Pattern 1746 Land and Sea Service Musket

Dateca.1746-1748

Maker Board of Ordnance

OriginEngland, Birmingham and London

MediumWalnut, iron, steel and brass

DimensionsMusket - OL: 61", Lockplate: 7 5/8" x 1 1/4", Barrel: 45 15/16", Bore .78 caliber

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number2003-12,A

DescriptionLock - Pattern 1718 Sea Service type - flat, with no engraved borders, double-throated cock, facted steel, simple pointed steel spring finial.

Barrel - likely of Liege manufacture, but of standard Ordnance form with turnings at the breech and a rectangular bayonet lug set back 2 1/4" from the muzzle.

Furniture - of cast brass, with three barrel shaped ramrod pipes (one missing) made to accept a wooden ramrod, no tail pipe and diagnostic buttplate, trigguerguard and triangular sideplate with thumb recess. Later American wristplate.

Stock - Of typical Ordnance form with prominant swell at entry of ramrod channel into stock.

Label TextThis hybrid musket, intended for both the Army and the Navy, has features of both Land and Sea Service muskets. It combines the long, 46” barrel of a Land Service musket with the flat lock of Sea Service musket, and adds a unique pattern buttplate, triggerguard and sideplate. Few were made, and it appears most were shipped to America during the French & Indian War. Numerous relics of this odd-ball arm have been recovered during archaeological digs at Fort Ticonderoga, including the wreck of the Boscawen, sunk c.1760 at the Fort's shipyard. Only known from documentary sources until 1995 when an intact example was found in the collection of Fort Ticonderoga, three examples have been identified.
InscribedLock - Tail engraved "I VAUGHAN/1745" and "Crown GR" cypher ahead of cock.

Furniture - Buttplate tang dot-punched with a decoration resembling the Union Jack surmounted by a tombstone. Sideplate engraved with "26," certainly a British weapon number. Side plate additionally dot-punched with linear geometric decoration, possibly ill executed initals. American escutcheon engraved "1759" over dot-punched shield-shaped decoration.

MarkingsLock - Marked under the pan with the "Crowned Broad Arrow," denoting British Government ownership.

Barrel - Marked with an "asterisk over 5" on the left side of the brrech (Note: barrel was not removed from stock, so other markes on the underside remain unknown).

Furniture - "Crown" struck inside of triggerguard bow.

Stock - Ordnance Storekeeper's mark of "Crown over addorsed 'GR' cyphers" to right side of buttstock. Others in ramrod channel, behind triggerguard and to rear of sideplate present but not readable.
ProvenanceThe vendor, now a resident of Richmond, found this musket locally when he resided in the Cherry Valley - Mohawk Valley area of New York in the early 1950s.

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