How They Did It In The Old West?

[dbarnhart]

Chapter 1 of 'From Ingot to Target' contains a brief history of bullet casting and that got me thinking? How did they do it in the old west? I'm not talking about Winchester, Remington, etc. If the cowboys and gunslingers in the 1880's cast their own bullets...

- Where did they get the lead?
- Did they alloy the lead and if so how?
- How did they melt it?
- How many blacksmiths had a side business making ammunition?
- How come we don't hear about The Great Lead Robberies?

Sorry but my brain just works this way.

[Molly]

Chapter 1 of 'From Ingot to Target' contains a brief history of bullet casting and that got me thinking? How did they do it in the old west? I'm not talking about Winchester, Remington, etc. If the cowboys and gunslingers in the 1880's cast their own bullets...

- Where did they get the lead?

From my reading, mostly bought factory ammo. Hunters were another story: Shooting all tay would get expensive with factory ammo, so the buffalo hunters largely loaded their own. They either bought the lead in pigs and cast it, or some target shooters ordered their bullets cast from a specified alloy.

- Did they alloy the lead and if so how?

Remember, the shoting was low velocity BP stuff, and didn't need much past the hardness of pure lead. There were few shooters using anything harder than 1 part tin and 20 parts lead. And I don't think they used any other alloy ingredients, though there may have been a few experimenters from time to time.

- How did they melt it?

IIRC, the buffalo hunters were sometimes reduced to dried chips. Dunno about the others, but I've seen old advertiements for pot and rings that would fit the top of a wood burning stove ...

- How many blacksmiths had a side business making ammunition?

Never heard of the practice.

- How come we don't hear about The Great Lead Robberies?

Probably because there weren't any. It was worth the risk to rob gold and silver shipments, but lead? Not so much.

Couldn't refer you to any specific sources for this info, but that is what I recall from several decades of reading about shooting and reloading. Hope it helps you out.

[ku4hx]

Chapter 1 of 'From Ingot to Target' contains a brief history of bullet casting and that got me thinking? How did they do it in the old west? I'm not talking about Winchester, Remington, etc. If the cowboys and gunslingers in the 1880's cast their own bullets...

- Where did they get the lead?
- Did they alloy the lead and if so how?
- How did they melt it?
- How many blacksmiths had a side business making ammunition?
- How come we don't hear about The Great Lead Robberies?

Sorry but my brain just works this way.

Good question. I'm not a big supporter of Wikipedia, but there's a pretty good write-up here which has some references.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cast_bullet

Lead has been in use for centuries and the Romans served a drink in a cup lined with lead to sweeten it. I think most "cowboys" bought factory fodder, but I have seen round ball molds used during the War Between The States.

[Certaindeaf]

The mountain men would probably go out with ball, mold and ladle. They'd bring the mold and ladle to form lead gotten from rendezvous or scavenged lead etc.. the vendors would vend plain, unformed lead because they'd not know what caliber/form would be wanted/demanded.

[10x]

The mountain men would probably go out with ball, mold and ladle. They'd bring the mold and ladle to form lead gotten from rendezvous or scavenged lead etc.. the vendors would vend plain, unformed lead because they'd not know what caliber/form would be wanted/demanded.

Lead was sold in sheets by the Hudson's Bay Company. They also sold shot, ball, and bullets to match the diameter of the trade guns they sold. Sheets of lead were easier to transport and took up less room in a York boat than precast bullets.

[Poygan]

I read where Lewis and Clark carried their powder in lead containers which they melted.

[zack]

I've read accounts of the buffalo hunters carring pigs of lead and tin in their wagons, then casting in frying pans over a buffalo chip fire. And reloading their shells by firelight. Can't remember wher I got that.

I've read the mountian men would carry a large spoon in their gear to melt lead in. Lead at rendevous was in 'sheets' that they could easily fold and cut with an ax or knife. Also, bulk linen cloth was brought to renvevous for not only clothing but to make patching.

[C.F.Plinker]

I was at a rendezvous a few years ago and one of the participants gave a demonstration of casting in his teepee. He started by telling how he made the mold and went on to cast a few round balls with it using a spoon over some coals from his fire to melt the lead. The first ones were wrinkled but after than they smooted out and were very useable. If you had the lead and a mold, it would have been easy to do.

[fcvan]

Lead was mined wherever found and used in many products. Think about white-wash paint and such. As I understand it, St. Louis was a huge source of mined lead as were many other areas where lead was discovered.

Probably one of the first, and quite interesting sources on the subject was Laura Ingalls-Wilder in her "Little House" books. The chapter on "Pa's Gun" went into great detail of her father's meticulous care of his rifle and casting of boolits. The mold was the old 'plier' looking type. He had a ladle he kept his lead in which he heated over the fire. 10 or so boolits were poured and after cooled he cut the sprue with his knife and threw the bits and reclaimed boolits from killed game into the ladle. The gun was cleaned with hot water, dry patched, oil patched, and oiled with rendered bear fat using a feather. Interesting stuff. Frank

[runfiverun]

lots of black powder was shipped in lead boxes.
good idea, it didn't produce static,was waterproof,and could be used instead of being discarded.
it also cut down on rough handling if the box was large enough.

[Longwood]

I use one of the old plier type molds.
It is very thin on top so I just turn it sideways when it gets full and that sort of wash the lead off of the top so there is often no sprue to cut.
Soimetimes a little bit of thin flashing has to be cut off.
I can cast round ball bullets faster with it and a spoon in a dip pot, than I can with a bottom pour single cavity mold with a sprue cutter.

[Longwood]

Tin was very common and easily mined and smelted.
Tin, lead and silver was often in thick veins of pure metal.
Some indians had some or knew where it was.
Tin cans were made from tin for a spell then jar and bottle seals, but I do not know when they came around.

[gmsharps]

I read somewhere that at some of the rendezvous's there would be a shooting competion and the bakstop was a log. The winner got the log which he through on the fire and later pickup his winnings when the fire got cold.
gmsharps

[Arceagle]

A friend of mine has a lead mine on some of his property that was dug by hand during the Civil War. It's a straight vertical shaft until it hits a lead vein then the mine just follows the vein. I have no idea if it is pure lead or if it has to be processed some how. I would like to go down there sometime but them Civil war boys must have been much smaller than I am.

[44man]

Injuns would lose WW's on the rough ground. I just walked buffler trails and picked up all I would need. [smilie=l:
The only problem I had was to find a tepee to plug my pot in.
Yeah, I feel that old sometimes! :holysheep

[rbertalotto]

I read where some buffalo hunters would try to shoot a buff just right so the lead wouldn't exit.

They did indeed bring BP that was loaded in lead cans. One book I read talked about the quantity of BP and lead they carried. Hundreds of pounds of lead and the nearly same of BP. Most things they could source or make out on the prairie, but lead, primers and BP were not some of them.

They melted the lead in a frying pan or a small pot just for this use. But the frying pan also made breakfast the next morning.

Lube was no issue as they had tons of buffalo lard.

[44man]

Yum, lard fried lead pancakes! :bigsmyl2:

[Katya Mullethov]

Probably one of the first, and quite interesting sources on the subject was Laura Ingalls-Wilder in her "Little House" books. The chapter on "Pa's Gun" went into great detail of her father's meticulous care of his rifle and casting of boolits. . Frank

The only part of that I retained this long was her inability to resist picking up the new shiny smokin' hot bullets and getting burnt for it . -.

[Longwood]

The only part of that I retained this long was her inability to resist picking up the new shiny smokin' hot bullets and getting burnt for it . -.

Freshly welded parts, and freshly cast bullets, do not take long to inspect.

[10x]

Freshly welded parts, and freshly cast bullets, do not take long to inspect.

When I was a kid the local blacksmith had heated up a piece of iron to work on it. He laid it on the cooling bench and one adult watching mentioned a kid might pick it up. The blacksmith said - "any kid picks that up is gonna drop it without being told...".

[Sonnypie]

When I was a kid the local blacksmith had heated up a piece of iron to work on it. He laid it on the cooling bench and one adult watching mentioned a kid might pick it up. The blacksmith said - "any kid picks that up is gonna drop it without being told...".

Any kid that would pick that up would grow up to vote for Obama.
Speaking of lead balloons..... :lol:

[Longwood]

When I was a kid the local blacksmith had heated up a piece of iron to work on it. He laid it on the cooling bench and one adult watching mentioned a kid might pick it up. The blacksmith said - "any kid picks that up is gonna drop it without being told...".

One quick dip in the water bucket is sometimes not enough.
I learned that watching my uncle Blacksmith, when I was ten.
My dad always said that I would learn some things faster than others.

Things have changed some since then.
It was in the early fifties and my dad and uncle worked in a mill at a copper mine in Holden Washington.
In the summer time, I would walk about a half mile to the mill building with their lunches.
At the bottom of the building, I would pull a cord twice and a huge cable car for freight would come slamming through a big steel double door and roll down a long track and stop at the bottom. I would hop on, pull the cord once, and to the top of the mill building I would go.
I would spend the rest of the day in the machine shop, watching him operate mills and lathes or even more interesting, watch my uncle blacksmith.
We overhauled the engine for our 1933 Ghevy Ton N a Half in the machine shop.
I have been learning how to mechanic and such ever since.
I made a forge when I was eleven with a cylinder sleeve and piston from a Case tractor.
I still have a scar to prove it.:groner:

[10x]

One quick dip in the water bucket is sometimes not enough.
I learned that watching my uncle Blacksmith, when I was ten.
My dad always said that I would learn some things faster than others.

Things have changed some since then.
It was in the early fifties and my dad and uncle worked in a mill at a copper mine in Holden Washington.
In the summer time, I would walk about a half mile to the mill building with their lunches.
At the bottom of the building, I would pull a cord twice and a huge cable car for freight would come slamming through a big steel double door and roll down a long track and stop at the bottom. I would hop on, pull the cord once, and to the top of the mill building I would go.
I would spend the rest of the day in the machine shop, watching him operate mills and lathes or even more interesting, watch my uncle blacksmith.
We overhauled the engine for our 1933 Ghevy Ton N a Half in the machine shop.
I have been learning how to mechanic and such ever since.
I made a forge when I was eleven with a cylinder sleeve and piston from a Case tractor.
I still have a scar to prove it.:groner:

My grandfather was a blacksmith - trained in Norway prior to 1898. His theory was that if man made it, another man could repair it or make another. When I was six I watched him make 3/8" logging chain (3/8" was the diameter of the rod in the links. ) He could also cut, weld, and shrink a steel rim onto a wooden wagon wheel without bowing the spokes in or out and the wheel would run true. And you could not find the weld in the rim when he was done.

He built all of his own tools, (pilfered by my uncles and probably sold as scrap) and even welded a new face onto his anvil. That anvil would bounce a ball peen hammer head just like a super ball would bounce off a tile floor.

[PanaDP]

- Did they alloy the lead and if so how?

Remember, the shoting was low velocity BP stuff, and didn't need much past the hardness of pure lead. There were few shooters using anything harder than 1 part tin and 20 parts lead. And I don't think they used any other alloy ingredients, though there may have been a few experimenters from time to time.

Are we sure about this? I would agree with you that the commercial hunters were probably not picky for reasons of economy but game hunters in Africa and India at the same time were quite sophisticated with regards to the make up of their bullets. They knew fully the needs of their bullets and that different additions of tin would help them achieve the best performance.

For example, there's a passage from Gen. Harry Smith Obbard's diary reprinted in "The Paper Jacket" where he recounts advice on bullet hardness:

"Bullets for express rifles a twentieth of tin and lead for small game such as buck, etc. a sixteenth for larger game-tigers, etc."

There are other references to "hardened lead" though it is left unclear what exactly that alloy was. One assumes that it simply had more tin or possibly antimony.

If the British game hunters knew about the advantages of tailoring the bullet to the game, what's to say the Americans didn't?

[zack]

In the James Michner book Centennial, Pasquinel the trapper had a blacksmith make thin lead sheets and he would make a container out of the lead, put in gun powder and then solder them up. I bet the cheeks were squeezed tight when he was soldering. I need to read Centennial again.

[gbrown]

Lead comes in many different form--Galena, Pyrite, etc. Lead was a common metal back in the olden days. It is attributed to the fall of the Roman Empire (Plumbium, hence Pb) because it was used for water pipes in the homes of the rich and ruling. Will not comment on that. Lumps of ore high in lead were sold in markets for shooters back in the early days. A frontiersman, trapper, etc., would have these in his possibles bag to melt in a spoon or small ladle at night over a fire. The movie "Jerimiah Johnson" shows this. Many common things contained lead--remember the "Patriot"? Mel Gibson melting down his son's toy soldiers for bullets? Early gun makers made a mold to go with the weapon. A lot of people made molds out of stones. You do what you need to do.

[Wolfer]

I read somewhere that a lot of the old molds had a pair of nippers in front so they could nip a chunk out of a bar of pig lead and melt the chunk in a spoon over the coals. Pretty slow to be sure but they didn't watch tv in the evenings.
I've also read somewhere that the long hunters in the eastern states ( when Kentucky and tennessee were in the west ) would know about how many bullets to carry on a trip if they could recover some of their lead and recast it. If they could recover a third that was that much less they had to pack.

I know from my early days of backpacking for elk you get really picky about what goes in your pack. Now that I have horses I'm not so picky.

[DIRT Farmer]

The most expensive thing on the early fronteer was the heaviest thing you carried. Small bore rifles use less lead.
I have a copy of a book on the buffalo hunters printed by Dixie Gun Works here some where that has a lot of short accounts in it, the most interesting are the entries from the traders listing the ammounts of lead and powder. They used a lot.
There was an article in this months Muzzle Blasts about a round ball mould that cast several popular sized balls, possibaly a mould for a trade post where an employee could cast up a supply for sale.

[lead-1]

Injuns would lose WW's on the rough ground. I just walked buffler trails and picked up all I would need. [smilie=l:
The only problem I had was to find a tepee to plug my pot in.
Yeah, I feel that old sometimes! :holysheep




LOL, I just had visions of traveling boolit maker/tinkers slamming on the brakes at the intersection of Main and Locust in Dodge City to grab a used boolit laying in the wild.

[fredj338]

I doubt many cowboys were reloaders. If they wanted to reload & cast their own, a camp fire & heavy pot w/ dipper & mold, just like today.

[Hang Fire]

Lead was a most common commodity in the west, dating back to fur trade. Black powder was often sold in sealed lead containers, which were then melted down and cast.

[MT Gianni]

Most blackpowder rifles were not true to any one caliber so a mold was sold with the gun. Lot's of museums have the mold next to the gun.

[Longwood]

Being a Cowboy was not as Glorious or Romantic as Hollywood made it out to be.
Those poor slobs lived about as bad as a person did in those days and got paid accordingly.
Many of them were blacks because white men did not want to live in such poor conditions and get paid so little.
I suspect that most of them reloaded the tiny amount of ammo that they used.
Working down in a hole in the ground was a better and higher paying job choice to most men.

[MT Gianni]

Being a Cowboy was not as Glorious or Romantic as Hollywood made it out to be.
Those poor slobs lived about as bad as a person did in those days and got paid accordingly.
Many of them were blacks because white men did not want to live in such poor conditions and get paid so little.
I suspect that most of them reloaded the tiny amount of ammo that they used.
Working down in a hole in the ground was a better and higher paying job choice to most men.

Less risky also even before the days of MSHA.

[44man]

So true, life was VERY harsh back then and most of us would have never made it.
I read once about a fella that was captured by Indians out west, stripped naked but escaped. He outran them and made it all the way to St. Louis with nothing.
Today a guy needs a 6 oz gun to carry! :kidding:

[bbs70]

John Colter.
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/we-johncolter.html

I couldn't do it, even in my younger days.
And I doubt if some of the youngsters of today could either, at least without their Cell phones, ipads, ps3s, Nike cross training shoes, evian water.[smilie=s:

[waksupi]

I doubt the average cowboy shot a box of cartridges in a year. There wasn't the need in the job. They didn't wear a gun every day, most were kept rolled up in their bedroll, or in the bunk house or chuck wagon. A gun gets in the way if you are working cattle or fence.
The mountain men wouldn't burn all that much powder and lead if they could help it. Fresh meat wasn't needed every day, and they didn't want to advertise their presence any more than necessary. More powder than lead would be expended, as lead would be recovered and reused. Although they would get 5-6# at rendezvous, I suspect most of that was used as trade goods.

[Doughty]

In one of the Hopalong Cassidy books by Clarence Mulford, the reloading, and I believe casting, procedures are included. Right now I can't remember which book it was though. Hopalong was created in 1904 I believe, and Mulford, I also believe, had at least some idea of what a "real" cowboys life was like.

[10x]

I doubt the average cowboy shot a box of cartridges in a year. There wasn't the need in the job. They didn't wear a gun every day, most were kept rolled up in their bedroll, or in the bunk house or chuck wagon. A gun gets in the way if you are working cattle or fence. snip



A handgun can save your life when working with cattle or horses. In the early 1920s my father saw many cowboys in Southern Alberta who carried a six shooter. Several would come to their farm to buy milk, eggs, bacon, and chickens. He mentioned that they all had a handgun with them when they were working. A wolf, bear, rabid dog, cow with a broken leg, or their own horse were reasons enough to keep a gun handy. The ranch hands seldom took a gun to town as well.

[Wolfer]

According to Elmer Keith in his book Sixguns he tells some pretty hairy stories about using his sixgun in self defense against cattle and horses. I believe most cowboys of the 1800s carried a sixgun for protection. If your horse throws you ( a common occurrence ) and your foot gets hung your only chance of survival is to shoot your horse.

According to Teddy Roosevelt in his book hunting trips of a ranchman he leads one to believe most carried a revolver. He also mentioned that some of them target shot a lot.

According to Billy Dixon in his book The life and times of Billy Dixon. He says in the buffalo camps there were three types of entertainment, drinking, gambling, and target shooting although I'm sure there was some overlap among the three.

I don't know when the Lyman tong tool came out or if it had a predecessor but many of them had a bullet mold on the end.

Think about it , most of us here are shooters and if you were working on a ranch with no electricity, TV, radio what would you do for entertainment in what spare time you had.

[Tracy]

According to Elmer Keith in his book Sixguns he tells some pretty hairy stories about using his sixgun in self defense against cattle and horses. I believe most cowboys of the 1800s carried a sixgun for protection. If your horse throws you ( a common occurrence ) and your foot gets hung your only chance of survival is to shoot your horse.

According to Teddy Roosevelt in his book hunting trips of a ranchman he leads one to believe most carried a revolver. He also mentioned that some of them target shot a lot.

According to Billy Dixon in his book The life and times of Billy Dixon. He says in the buffalo camps there were three types of entertainment, drinking, gambling, and target shooting although I'm sure there was some overlap among the three.

I don't know when the Lyman tong tool came out or if it had a predecessor but many of them had a bullet mold on the end.

Think about it , most of us here are shooters and if you were working on a ranch with no electricity, TV, radio what would you do for entertainment in what spare time you had.

Winchester used to make tong tools, complete with bullet mould, to sell with their rifles.

[rainierrifleco]

i read somwhere the mountian men wrote about "runnin ball' refering to billet casting

[gunoil]

there had to of been a guy that built ammo for all the locals, dont ya think? Ya just drop your brass and spent lead off, come back and ammo's done? How'ed they resize and expand? what did primers look like?

[Texantothecore]

Most cowboys reloaded as the towns were very far apart and a trip to the general store might be a one or two day event. The boolits were cast and shot as cast and were put in the cartridge case by hand. The powder was compressed with a stick.

One of the instruction sheets for the tools used to cast had the following instruction:

"Trim the flashing from the bullet."

Yikes.

[BLTsandwedge]

Injuns would lose WW's on the rough ground. I just walked buffler trails and picked up all I would need. [smilie=l:
The only problem I had was to find a tepee to plug my pot in.
Yeah, I feel that old sometimes! :holysheep

A well documented fact- between 1850 and 1890 lead vests became popular with the X-ray techs of the native American plains nations. The catalyst is believed to have been delivered by the medicine dentist O'ouchit Hur'etz, DDS* (meaning "shoots blanks now") in convincing but anecdotal correlation between covering one's testes with lead when being x-rayed (or using x-ray equipment) and the prevention of a'nukamana 'akat (translated- "wrinkeled ball"). Many such lead vests were discarded or traded when electomagnetic imaging technology made inroads into the population.

*he got his degree at Mt. Sinai hospital in Yonkers.

[Green Frog]

I got a better supply of lead picking up lost wheel weights from prairie schooners where they hit bumps in the deep ruts of the Oregon Trail. :mrgreen: Later, you could do pretty well following the Chisum and Goodnight Trails to pick up wheel weights dropped off of Chuck Wagons outrunning stampedes! [smilie=w:

Froggie :kidding:

[sthwestvictoria]

From FoxFire series, book Five about mining lead and casting balls:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/imagehosting/thum_2099350a23a4375166.jpg (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=7431)

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/imagehosting/thum_2099350a23a846a1db.jpg (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/vbimghost.php?do=displayimg&imgid=7432)

[cajun shooter]

Once the cartridge guns came about like the 44WCF in 1873, one could purchase a case of 1000 rounds for $15. This would last most men of that time a very long while.
You could also purchase all the makings for the MZ guns of the time.
Many hunters tried hard to recover the lead balls they fired for melting and using again. Ammo was cheap compared to today's standards.
Imagine a wooden box of 1000 44WCF rounds, wrapped in paper and ready to be fired for just $15 to $19.
I have a Ideal #5 tool that was made for the 44WCF of the time. It has a single mould and will deprime,reprime, size the bullet and load it for a complete round. The mould drops .425 bullets as the first guns in that caliber had such bores.
It does not take many poured bullets for the steel mould handles to become too hot to handle.
They must of used leather to protect the hands with.
It was nickel and has a patent date of Dec 11 1883 Later David

[sergeant69]

When I was a kid the local blacksmith had heated up a piece of iron to work on it. He laid it on the cooling bench and one adult watching mentioned a kid might pick it up. The blacksmith said - "any kid picks that up is gonna drop it without being told...".

this is probably BS, but my father loved to tell the story he said his father told him of a teamster at the blacksmiths picking up a fresh made shoe and dropping it quick. the blacksmith said "hot"? and the teamster said, 'nope, just don't take me long to inspect a hoss shoe". as a teen after hearing it ad nauseum i told him woulda made a better story if he'd a dropped it down his pants. a slap upside my head (one of many) reminded me of my place. was worth it.

[40Super]

$15 to $19 for 1000 rounds back then was probably more than a months wages(maybe even 2 or 3). It wasn't cheap by no means,for them anyway. A gun went for $4 to $10 IIRC. I would love to get my hands on one of those earliest Robucks catalogs.

[10x]

this is probably BS, but my father loved to tell the story he said his father told him of a teamster at the blacksmiths picking up a fresh made shoe and dropping it quick. the blacksmith said "hot"? and the teamster said, 'nope, just don't take me long to inspect a hoss shoe". as a teen after hearing it ad nauseum i told him woulda made a better story if he'd a dropped it down his pants. a slap upside my head (one of many) reminded me of my place. was worth it.

It isn't BS. Anyone who has ever picked up a hot piece of iron has set it down quickly...

[10x]

$15 to $19 for 1000 rounds back then was probably more than a months wages(maybe even 2 or 3). It wasn't cheap by no means,for them anyway. A gun went for $4 to $10 IIRC. I would love to get my hands on one of those earliest Robucks catalogs.

That is a really good point. $10.00 a month plus found was a respectable wage up until 1914 or so. In the 1930s ( the great depression) $1.00 a day plus found was harvest wages. 80 cents for a ten hour day was far more common.

[fredj338]

The average cowboy shot very little & certainly did not reload. A box of cartirdges would last them an entire season. Buffalo hunters, totally diff story. Then theyhad wagons to carry their supplies of powder & I would bet most shot factory ammo still.

[randyrat]

When I was young my father and I would eat toast and a can of beans while watching cowboy movies, i was in heaven. One day I asked my dad where do the cowboys carry their coffee pots and extra ammo. He said don't ask questions, just enjoy the show. I was puzzled.

[starmac]

Any ranch I ever worked on, you slept in your spare time, and was glad too.

[cajun shooter]

I did not imply that every cowboy purchased it by the case! I have a 1870's Winchester catalog that has some very nice reading. I was just letting you know the price of a case. How many of today's shooters that work for just getting by wages go into a store and purchase a case of 45 ACP?
You post information and every one wants to jump in and read what they think you were saying. Jeez Guys, lighten up!!
Every store also had by the box prices also.
The average cowboy did not shoot his sidearm as much as the westerns imply. They did however use them to supply meals of rabbit, deer, and any other game that looked like a meal.

[sw282]

l do believe cowboys carried most of the time but shot little. Like our poice officers of today do. A handgun was a tool like a saddle, tack, or a Crown Victoria. Used but not fondled. Ammo has ALWAYS been expensive. Guns too

[10x]

snip
the average cowboy did not shoot his sidearm as much as the westerns imply. They did however use them to supply meals of rabbit, deer, and any other game that looked like a meal.

When my dad was a youth in the 1920s in Southern Alberta one cowboy told him that the handgun was to shoot injured livestock and your horse if the need ever arose.
The corrosive nature of black powder and primers meant cleaning after even one shot. So many were reluctant to shoot when water was scarce.

[Catshooter]

When I was a kid every gun shop would sell individual rounds. If you needed two or three, or twelve, they'd sell 'em to you.


Cat

[.22-10-45]

In reading old references to bullet casting by Ned Roberts, Harvey Donaldson, etc. I don't think they cast up the huge volumns of bullets most modern shooters do at one session. I get the feeling they only produced enough for coming match plus practice..or enough for hunting.
I taught myself how to cast over an old fashoned cast iron wood range...Very hot work in summer! Here's something interesting: The main burner lid has a smaller removable lid fitted in it's center. A small 10# cast-iron pot fits perfectly inside this opening..I wonder if the stove makers had bullet casters in mind when they designed this?

[rbuck351]

Most of the older wood ranges had one lid that had three or four lid/rings that could be removed to make a bigger or smaller hole directly over the fire to control the amount of heat desired to a fry pan. Bigger hole more heat.

[waksupi]

Mine has double lids. Meant for different sized pots.

[brotherdarrell]

I actually saw it being done in the old days,.......well, sorta.

You see, Marshal Dillon was going to Mexico to get a bad guy and he came across a couple of bandidos, one of which had a little pot of molten lead and was actually pouring boolits right by the campfire. Upon seeing Marshal Dillon the bandido quit casting and a few things were hashed out. Unfortunately I did'nt get to see the re-loading equipment as the cameras followed the Marshal instead of staying in camp.

Hey, if it was on Gunsmoke it had to be true, right?

brotherdarrell

[Gibson]

brotherdarrell:

Recall the episode with the sadistic buffalo hunter who as the story begins is bringing in one of his skinners who allegedly got a face full of molten lead by accident?

"A ruthless buffalo hunter named Gatluf decides it's easier to kill his hired skinners than it is to pay them their deserved wages. He brutally forces one of his skinners' face into a vat of hot lead. They take the poor soul to Doc's office, where the man later dies."

Harold J. Stone was the actor in the role of Gatluf. SO4EP33

[sthwestvictoria]

I am reading Elmer Keith's Hell I was there! at the moment. On page 63 he has got in a mix up with some game wardens in Ovando who threaten him. His father goes to town to purchase "200 pounds of pig lead, 25 pounds of black powder and 5000 caps for my old .45 colt. I asked him what this was all about now that the sheep were gone. "oh" he says, "I thought you might want to do a little practicing 'fore you went to Ovando this fall."

[Wayne Smith]

I read where Lewis and Clark carried their powder in lead containers which they melted.

Not only that, but the cases were measured and weighed so that the powder was used up by the lead in the case.

During the time of the buffalo hunters Sharps and Remington were providing most of the guns and ammo used. Remington loaded their ammo with a 20-1 mix, Sharps loaded with a 16-1 mix. This suggests that many of the buffalo hunters purchased their ammo as well as their rifles.

[jlchucker]

When I was a kid every gun shop would sell individual rounds. If you needed two or three, or twelve, they'd sell 'em to you.


Cat


So did the general store in my home town. The owner of the store started his business in 1906, and would even rent out rifles and shotguns during the hunting season--mostly nondescript old single-barrel shotguns, as I remember. He kept them in the little office in back of the store. Some of the ammo he sold by the round was pretty old. That old man died in his store in 1960, and looking back on it, that store was a unique part of history you don't see any more. When I was a kid I remember going in there in the fall and buying 5 shotshells, with a quarter, to go grouse hunting with. Today, society would go out of their minds at even the thought of a 12 year old buying shotshells--especially a round at a time.