The human being is a varied and unpredictable creature.
Some avoid risk at all costs while others tie large rubber bands to their legs and leap off bridges.
Hunters vary also. Many are content to avoid exercise while others don’t blink an eye at walking 10 miles through deep snow, up and down steep side hills.
A special breed of hunters accept additional challenges; those who eagerly confront a more demanding course, who embrace the arduous effort needed to succeed, reach a higher plateau.
Flintlock hunters certainly fit this mold for it’s a very challenging sport, fraught with uncertainties and the unknown. A perfect example of this is a friend who hunted hard for several long, cold miserable days a few years back. He walked miles, slipped, fell, had a twig poke his eye, burned his gloves, got lost for two interesting hours and never saw a deer.
Undeterred by his bad luck he continued hunting. One the last evening of the season when the light began to dim and the temperatures plummet he stopped just short of the highway to catch his breath. His truck was just visible some 200 yards away through the trees. He reflected on his failure to see a deer, smiled at his misfortunate. Then a flash of red brake lights cut through the dusk and to his astonishment he saw four deer running right at him from the road. Was this a dream?
The deer ran up to within 20 yards and stopped looking back at the highway; two adult does, a fawn and a 6-point. Totally unbelievable!
He swung the wide black front sight of his flintlock onto the buck’s chest, made sure the front sight was level with the rear buckhorn and squeezed the trigger. The heavy hammer fell, the flint sparking brightly in the dusk, but the rifle didn’t fire!
The deer jumped at the click and looked his way, eight eyes boring into him. He raised his head off the stock slightly to re-cock the rifle and saw a thin tendril of smoke in the pan. Then “WHAM” the rifle fired with a roar and a huge billowing cloud of black powder smoke blotted out everything in front of him!
The deer almost broke their own necks jumping, leaping, dashing through the trees while the hunter hung his head and swore softly, sick to his stomach. A “hang-fire” of all things and why did it have to happen NOW!
A hang-fire occurs when the sparks striking the powder don’t immediately totally ignite the powder. Occasionally damp powder smolders momentarily and then suddenly hits a drier spot and flares firing the rifle.
Our hunter knew this could happen and also realized he only had to have kept the sights on the buck a second or two longer to have been successful. Murphy’s Law had struck again.
Flintlocks have been used for centuries. The Spanish first developed the basic working model in the 1600s that’s still used today and called the mechanism the “Miquelet.” Flintlocks were the standard military firearm until replaced by percussion cap rifles in the 1850s.
The hammer on the flintlock is serpentine in shape with a small set of jaws on top to hold the flint. The top jaw is equipped with a screw to tighten itself onto a rectangular shaped piece of flint wrapped in a piece of hide to help hold it in place. The front of the flint’s tapered to a sharp edge.
The pan’s fastened to the breech and filled with a small amount of very fine FFFFG powder, 4 F. The pans purpose is to catch the sparks from the hammer and flint striking the frizzen.
The L-shaped frizzens clever design allows it to hinge forward on a spring and when snapped back covers the pan, protecting the powder in it.
To load a flintlock 100 to 150 grains of powder or two-to-three pellets are poured or dropped down the muzzle. Next a bullet is pushed down the barrel with a ramrod and seated firmly on top of the propellant. Then the pan is primed with 4F and the frizzen snapped shut over it. To fire the rifle pull the trigger; the hammer and flint falling forward and striking the frizzen, opening it and sending a shower of steel sparks downward into the pan.
Does the above sequence seem rather involved and prone to error?
Can the powder become damp or windblown? Perhaps the flint moves slightly out of position or the frizzen itself become wet or dirty. Can the touch hole between the pan and the breech plug up? The answer is always yes! Lots can go wrong and usually does, but only at the worst possible time. Murphy lurks everywhere.
In dry weather, with quality powder, a high quality, sharp flint properly positioned in the hammers jaws and adjusted just far enough forward to strike the frizzen correctly; you can fire shot after shot successfully with only an occasional misfire. But in hunting conditions often exposed to windy, damp or rainy conditions things can and do go wrong.
Hunters do everything possible to keep flint and powder dry and ready to fire. I’ve seen bread bags, pieces of heavy plastic and once an entire buckskin rifle case wrapped around or covering the hammer and frizzen to keep moisture or rain at bay. Often a loose outer coat is worn and the rifle carried inside it on a crooked arm to keep the elements at bay.
Flintlock opens Dec. 26, so if you see someone stalking the woods with a flintlock rifle take your hat off to them. They’re true hunters, using a primitive weapon even modern technology and the best of materials can’t make fool proof.
Anyone skillful and fortunate enough to bag a deer still hunting with a flintlock is a dedicated outdoorsman whose accepted the challenge, persevered and triumphed. Their deer is a true trophy.
