Fun guns. Love my .32 TC Cherokee.

 

I use to own a T/C .32 Cherokee, also had a .45 Cal. barrel for the rifle. Fine little rifle!!

 

I use to hunt a lot and starting as a kid I concentrated on things such as squirrels and rabbits. Mostly it was a .22 rimfire I carried into the woods. But in the mid 1960s I got into muzzleloaders and have been a fan ever since. I killed bobcats, deer and squirrels. It didn't take long for me to realize that rifles that fired tiny patched balls, .32 & .36, were so much better at taking little critters than anything larger. Yes, careful shooting at a squirrel's head/neck did well using .45 and up but a less than perfect shot could leave one with an empty game bag.

So I managed to find a little .32 rifle with a percussion lock, it is called the "Crockett". The accuracy was astonishing and gave up uthing to a .22. Of course we're talking about open iron sights; I used them on my .22 as well. Years passed by and most of what I fired at the point had flint locks. After years of fine service the Crockett found another home and it's place now taken with a flintlock longrifle of .36 caliber. A grand little longrifle that is still a favorite.

But I still remember the fun I had with the .32 Crockett and just had to have a flint replacement. I had an SMR (southern mountain rifle) built which IMHO had the ground now fully covered. A .311" lead ball weighs right about 46 grains while the .36 ball averages around 66 grains. No recoil, no major noise, just a sharp crack make up the only side effects.
The .32 Crockett.

The .32 SMR.

The .36 SMR.

Nice looking rifles. Thanks for sharing the pics. These are vintage oldies.

 

This is my TC 12ga. Killed a few rabbits with it.

 

I have a TC New Englander like yours but in .50. Gave up looking for a 12 ga barrel for it; folks are asking more than I paid for the rifle new.

 

You might be better off just looking for a complete shotgun.

 

Very nice rifles there, Hanshi.

Back in the '80's and '90's I shot mostly muzzleloaders, and those were mostly 20 gauge or .32.

One thing I did with the .32's was to use 4F vs. 3F. I found that 15 grains of 4F was approximately the same as 25 grains of 3F, loaded easier, produced less smoke, and the rifle was easier to clean (less fouling). My .32's are percussion, but using 4F would be especially convenient for someone shooting a flintlock.

The two .32's I have are 42-inch barrel rifles that I built. I had a little .32 CVA for a while but sold it not too long ago.

Some of my ML long guns.
Top to bottom: .40 (gave to a nephew), .45, .32, .32, .36 flint (gave to different nephew)

 

In my younger years when my eyes could shoot iron sights (I'm in my early 80s now), I used a couple of flintlocks on the tree squirrels. I started out with a .29 caliber and eventually went to a .25 caliber. A pound of lead and a pound of 3F will go a long way with these two small calibers!

 

Bought a .45 cal. Thompson Center Hawken in 1973. The store owner said he used to sell a lot of them until the movie Jeremiah Johnson came out. After that, all anyone wanted were the 50s! 🤣 I put together a CVA .32 cal squirrel rifle kit and would take it and my 6.5” Single Six into the squirrel woods. Lots of fun. I later bought a .32 cal TC Cherokee and it seemed to fit me a little better than the CVA. I know they make modern bullets that are much more ballistically superior but there is nothing like seating a patched round ball.

 

I have a Pedersoli .32 that I never really warmed up to. Couldn't stay ahead of the fouling anyway. Currently putting together an SMR in .40cal. Just got the barrel draw filed.

 

Too old,too fat and too sick to enjoy hunting anymore but I still have my H&R .32 cal underwater. It was the perfect BP rifle for small game. Hopefully my son will get into hunting and use it.

Steven

 

Ran ml for decades, thinned the herd but still have some including a .32 cal. 'carbine' I did up for my now 29yo grandson.
I wanted a .36 but one day at Cabela's back room was this .32 (pedersoli?) percussion rifle that looked a lot like the Hatfield. The wood up front was messed up and it was cheap....and so was I.
I could have trimmed the full stock back to a half stock but Josh couldn't handle the barrel weight. I cut the barrel and stock back to have the same config at the middle ramrod pipe as it had at the original front. It made a rather lovely, light and trim carbine; shot well too. We settled on 20gr FFG under a patched rb. He did very well in the WMLA youth matches and it fit me like a rook & rabbit or buggy rifle for a walkabout.
Josh became a USA Infantryman with high score of his unit on the range, then on to the Old Guard....now a civi.
I should pull that old gun out.

 

I built a LH .40 Virginia rifle a few years ago, it has a 7/8", 42" Rice barrel, it's fitted for both a flint and cap lock. I've never fired it with the flintlock though. It's very accurate and would a fun gun to squirrel hunt with.

 

I once put together a T/C Hawken .50 caliber flintlock from a kit but never tried anything more challenging. I did, however, have a friend who built me a .29 caliber flintlock which took many tree squirrels back in the 70s-90s. I even had someone build me a .25 caliber flintlock that accounted for several squirrels. There's a lot of .25 caliber balls in a pound pf lead!

 

Real 'peashooters' there

 

Nice gun

 

.

Fat fingers led me to a .36 H&A underhammer, then a .36 T/C Seneca (when I was lucky enough to stumble across a pristine one F/S), after I bought/fumbled with a couple of .32's ( a rebarreled T/C Hawken that was way too heavy, then a nice lightweight T/C Seneca).

The .36's were much easier for me to load. (YMMV)

.

 

IME, any caliber ML rifle will require head shots. A good friend built a 25 caliber to shoot one pellet of #4 buckshot ahead of a small
dose of ffffg as a “squirrel gun”. Interestingly, he had to use a hardened drill rod as a ramrod as the very small hickory rods were too fragile (and dangerous). He quickly discovered that body shots were, in his words, like hitting them with a grenade. Ha!

 

I used to use a ML reproduction Springfield rifle .58 caliber with 500gr lead molded bullets. Back then we had only black powder. Head shots were a must! The only powder we could find was FFF but it worked just fine. I had no problem getting my legal limit of six squirrels with that rifle. We used Crisco for bullet lube.

 

The 36 and 40 cals I had were easier to load and swab/clean than than the 32! Even so, I made a metal rod for the 40 as I was using it for shooting matches and didn't want rod problems and it gave me some weight forward balance.
For the 32 (it's factory rod was pure junk) I chose as straight grained a hardwood dowel as I could then heated and soaked it well with linseed oil. It held up well.
Ime most factory made jags are too large a diameter, especially for the small bores. Once a wet patch is on its too tight a fit and will push the fouling down bore then piles it up into the breech. I want the patch to mostly ride down within the fouling layer and bulk up on an upstroke to pull the fouling out. To that end I 'jig' a cleaning patch; down a bit and up, then repeat , feeling it out, rather than all the way to the bottom and try to pull everything out from there. It is easy enough to reduce the jag dia. for the thickness cleaning patches you use to be the comfy fit in bore.
At the matches I took a metal range rod for it. I discovered early on that going more than 2 shots without a swab could make for a sticky wet patch or too tight for a tight patch/ball reload. It only took me one jammed reload about 1/2 way down to convince me a damp swab between every shot was best for me. Btw, that stuck one took a CO2 blaster to blow it out.

 

I hate to bring this up because I really like and enjoy the traditional muzzle loaders. But the inlines can be swapped from the breach end after every shot and resulting in some pretty amazing accuracy.

And yes, I too got bullets stuck 1/2 way down the bore and resorted to a mallet and my home made aluminum rod. In a non traditional way of thinking a hooked breach like the old TC guns with a barrel setup with a similar unscrew plug would be a nice variation on the theme. Push the wedge out, life the barrel, unscrew the plug, swab and re-assemble.

 

Recently completed a .50 caliber Lancaster style flintlock from scratch. Planning to begin a .36 caliber Bedford style (flintlock) , always wanted a small caliber smokepole for squirrel, hope my old eyes will be kind. Used to have a .36 TC Seneca that I loved, son now has it.

 

That's really nice, jw!

 

Nice!
Maybe consider a .40cal? Imo it is not too big for small (and even larger game up to deer, but why if you have a 50), easier to handle and carries better in wind and distance.

 

I Like T/C's and greatly prefer the. 36cal to .32cal, for small game, the .36 Senica is my favorite, the extra barrell length of the Senica gives much better forward balance for offhand shooting than the Cherokee. For targets out to 100yds, it's the .36cal Hawken with Rice barrel, and it and the .40cal GM barrel Hawken are my most used Go-to BP rifles. For stalking dear sized game, can't beat the .45cal Seneca. Though I do have a .58cal big bore comming.

Left to right:
.32 Cherokee
.36 Senica
.45 Senica
.32 Hawken with GM barrell
.36 Hawken with Rice barrel
.40 Hawken with GM barrell
.45 Hawken with T/C barrel
.45 Hawken with GM barrell
.45 Hawken Flintlock T/C
.50 Hawken with GM barrell
.50 Hawken Flintlock GM
.50 Pennsylvania Hunter T/C 1:66 barrell
.50 Renegade with T/C barrel

 

I share your passion for T/C. Yes a bIg boar 58 you need that. Next a 12ga New Englander and White Mt carbine. The Cherokee and PA Hunter are two of my favorites. Although, I only hunted seriously with the Renegade and New Englander. Not the Renegade below another in cap lock.

I have a group photo of my fancy, four: Excuse the Lyman, but its a nice early model. Former owner did good job customizing the bottom Renegade into a Hawken. Those who can zoom in, the 2nd down is from the custom shop.

 

I wanted to love the Seneca but when I finally got one the stock didn't 'fit my face'

 

I have owned a Traditions Crockett 32 cal for a few years and have squirrel hunted with it quite a bit. The Crockett is plenty accurate but my old eyes make things tough at longer ranges.

 

Love the T/C Hawken patch on your bag. I have a question about the Traditions Crockett, is the barrel 13/16ths across the flats?

I have a .32cal T/C Cherokee, but often wished that it had a longer sight radius and a little more weight up front, I had a .32cal GM drop-in for a 15/16ths Hawken, but at 12+lb. it was way too heavy, so I traded it!

 

Around a half inch across the flats for the Crockett.

 

Wow!
0.500" - 0.320" = 0.180
0.180" / 2 = 0.090"
So that barrel is less than 1/10" thick at the lands, minus however deep the rifling is at the grooves. Then minus the depth of any dovetails cut into it. That is a really thin barrel! 😳