Northwest Trade Gun by Doug Warren

NORTHWEST TRADE GUN
by Doug Warren

By Joshua Shepherd
Photography by H. David Wright

Classic firearms from America’s past are naturally at the heart of the modern Longrifle Culture. Collectors at this year’s CLF fundraising auction will have the opportunity to acquire a truly iconic weapon that saw broad use across the early American frontier: the Northwest Trade Gun.

Artist Doug Warren has donated a truly unique version of the ubiquitous British trade gun. Easy to carry, quick to load, with tremendous stopping power and accurate to fifty yards these guns were favorites with the tribes, traders and trappers. Warren’s custom-built smoothbore sports a 20 gauge, 36” long, octagon-to-round Colerain barrel and is fitted with a Chambers round face lock, noted for excellent sparking and reliability. Warren scratch built the trigger and stocked the gun in maple, which was given a rich hand-rubbed oil finish.

A longtime member of the CLA, Warren is an experienced gun and bag maker with over thirty years of experience, and his Northwest gun is far from a standard mass-produced trade musket. The maker refers to the gun as a “contemporary trade gun.” Although original trade guns generally possessed stocks with little more than 1 inch of drop, Warren’s offering features a buttstock with 3 inches of drop, ensuring a gun that will handle and sight far easier for the modern shooter.

For more information on the work of Doug Warren contact the artist directly at: dougwarren1969@gmail.com