16ga.com ~ View topic

From The Old Man and the Boy Chapter 1: 'It Takes a Gentleman to Approach Another Gentleman'

...and on the bed was a 16-gauge double with a leather case that had my name on it. There were engravings of quail and dogs in silver on the sides and my name on the silver butt plate.

KyBrad and I were PMing about the popularity of 16s and also LC Smiths in the South.
Anyone with a copy of Someone of Value by Hugh Foster? What shotgun did Ruark shoot as a young man, and later in life?
How about Babcock and Rutledge?

The Southern gentry most certainly did. Many were diehard Anglophiles who loved the pomp and ceremony and could afford the lifestyle, especially before the Civil War. They were the Southern Aristocracy so laughed at by the English upper class.

Ironically enough, many of the English lower middle class who settled in America from 1830 on and found they were both freed of class restrictions and could afford to hunt the more plentiful American game birds and waterfowl. They favored the plainer American muzzleloading doubles. The best of these native guns easily rivalled the best English guns for fit and function. Most of the best used English locks. They were just not as embellished and were a darned sight less costly to buy.

Some of the best Yankee makers were settled around the Maryland and Northeastern Virginia area. Others were right from around Boston, MA, Hartford, CT, and New York City. Back in 1976, I found a pair of muzzleloading barrels tucked into a space between a couple of studs in one of the Boston, South End bowfronts we were rehabbing on St. Batolph Street. They were behind a false wall in a closet and had been sealed up there for probably near a century. They were made in Boston according to the stamping on them. I was not aware of what I'd found and gave them away. However, they appeared to be very well made in spite of the age and rust.

Not near as many of these American muzzleloading double guns survive as English best guns. They were made to be shot. Most were used up in the East by market hunters or went west to disappear into history. Many more were converted to early breechloaders by native smiths or were traded to midWest farmers for occasional use where they rusted away in many a barn. Many more were scrapped as passe or given as toys to the youngsters after being rendered nonfunctional. However, their form and style are easily seen in the transitional era American breechloaders of the 1870's and 1880's, especially the hammer guns.