Gentlemanly Pursuits ~ Oregon Regency Society

The Quest for a British Infantry Rifle

2012-02-20T20:12:00.000-08:00

Good Evening,

I began shooting blackpowder about a year an a half ago. The Baker Rifle (more correctly known as the British Infantry Rifle) was the famous rifle of the British 95th rifles and features as an important pseudo-character in the Bernard Cornwell Sharpe's series (starting with “Sharpe's Rifles”). As an avid fan of both the Sharpe's book series and the Sharpe's video series I decided that I wanted a Baker Rifle of my own.
Turns out this was far easier said than done. Early research found that no one makes a production reproduction of the Baker Rifle. There is an India made reproduction, but it has a smoothbore not a rifled
barrel. The apparent reason for this is that you have two distinct groups commonly firing reproduction black powder weapons. Military reenactors and Fur Trade reenactors. The military reenactors are perfectly happy with the smoothbore, they are mostly firing blanks anyway so the rifled barrel is unnecessary and even an inconvenience. For the Fur Trade reenactors, the Baker Rifle is not one that there is a lot of interest in. You see way more American style long rifles (Kentucky, Pennsylvania, etc.).

This is not to say that there are not people shooting a rifled Baker Rifle, but they are rare and their rifles are, by necessity, customized to some level. For example Track of the Wolf has a custom made Baker Ordnance Rifle for almost $2700. Nice rifle, but not the pattern I am looking for. I also found some that were being custom made in England, exactly the pattern I wanted, for as much as £3500 (I do not even want to convert that to dollars).
I began with a Pedersolli Kentucky Longrifle in .50 caliber. This has been a very good rifle and will always be my 'first' rifle. However, I still wanted a Baker Rifle. Now I had much more time to work on it as I already had a rifle to shoot. In time, and with much help from Craig Schmidt, I searched more thoroughly. Digging through the forums of the various 95th Rifles reenactment groups. Talking with Sutlers and gunsmiths.
The conclusion I came to was to get an India made Baker Rifle (smoothbore) from Track of the Wolf. Have it sent to Mr. Ed Rayl, barrel-maker, who will swap out the smoothbore for a custom rifled barrel.
This part of the project starts tomorrow.

If all goes well I will have a completed, semi-custom Baker Rifle by the middle of May, perhaps in time for my birthday. While waiting, I will start assembling a shooting kit for this new rifle.

- Colonel de Valois

References:

Wiki overview of the Baker Rifle:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baker_rifle

Bernard Cornwell, Sharpe's Series
http://www.bernardcornwell.net/index2.cfm?page=1&seriesid=1

Track of the Wolf, India made Baker Rifle:
http://www.trackofthewolf.com/categories/partDetail.aspx?catId=12&subId=81&styleId=282&partNum=AAJ-226

Track of the Wolf, full custom Baker Ordnance Rifle:
http://www.trackofthewolf.com/Categories/partDetail.aspx?catId=12&subId=81&styleId=282&partNum=AAK-367

Pedersoli, Kentucky Rifle;
http://www.davide-pedersoli.com/scheda-prodotto.asp/l_en/idpr_91/rifles-kentucky-kentucky-flintlock-model.html

Le Chevalier "Throws Down the Gauntlet"

2012-01-16T14:01:00.000-08:00

Good Evening Gentlemen,

There is a common concern / complaint / belief that there is very little for Gentlemen to do at Georgian and Regency events.

This is, for the most part, true; and is true because there are very few Gentlemen attending these events.

"What did Gentlemen do?" You ask. Shooting, Fencing, Riding, Rowing, Fishing, Gambling, Smoking, Drinking, Dancing and Looking Good. Obviously, not all of these are going to appeal to all people. Also, some are expensive, especially the first three. Although the Fencing and Shooting may be dabbled in relatively easily.

At Balls it is pretty easy to find a small table and a few friends for a game of Whist. Don't know how to play? No worries, plenty of us do. With regards to Gambling, we would like to avoid real money changing hands, but poker chips, tokens or replica coins may be used. There has been talk about having a year long Whist tournament.

There are a few avenues for fencing. I myself run a Georgian / Victorian fencing practice on most Sunday afternoons. Contact me directly if interested. Academia Duellatoria here in Beaverton also offers classes in western martial arts.

http://duellatoria.com/

All of these activities require that one 'look' the part. Many modern Gentlemen can be put off by the knee breaches and silk stockings. If this is the case, move forward a few years when they go
out of style and trousers come in. The classic 'Beau Brummel' look is basically the predecessor of the modern suit.

http://www.wemakehistory.com/Fashion/Regency/RegencyMen/RegencyMen.htm
http://www.georgianindex.net/tailors/tailor.html

Another option is a Military or Navy look. These two take a bit more work and will be discussed later.

Keep in mind, that for the amount of events you are likely to attend, one outfit will largely suffice.

We have planned a series of three events this summer:

1) A Day at the River. Canoeing, fishing and a pique-nique.
2) A Day at the Salle. An assault of arms with sabre, smallsword, la canne, singlestick, bayonet, rapier, etc.
2) A Day at the Fort. Introduction to black powder flintlock weapons.

In conclusion, when it comes right down to it, in order to get more Gentlemen's Activities we need more Gentlemen willing to come out. At present there are only a few of us and while we enjoy having the ladies to ourselves it would be nice to have more fellows about.

-- Colonel Le Chevalier Etienne de Valois

Welcome to the ORS's Gentlemanly Pursuits page.

2012-01-06T11:19:00.000-08:00

Image courtesy of Empire Costume, France.

The Oregon Regency Society is striving to provide more options for our male participants. In part, we have created this page.

This page will focus on historical and instructional material, costume-related topics for gentlemen, resources for patterns, weapons and kits, most importantly, events listings for men's activities and more.

If you are a regency enthusiast and a gentleman, then this is the place for you.

Welcome. We hope to see you at one of our events very soon.