Spilling out the Shot Pouch

Somehow I keep gravitating to shot pouches in these posts. Guess it’s just a fun thing to nerd to. Read any muzzleloader or bushcraft forum or page and everyone feels like posting their EDC. Add into it the obsession with firearms and properly maintaining them and we have a recipe for eternal content. But, let’s say if our historical protagonist got worked over by a buffalo and took a spill what would we see tumbling out from his shot pouch?

First things first let’s establish the following again for anyone new to the page: a shot pouch/bag, rifle pouch/bag, rifleman’s pouch/bag, shooting pouch/bag, bullet pouch/bag, etc IS NOT A POSSIBLES BAG. The bag being referenced here is the one with the primary tools and items to load and service your longarm and possibly pistols. Historically these were smaller than what rendezvous culture has rammed down our throats. These bags were made just for the essentials and not much else but what constitutes essentials and was there ever any odd pocket trash recorded? You’ll see the standard items but the number of lead balls, flints, and that sort of thing is a neat concept to look out for. You’ll also have some items really out of left field… and those are fun! Let’s get this ball rolling again. This post will also be heavier on the quotation side than the picture side, BTW.

"It had been the uniform testimony of the Regulators in this section that they did not fly from Tryon's cannon until their ammunition had failed; and this was probably the fact, for the most of them did not expect they would need more powder and balls than they were accustomed to take with them on a common hunting expedition. An old man, who was seventeen years old at the time of the battle, told the writer a little more than a year ago that he assisted George Parsons in moulding his balls the night before the battle, and that when they had moulded twelve bullets they stopped. He then observed somewhat jocosely to Parsons that if he shot all those bullets, and did execution with them at each shot, he would do his share. Parsons replied in the same spirit, that he would certainly use every one of them if there should be occasion for it. He afterwards told my informant that he had used every one of them, and he believed that he had done execution with every one, with one exception, when his gun choked in loading."

-Life of Dr. Caldwell, 1842

ariveing at the summit of the hill they discovered that it was covered with a vary heavy kind of oar, each of them put some of the oar in their shot pouch and returned to the camp, when

they arrived at the camp they took some of the oar and by means of their hand bellows and some thick oake barke it was melted and they found it to be silver var, they brought with them to Martain's Station the silver they had extracked & some of the oar the silver was pronounced by all who saw it to be vary pure.

-Reminiscences of Western Virginia, 1770-1790

He was taken over the Ohio River and left in the care of a big and a little Indian.

At the time he had an Indian scalp in his shot pouch The little Indian kept wanting to get into the shot pouch and he endeavored all the time to prevent it if possible. He knew that if this little

Indian did get into it and the scalp was found with him then he would

certainly be killed and yet he was afraid that he would. In this uncertainty he thought of the end of his powder horn that was very nobly turned and he just cut or broke it off and gave it to him, with that the little Indian seemed very much pleased and let him alone.

John McKinney was surveying down on Licking (when shot by Indians). The bullet struck another mans powder horn, went on into his shot pouch, and striking a piece of leather, glanced off again, and struck McKinney in the nipple, sinking into his breast, but he drew it out by the thread of his shirt, which was not broken.

Our bait was from the belly of the animal itself. Under the belly of all beavers is a cavity

about 2 ½ inches long, containing in 2 separate apartments, what are called the oil and behind it the bark stone."

The barkstone is a little larger of the two, and is so called because of the little strips of bark that are done on the outside. The fluid from these two stones, smelling a good deal like assafetida are put together in some tight vessel. I kept some in a horn, the small end unopened and the larger end fitted with a bottom, having a piece of leather sewed around it, so as to make it tight, and a string to draw it out by, the whole so small that I could get it in my shot pouch,

-Frontier memories III : Rev. John Dabney Shane interviews

young fellow, was so hard pressed by Girty and several -savages, that he was compelled to discharge his rifle, (however unwilling, having no time to re-load it,) and Girty fell. It happened, however, that a piece of thick sole-leather was in his shot-pouch at the time, which received the ball, and preserved his life, although the force of the blow felled him to the ground.

-Historical sketches of Kentucky : embracing its histo-ry, antiquities, and natural curiosities, geographical, statistical, and geological descriptions; with anecdotes of pioneer life, 1848

When on the bluffs yesterday, I observed in the river an extensive bend, and determined to travel across the neck, I therefore did not embark with the boats, but filled my shot pouch with parched corn, and set out

In the course of this forenoon we observed three rattlesnakes, of an entirely new and undescribed species: one of them I killed, and carried in my shot-pouch, and during the time we stopped to feed our horses, I secured the skin.

-TRAVELS IN THE INTERIOR OF AMERICA, IN THE YEARS 1809, 1810, AND 1811;

Powder- Horn and black leather bullet pouch, large enough to contain bulletmold, a steel and flint, tinder box, tow, priming-brush and charger suspended from it.

- Major Cuyler, of New York, to Mr. Custis, dated 5th Sept 1810. (Description of a cheap durable homemade uniform for riflemen)

His first depredation, this morning, was stealing a case of razors, which being discovered in his shot pouch, were taken

from him; these he said, he only wanted to shave his head, and would then have returned them.

-A journal of travels into the Arkansas territory, 1821

In the bundle on top of the gun were my belt and trappings for hunting. A description of them may be interesting to some of those who may in after years feel like settling another Texas, if such can ever be found in North America, which I very much doubt. The belt was of worsted girthing, of a brown chocolate color, with a large buckle with a leather tongue to fit. On the left side was attached, but removable, a sheath for a large knife some 13 or 14 inches long and 2 inches wide with a firm hickory handle. It would weigh 3 lbs. and was of the best cast-steel, finely tempered. This, Mr. Nichols said, was in every way preferable to a hatchet or tomahawk. On the right side of the belt was attached a bag con-taining two compartments and protected by a flap or covering of a material impervious to water.

A second strap of the same mate-

rial as the belt came down from the right shoulder, the two ends buckled to the belt near together on the left side. On this was my small skinning knife, the blade "Turk" shaped, 54 inches long, and of the best metal, and a sack of twelve or fifteen bullets and flints.

Adventures of the "Lively" Immigrants, 1899

" I had lost my rifle and all my plunder, I felt quite rich, when I found my knife, flint, and steel in my shot pouch. These little fixens," added he, " make a man feel right peart, when he is three or four hundred miles from any body or any place-all alone among the painters and wild varments."

Letters from the West: Containing Sketches of Scenery, Manners, and Customs, and Anecdotes, 1828

All this day's march was along a country abundant in minerals. In several places we saw lead and copper ore. I picked up a small parcel of ore, which I put in my shot-pouch, which was proved afterwards to be an ore of silver.

During the day we discovered fresh bear fracks in the wood, and my servant advised me to have my gun loaded. At this remark put my band in my shot pouch and found but a single ball, and

no lead withwhich to make more. At this discovery I saw at once the uselessness of self reproach of my own carelessness and neglect,

The personal narrative of James O. Pattie, of Ken-tucky, 1831

I rested my rifle against the trunk of a tree, and after a long aim, fired; the bullet dashed the head of the little animal to pieces, and whirled him some twenty feet off in the air.

I had lost my knife on the day previous, but with the assistance of a which I

found in my pouch, I skinned my prize

-Indian sketches, 1835

Over his left shoulder and under his right arm hang his buffalo powder- horn, a bullet Pouch in which he carries balls, flint, and steel, with other knick-

knacks.

-Alfred Jacob Miller

Having traveled about two hours, we perceived a party of warriors; but, fortunately for us, we saw them first, turned back a few steps, and then struck for the roughest part of the mountains to hide and select a good place for defense, in case we should be found.

During this rambling I thought of a dried buffalo sinew which I had in my bullet pouch to mend moccasins. I pulled it out and cut it in two, offering my hunter a part of it, which he refused, saying, "Eat it all; I believe I can starve better than you." So, without asking him a second time, I soon demolished the sinew, which I found excellent, except that it was too small.

-Forty years a fur trader on the upper Missouri, the personal narrative of Charles Larpenteur, 1833-1872

Over his left shoulder and under his right arm hang his powder-horn and bullet-pouch, in which he carries his balls, flint and steel, and odds and ends of all kinds.

Adventures in Mexico and the Rocky Mountains, 1847

We nooned at the roots of a fallen cottonwood, called "Dead Indian." The lower jawbone of a woman was picked up by Bransford. The teeth were sound and regular; I put it in my bullet for safe keeping.

Wah-to-yah, and the Taos trail, 1850

From this time till we reached the Pueblo, we killed at least four or five of these snakes every day, as they lay coiled and rattling on the hot sand. Shaw was the Saint Patrick of the party, and whenever he or any one else killed a snake he always pulled off his tail and stored it away in his bullet-pouch, which was soon crammed with an edifying collection of rattles, great and small.

The buffalo looked uglier than ever. * Here goes for another of you,' thought I, feeling in my pouch for a percussion-cap. Not a

percussion-cap was there.

Prairie and Rocky Mountain life; or, The California and Oregon trail, 1852

Under one arm hung a large powder horn, which had been selected for the beauty of its curve and texture, carefully scraped and polished, and covered with quaint devices, traced with the point of the hunter's knife; under the other was suspended a square pouch of leather, containing flints, patches, balls, steel, tinder, and other "little fixens," as a backwoodsman would call them, constituting a complete magazine of supplies for a protracted hunt.

-James Hall Legends of the West, 1854

Six or eight years since, Du Shay, an old French hunter, while ranging in the parts above alluded to, on crossing one of the two principal forks

that unite to form the main stream. observed a singular looking something in the creek bed, which he picked up.

It was apparently a fragment of

rock, very heavy, and contained numerous yellow specks.

Having deposited it in his bullet-pouch for preservation, subsequently, in approaching a band of buffalo, its weight became so annoying he thoughtlessly threw it away.

The year following he visited Santa Fe, at which

place his pouch was accidentally emptied, and, among its contents, several bright particles, that had become parted from the rock, attracted the attention of the Mexicans.

These were carefully gathered up, and, upon due examination, proved to be virgin gold.

-Rocky Mountain life; or, Startling scenes and perilous adventures in the far West, during an expedition of three years, 1857

Uncle Ben has a whet rock in his possession which he has owned ever since 1830, and carried it in his shot pouch in all the battles he was engaged in. It was given to him by Jacob C. Trask, at Matagorda. It is about three inches in length by one and a half in width, and is much smaller than when he first came in possession of it. On one side is a deep groove, made there by sharpening his awl in the days when he made moccasins and buckskin clothes

Early settlers and Indian fighters of southwest Texas, 1900

Fortunately, one of us found that he had got with him in his hunting pouch the means of kindling a light, so after a little discussion, another of the party determined to lead the way, and crawled accordingly, with his comgades behind him, on his hands and knees, into the nearest passage

-Diary of a journey from the Mississippi to the coasts of the Pacific with a United States government expedition, 1858

He would whistle away vigorously through the hollow wing-bone of a bird, to dispel the approaching thunder-storm. He would carry the horny tails of rattlesnakes in his bullet-pouch,

as charms, to give certainty to his aim. But only a

small portion of the French population was thus easily degenerated.

-The states and territories of the great West : including Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Michigan, Wis-consin, lowa, Minesota [sic], Kansas and Nebraska ; their geography, history, resources ..., 1856

The ammunition, rifle balls with bullet moulds, an extra flint or two, gun wiper and "bullet patchin" were carried by each man in his

"shot pouch" made of leather or dressed skins and worn at the side suspended by a broad strap that went over the shoulder. Attached to this pouch was the powder horn. Thus, on the morning of October 1, 1835, was accoutred that little army, the hope of a new nation.

-Tall men with long rifles,1935

Till next time, I hope to see more rattles in pouches and someone striking it lucky somewhere with ore in his bag!