Comments by "51WCDodge" (@51WCDodge) on "Wheellock 101: History and Shooting" video.

  1. Yes they may be able to afford a wheelock, but do you really want the 'Lower Classes' to be as well armed as the Aristocracy? They may well get ideas above their station!" What would the world come to?
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  2. At the time a Clock was the height of technology, the Spring was the up and coming thing, so a Firearm that had a spring in it and didn't need a match? Every little boy would have wanted one! :-)
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  3. Just trying to think. British expressions from guns, weapons. The use of a Petard to blow open gates, if you get caught out by being to clever 'Hoist on your own Petard. A complete package 'Lock Stock and Barrel' Very sharp comedy can be rerffered to a s a 'Rapier Wit'. Leaping into a situation before you fully understand it, 'Going off at Half Cock' I'll try and think of some more.
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  4. There is one, and it argued wether it is really true. Iron Cannon balls were stored with a brass ring bettween them, to sto them rusting together. this was reffered to as a 'Monkey'. Now brass and iron have different coeffients of shrinking. So if it very cold the expression isit's cold enough to 'Freeze the balls of a Brass Monkey', somtimes shortened to 'Brass Monkey weather'.
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  5. Wonder if it could also be the origin of 'Spinning your wheels' when nothing happens. Of course that could just be 'A flash in the pan'.
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  6. In English there is an expression if something is not quite the quality it seems or a wonderful plan is going wrong. 'The Gilt is coming of the Gingerbread'. British gun makers referred to the gilt finish on gun decoration as Gingerbread.
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  7. First point, NEVER put your palm over the top of the ramrod! If there is a hot ember or chamber is hot, it can act as a fire piston and set the charge off. Ian if you do get to London, visit the Wallace Collection. It's free to enter, and the armoury has one of the finest collections in the world.
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  8. Looks like a Briitsh Army WW1 Trench Cap, supperseded in 1916 by the Brodie Steel Helmet, though still used in the rear as 'Soft' headgear.
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  9. Yep, and one obvious 'I've got it in my sights'. Suprising how many old phrases hang about, and how few people know where they derive, Ramrod straight is another, and another quick one Swashbukler, from the sword and small sheild.
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  10. What wonderful discussions we go off into! :-) In UK Pawnbrockers use a sign traditonally of three bras sballs in an inveted triangle, the other joke is 'If you see the Pawnbrocker covering them with a blanket, it's going to be cold. just thought I'd launch a broadside at you all, seeing as we are up the hilt in this? (Or maybe I'd better just go fo a lie down in a darkened room?)
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