18th Century French Gunflint

    Hello again, I come to you with new artifact finds from my unit, N8 W4, located in the center of the 3-unit trench at the Fort St. Joseph site. Later last week, and then again on Monday morning, troweling in my unit revealed two complete gunflints! This is super exciting for us, especially since both of these artifacts were located in the east side of our unit---this may help us create hypotheses as to what this particular location was used for during the 18th century. The two pieces of gunflint we found were both honey-colored, typically associated with France (meaning it was imported to the fort by its occupants). The first gunflint we found was pretty large, a bit larger than the diameter of a quarter, and the next one was a bit smaller: they both had very sharp edges. The second gunflint was even lighter in color than the first pictured below. Further research on 18th century (French) gunflints has led me to some interesting information about manufacturing techniques and color variations that I thought I would share with you all. 

This is the front view of the first gunflint we found; it has a brown-honey color. This is a spall-type gunflint, meaning it was knocked off of a large flake. It also has that “D-shape” mentioned!   

To start off, for those of whom may not fully comprehend how a gunflint works, I will give a brief explanation. To my knowledge, pulling the trigger of a gunflint firearm will create sparks when in contact/friction with the flint. This sparking will ignite the gunpowder in the gun, and it will shoot off. According to the archaeologists at the University of Mexico, the honey-colored French gunflints, even possibly the ones that we uncovered, were considered one of the best available during the 18th century, if not the best (The Testimony of Hands, n.d.-b). No wonder they ended up at Fort St. Joseph!

    These French gunflints have been discovered at various other American archeological sites, including that of Fort St. Louis in Texas. Texas archaeologists and analysts believe that 18th century French firearms required “higher quality” of flint in order to work properly, due to their distinct flintlock mechanisms (Fort St. Louis, n.d.), which ---in my own opinion---could ultimately include the honey-colored artifacts we found. The gunflints we recovered appear to have sharp edges and would have been purposefully built to last a long period of time—although I’m sure the occupants didn’t expect their gunflints to be dug up by archaeologists three centuries later.

    During the 18th century, there are many differences between gunflints being made in France and England during the time (the popular locations in which mass-produced gunflints)---some have even argued that the French manufacturing techniques created a finer quality of gunflint. Important key differences between the French and English flint include color, shape, and manufacturing process. Canada Historical Parks explains that the French typically broke their flint shards into uniform lengths and had carved in gnawed edges (Hamilton & Fry, n.d.). They argue that the best quality of French gunflint would be “trapeziform” from the sideview because it would grip the surface inside the gun jaws more securely (Hamilton & Fry, n.d.), therefore creating a stronger spark. History Revealed mentions that in comparison, English flint cherts were more of a gray or dark color, but that the French honey colors dominated the market in the 18th century due to their visible “D-shape” distinction (A French Connection in Virginia, 2019). These manufacturing variations could contribute to the quality and overall lifetime of the gunflints. 

This is my partner Paige and I’s east side of our unit in which we found both of the gunflint (we have a stump in the center of our hole- aka “stumpy”)

  

     Although color and manufacturing techniques are vastly different, many accounts have argued that the darker, black-colored flints reigned superior, including a French fur trader who shared that these “never misfired” (Luedtke, 1999, p.73). Some analysts even suggested that the color may be associated with the performance, as the black flint created “more sparks” and the honey-flint caused “less damage” to the steel of the gun (Luedtke, 1999, p. 73). Despite this, the occupants at Fort St. Joseph were using both types of gun flints and their individual preferences may have resulted from their loyalty to their country, their available resources, or their beliefs of a higher manufacturing and material quality. For now, this remains a mystery. 

-Ava Hall

Sources: 

A French Connection in Virginia. (2019). HistoryRevealed. (https://www.historyrevealed.co/post/a-french-connection-in-virginia 

Fort St. Louis. (n.d.). Texas Beyond History. https://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/stlouis/images/traces-gunflints.html 

Hamilton, T. M., & Fry, B. W. (n.d.). Canadian Historic Sites: Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History No. 12. Parks Canada. http://parkscanadahistory.com/series/chs/12/chs12-3e.htm 

Luedtke, B. E. (1999). WHAT MAKES A GOOD GUNFLINT? Archaeology of Eastern North America, 27, 71–79. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40914428

The Testimony of Hands. (n.d.-b). University of New Mexico. https://hands.unm.edu/2015-2-60.html