Powder Flasks and Horns

vmicraig

Sergeant
Joined
Mar 12, 2018
Location
London, England
Anyone else find the variety of powder flasks and horns interesting? I've got a few, but there are so many knock-offs on the market, it's hard to tell when you have an original or a fake.

My pictured copper specimen is a New Haven Connecticut Powder Flask: 9.5" long ... shiny copper ribbed design and signed “J. Matthewman.” There is a minor seam opening in the bottom. Carrying rings intact. Overall VG condition. Matthewman produced flasks in New Haven prior to and during the Civil War years.

Modern manuals on muzzle-loading guns all say the flask should never be used to pour powder directly down the muzzle, but from the English sporting press of the 18th and early 19th centuries it is all too clear that this was then common practice, resulting in many accidents. Instead the powder should be poured into an intermediate container known as a charger or powder measure. Sometimes the cap to the spout represented the measure, especially for priming flasks. Sometimes the spout itself was the measure, with a sliding device to shut off the supply at the base, as well as a cap. This type became the norm in the mid-19th century.

High quality guns would often have come with a matching flask, chargers and other accessories. Many flasks have small rings for a cord which was slung round the neck to carry them, especially before large pockets on hunting clothes arrived in Europe in the 18th century. Some examples have original elaborate cords with knots and tassels.

Many types of early guns required two different forms of gunpowder (such as a flintlock with finer priming powder for the pan, and a coarser standard powder for the main charge), necessitating two containers, a main flask and a smaller "priming flask". During roughly the 18th century paper cartridges became more and more popular, and a higher proportion of flasks made were the smaller priming variety. It appears that the British Army in the Peninsular War, despite regulations specifying the issue of powder horns and priming flasks, found the former inferior in action to cartridges, with the measuring spout prone to get detached and lost, and informally switched to cartridges during the war. The powder flask was finally rendered obsolete by the spread of breech loaders and the innovations brought about by Hall, Sharps, and Spencer and the later development of self-contained cartridges that were developed and marketed successfully by Oliver Winchester, after which manufactured cartridges or bullets became standard. Powder flasks were also used for priming naval cannon; such a flask would be as large as, or even larger than, a main flask for a personal sidearm. The large rectangular boxes from which the main muzzle charges for cannon were scooped are called powder boxes; these were used either when making up cartridges in advance, or loading loose powder when firing.

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They are very unique and interesting collection. I would have trouble distinguishing original and reproduction. Thank you for posting them @vmicraig. I wouldn't mind seeing more of them.

I find the flasks more interesting than the horns, simply because they are easier to identify, but still, the wide variety of shapes and sizes of horns alone is astounding.
 

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