Prince Maximillian's rifle

[Rod]

Here's some pics of Prince Max's double rifle. I have no idea if it's the double he's toting in the painting Bodmer did of him meeting the Hidatsa--the guy was an avid hunter to say the least, and had many rifles, but this one was obviously a favorite. Note the colored pegs in the stock---there's a little inlaid head of different animals (boar, deer, elk, etc.) in the stock, and pegs put in beside each one as a tally. From the amount of pegs in that stock, it's a wonder he had time to write as much as he did.














The rifle was part of the display of Prince Max artifacts on loan to the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center at Washburn, ND a couple of years ago. The guy guarding the rifle while we were there with a tour group (part of the Prince Max symposium at Bismarck a couple of years ago) is a friend of mine, and he obligingly moved the rifle around so I could shoot from several angles.

Rod

[sean]

Neat gun. Thanks for sharing, Rod. Skinny barrels on that thing, but you can do that when you don't have to cut them for sights and lugs. Definitely the sort of fast twist you would expect, too. What do you think the muzzle cap is? Ivory?

Sean

[Rod]

I'd guess ivory, maybe bone. I couldn't actually touch the thing (especially with a couple of folks from the Linden Museum in the room at the time), but my friend the guard could, with the white gloves on. While no means typical of any fur trade gun, this is one that may have actually been used up here--although there's really no way to tell for sure.

Rod

[Librarian]

How do!

A nice double-barrelled "jaeger."

IMHO, likely ivory.

I suspect it was his "field gun."

The family castle/fortress of Coburg in Saxony (now Germany) belonged to Queen Victoria's "consort" Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg.
Today it has an extensive collection of armor, but also has an extensive collection dedicated to "hunting" filled with the smoothbores and rifles of the nobility.
When money was no object, the amount of gold, silver, ivory, and particularly elaborately hand-carved/hand chiselled detail carving in metal, wood, and ivory makes a peasant like me look at the guns as art not something to be actually fired.

"Potsdam" west of Berlin was the old Prussian capitol, and consisted of the town and the palaces and hunting grounds/woods of Prussian nobility such has Frederick the Great. As a result, gunmakers catering to the rich and nobility did a good business.)

(Worthless Trivia: Maximiilian von Wied was from Neuwied in now western Germany. I was in Neuwied last month, and in Potsdam a couple of weeks ago.)