accidentally shot and killed himself whilst removing a gun from a wagon. The mode was the usual one — never yet patented and open to all — the muzzle was toward him and went off of itself."

Sometimes the circumstances of fatal accidents were not reported. Mrs. E.D.S. Geer noted simply, "Today when our hunters came in they brought one dead man; he had shot himself last night accidentally. He left a wife and six small children. The distress of his wife I cannot describe. He was an excellent man and very much missed."

The report of Jospeh Rhodes is a model of brevity: "To-day we drove 10 miles where we camped on Little Blue River. It is a butiful (sic.) stream. The grass is very short, dry and hot. One man accidently shot himself through the head. He died instantly. His train was just behind us."

Non-fatal accidents, which occurred with equal frequency, resulted in wounds which ranged from negligible to very serious. A young man in the party of Jacob Snyder was "accidently shot, the ball passing through his side, making a fresh wound and lodging in his arm." This accident led Mr. Snyder to observe that "Guns should always be uncapped when brought into camp."

In addition to rifles and shotguns, pistols were also a not unusual accoutrement. Henry Allyn told of a young man who pulled a revolver from a wagon (apparently barrel first) when "it got hitched and sprung the lock, discharging and nearly ruined one arm." Dr. Benjamin Cory described another case: "A young man by the name of Lynzz discharged a ramrod and bullet from a pistol through his right hand which fractured the bones a good deal. His hand will be useless for months."

Finally, a companion of William Johnston "met with a painful accident which deprived him of the use of a hand during the remainder of the journey. In putting his pistols into their holsters, through some careless handling one discharged its contents through the palm of his left hand." If the complete record were totaled up, it seems likely that more wagon train pioneers were killed and wounded by themselves and each other than by the warrior tribes through whose land they were passing!
 

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