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Message:: [QUOTE="wlwhittier, post: 4485307, member: 76316"]Your pistol is a Percussion Cap gun. The P.C. was introduced ~1820. Cap & Ball guns were made to discharge a bore-diameter solid ball. Edward Teach, aka Blackbeard, died 22 November 1718. He never had the security of a weatherproof firearm. I note with glee the almost non-existent slots on the 2 screw heads shown on the left hand side of the pistol. Quite possibly those screws were at least partially hand made...and the wear obvious on them isn't so much from corrosion as from repeated usage over the years. This is from The Georgetowner:"The first record of a manufactured screw was in England in 1760. The patent outlined the use of a lathe and a set of metal-cutting tools, which were repeatedly run over the shank of the screw blank to cut threads, facilitating hand production. Many of these screws were flat bottomed, until it was realized that a pointed end worked better as a fastener. Screws made from about 1812 through the mid-1800s were partially machine made, giving the threading a more even appearance. The introduction in 1848 of the completely machine-made gimlet screw, with a tapered shaft and a pointed tip, marked the beginning of the modern era in screw production. For the first 10 years of production, machine-made screws were made with no slot in the head. Like those made earlier, the heads were still finished with hacksaws to add the groove to fit a screwdriver, so no two are exactly alike." I do not mean to advocate removal of either of your screws in an attempt to date the pistol by their configuration...but if it were mine, it would be ver' tempting to do so. Thanks for listening, folks![/QUOTE]

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