Pathfinder Outdoor Journal Ep2 - 18th Century Woodsman Apparel And Gear

hey I'm country backwoods and hungry I spend every Sunday just living good might do a little fishin a little hunting on the weekend with a bow I was sneaking back in the woods every now and then like to kick off my boots and get lazy again this episode of Pathfinder outdoor journal is being brought to you by self-reliance Outfitters the Pathfinder school Duluth pack battle horse knives short lane arms lansky survival resources carbon TV and survival life from hunting to fishing to camping to survival self-reliance Outfitters has the quality outdoor gear to help you and your family make the most of your next outdoor adventure visit us online at WWF reliance Outfitters calm outdoor gear for outdoor people at the Pathfinder school in Southeast Ohio we trained hundreds of people each year in short-term emergency survival emergency preparedness self-reliance and sustainability we trained individuals families and groups with low instructor to student ratios to guarantee the best possible training environment for your money to join us for an upcoming class please visit our website at the Pathfinder school llc.com Duluth pack handcrafted in Duluth Minnesota since 1882 true outdoorsman like Dave Canterbury have been using our canvas and leather products for over 130 years our american-made time-tested craftsmanship makes Duluth pack the only gear you'll need for your next adventure hunting fishing bushcrafting camping canoeing business gear backpacks all this and more at Duluth PACOM as we look at the equipment and accoutrements of the 1750s 1760s era let's first look at clothing because that's our first line of defense our first line of cover is the clothing that we wear and the frontiersmen is clothing was very simple but it was also very functional if you look at the writings of Joseph Doddridge if you look at the writings and see time on the Cumberland in the chapter called shirttail men you see that the typical dress of the period was very closely emulated to the Native American mixed with the European dress of the time clothing of the time period was very simple in fact if you own more than two sets of clothing you were said to be well off a sign of your wealth would be the hunting shirts that you had hanging like tapestry in your cabin along the frontier and at fort Boonesboro hunters and frontiersman of the time people who lived within that settlement were issued or given one set of clothing per year the typical pants of the period was the button fly or drop front breech and it was a short pant that came just below knee level and fastened with some type of button or tie at that point buttoned up the front or buttoned with a square fall front and then had some type of an adjustment string on the back to make it tighter or looser so it was kind of one size fits many the typical material of these pants was generally linen sometimes they were made of wool osman berg and sometimes cotton but cotton would have been a very expensive material at the time and only the well-to-do would have had cotton there's also mentioned in journals and Ledger's of these breeches being made from types of leather like brain tan if you're addressing a Native American fashion you would have worn instead of the breeches you would have one was called a breech clout and it was basically a piece of broadcloth about 18 inches wide about 40 inches long depending on how big you were and it basically just swaddled your crotch area and your tail end around came up through a belt and then flapped over the front almost like you'd hang a dish towel in your kitchen and they again we're typically made of some type of animal skin or hide like brain tan sometimes they were made of broad cloth like linen as well as wool that would have been typical Native American style dress and then a hunting shirt would have been worn over the top of that many woodsmen of the period would wear stockings below the breeches and they were basically made of wool silk and things of that nature these happen to be wool and they would go up above knee level and he would pull the breech down below to the area where your calf is right below your knee and you would either tie or fastened the breech there and that would give you your lower leg protection if you were not wearing leggings oftentimes hunters would wear what was called a legging the legging was a piece of outerwear that would help not only to provide a microclimate for their skin to keep them warm and keep it protected but also to avoid tearing up their clothing and stockings with the thorns and the briars of the eastern woodlands and the legging was typically just a tube of material or leather that was worn from just at the level of your boot or moccasin up to your knee just above the knee here and guard it off or sometimes it would come all the way up and be looped around the belt here and be cut low here and it was just a tube sometimes they had a flap on them sometimes they didn't but that was a typical thing that would be worn if you were in the woods if you're doing a tracker if you're doing a scout that would be something you typically wear to protect the clothing that you had stockings were expensive linen materials to make breeches was expensive so those leggings helped not only to protect your skin but also to protect that clothing that was so precious that would have to be repaired if it was torn up also available on the frontier would have been the Gator and this is a typical military-style Gator with a flap on the front that goes down on your boot a strap that goes under your boot on the bottom and buttons all the way up the side which goes just above the knee and would have been guarded off as well or strapped off with a leather tie of some kind this would have been definitely available to someone who had done service during shaniyah war had they lasted through his service he could have had these along the frontier as well battle horse knives are heirloom quality knives 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survival kits all the components necessary to build your own survival kit and emergency preparedness products check us out at survival resources com but we're in the frontier period was always an issue shoes of the period were really not made for walking through the woods trying to climb the side of a hill going through muddy clay based soil and things like that shoes of the period were what they called straight lasted there was really no left and no right you just had to wear him until you had a left and a right but basically it was just a straight leather sold sewn hop nailed shoe the soles are very slick very non conducive to walking through a wilderness area shoes were worn nonetheless in the wilderness and they were bought many times from trading posts by long hunters and travelers and things of that nature but they were not the only shoe that was worn during the period the moccasin is what we hear the most about in the frontier era and this is a typical pair of buffalo hide what they call pucker toe moccasins and the biggest problem that moccasins had along the frontier was they were in constant need of repair there are lots and lots of stories about frontiersman who had to repair their moccasins in front of the fire every night there are stories of Indian War bundles that were captured that contained 30 to 40 sets of moccasins alone that were being carried for the war party so extra moccasins were always something you had to have luckily for the 18th century woodsman he was able to pretty much shoot deer at will there are stories of men shooting deer on horseback shooting up to 20 deer without moving their horse this is a Fort Ligonier Schupak type moccasin this is called the Ligonier moccasin because a remnant of this boot was dug up at Fort Ligonier and basically it is a center seam type moccasin with a sewed on sole and a wool lining and this would have been something very typically worn as well during the colder months of the year if someone were choosing to wear more of a Native American style dress or something that could be easily repaired and again when you're talking about normal shoes they're not easily repaired in the wild where moccasins were easily manufactured and easily repaired as long as you had plenty of deer hide it's been written during the period that wearing moccasins was only a civilized way of going barefoot and many of the frontiersman suffered from rheumatism and arthritis at an early age and there are stories of them sleeping with their feet toward the fire and their head away from the fire instead of sleeping long ways to the fire so that they could get the maximum amount of heat to their feet every night so that they can even walk the next day this is a riding boot from the 18th century and it would have been available along the frontier especially had you been a prior service officer or something like that during the French and Indian War but again these were made for writing courses not really made for trucking through the woods they had the same straight lasted slick sole on them but someone who had a pair of boots like this would have been well-to-do by comparison in a settlement the pair of boots that I have honor typically referred to as a high low trekking boot and this boot was seen in period paintings of Thomas Jefferson it's just another leather straight lasted boot that laced up the front and then it was slicked leather sold like the other shoes and boots that we looked at the hunting shirt was the prized possession of the hunter the hunting shirt was a long loose shirt that came down about to just above the knees could have been made from Osman Berg linen most of them were made of linen could have been made of cotton again very expensive material in the period or could have possibly been made of wool as well a more typically an overcoat or a weskit that was called either short sleeve or long sleeve would have been the wool garment and the sleeping shirt or hunting shirt would have been made from Poznan Berg or linen this hunting shirt would be more typical of a Native American style hunting shirt it's got some printed pattern on it here that just would have been made with a wooden block mechanism with natural dyes it's been naturally dyed a dark brown walnut color and this would have been a very good hunting shirt of the period upper body outerwear of the period would have consisted of the weskit and the west couture waistcoat has sometimes called in the period would have been fairly long below waist level would have had pockets on both sides most likely and would have been made of some type of linen material or sometimes wool the one that I'm wearing now is made of linen I also have one here that's made of wool now something heavier than that for colder weather that may have been long-sleeved would have been something more reminiscent of this which is basically the same type weskit coat that's made out of a heavy double thickness of canvas material and canvas as I said would have been very expensive during the period so you would have had to been fairly well-off to own a coat like this and it would have been much more likely that you would have worn your blanket as your outerwear typical outerwear for the woodsmen beyond the weskit generally made from linen or wool could have been long-sleeve could have been short-sleeved would have most likely been their blanket worn in some type of match kilt fashion either with a hood depending on how he pinned it and folded it or just at neck level and wrapped around tight with a belt around the waist and depending on how he chose to wear that blanket it was his most versatile form of outerwear belt of the period consisted of many things from a typical leather belt like this one that has a knife attached to it with a hand towards buckle let's put them in the back they could have also worn some type of hand woven sash like this one that's about three times the length of my waist so that it can be wrapped around a couple different times and then tied in the back again that gives you the ability to tuck things in to hold your knife to hold a belt pouch to hold a market wallet and things of that nature or it could have been as simple as a piece of hemp rope from hunting to fishing to camping to survival self-reliance outfitters has the quality outdoor gear to help you and your family make the most of your next outdoor adventure visit us online at WWF reliance Outfitters calm outdoor gear for outdoor people at the Pathfinder School in Southeast Ohio we trained hundreds of people each year in short-term emergency survival emergency preparedness self-reliance and sustainability we train individuals families and groups with low instructor to student ratios to guarantee the best possible training environment for your money to join us for an upcoming class please visit our website at the Pathfinder school llc.com the equipment of the period that was carried by the frontiersman was very simple but yet very effective it was all they needed to affect their survivability and nothing more a knife carried by a frontiersman had to be capable of doing lots of things at the same time because he was not going to carry several generally speaking at most he would carry three he would carry a belt knife maybe a smaller belt knife and then he would have some type of what they call a whittling knife or jackknife which would be a single bladed penny style pocket knife that would have been the knife that they use for much of their small carving tasks and there are stories in seed time on the Cumberland of long hunters whittling rifle stocks next to the campfire with their whittling knife the knife that they carried on their belt was mainly reserved for processing game and processing meat and had to be kept very sharp the typical belt knife of the frontiersman would have been six to seven inches long and blade length it would have been anywhere from 1/8 inch to probably 3/16 in thickness always hand forged always up high carbon steel this one has bone handles and bone handles would have been typical material of the time period as well as wood this smaller French style trade knife and this would have been a typical knife that would have been available in trade houses and things of that nature along the frontier that would have been traded to not only Native Americans but also sold to frontiersman travelers and long hunters of the period and it's about four and a half five inches long with just a sweeping Roche belly design and curly maple handles again it is a one-piece hammered metal with the handle scales pinned to the material so I have two knives that I'm carrying on my boat one for smaller more intricate carving tasks and then one for the larger tasks the next cutting tool of choice of the woodsman would have been the tomahawk or the belt axe they would have carried larger felling type axes with them as well had they been traveling by horse caravan or bateau or possibly by canoe but if they were traveling a foot they would generally have carried a tomahawk or belt ax which is a smaller axe about the size of this tomahawk the difference being that a tomahawk handle is put through the top of the eye and friction fit and it can be removed from the head itself where an axe comes through the eye up the bottom and is wedged in place with a wooden or metal wedge the tomahawk is made to have easy handle replacement in the wild as well as become a secondary tool for skinning scraping and cutting if you remove the handle and it also has a nice hammer pole in the back for pounding steaks nails and things of that nature as well so the tomahawk would have been a very useful item to the woodsman in his arsenal of cutting tools as Lewis and Clark prepared for their journey in the early 19th century they purchased several dozen of both long butchering style trade knives as well as tomahawks to trade for safe passage throughout their journey metal tools were of a premium along the frontier or something to be guarded and well maintained as a general rule the wool blanket was the rule of thumb along the frontier for the cover element of the woodsman if he had the luxury of a horse a canoe or a bat oh he may have also carried an oil cloth of some kind that he could use for shelter or ground cloth but if he were tracking or trapping alone something like that generally a wool blanket is what he would carry he would also stuff other accoutrements and things inside his bedroll or his blanket roll like extra hunting shirts his hygiene kit maybe some food things of that nature and then he would carry that generally in tump line fashion which was a woven line generally made from some type of cordage be it hemp or some other type of rope and it would be finger woven into a strap and that strap would be used and it had tails that were a couple feet long that he could wrap around and tie off in a square knot he could then carry that over his shoulder or in true tump line fashion where he put this crosses forehead in this fashion and you would wear a tough line high on the forehead like this when you were walking the choice of blankets along the frontier would have been wool wool is water-resistant fire retardant and it retains much of its insulative value even if it's wet large wool blankets like this queen-size wool blanket would have been typical carry of the woodsmen because he could use it not only for sleeping but also for outerwear it's been said that many times Simon Kenton used the same configuration for a comfortable night's sleep leaned against a tree in the middle of the wilderness Duluth pack handcrafted in Duluth Minnesota since 1882 true outdoorsman like Dave Canterbury have been using our canvas and leather products for over 130 years our american-made time-tested craftsmanship makes Duluth pack the only gear you'll need for your next adventure hunting fishing bushcrafting camping canoeing business gear backpacks all this and more at Duluth PACOM hi I'm John McCain from survival resources we specialize in custom survival kits all the components necessary to build your own survival kit and emergency preparedness products check us out at survival resources com frontiersman obviously had to cook food make medicine carry water over distance if they chose to and things of that nature as well so they had to have some type of container element with them this is a piece of jock wear and it's basically just a leather canteen that's been what formed in other words it has been dampened filled with sand to make it the shape that it needs to be made and then dried to that configuration it's got a seam sewn around this double sewn and that a seal of beeswax the top is sealed with and lined with beeswax on the inside and then it is corked off it has strap cutouts in it here and then once the sand is taken out and it's lined with the beeswax it becomes a waterproof canteen typical metal containers hold on the frontier range from copper 210 to brass and this is a brass trade kettle - about 2 quarts - the hand forged bail this would have been something very typically traded with the Indians or available along the frontier at different trading houses and trading posts things of that nature could have been strung to the bottom of the bed roll carried through the woods and then use when needed to heat coffee water chocolate or to cook a meal remember as we walk through the gear the clothing and the accoutrements of the 18th century woodsman that their kids would have buried much like ours do today lots of things would have been personal preference so the things that I choose to pack and carry may not be the same thing carried by every other woodsman there were lots of different types of wool blankets lots of different types of knives containers firearms all of those things just like today had variances and were chosen by personal preference the frontiersman has lots of options available to him as far as cordage 'as for bindings wrappings tie outs and things to build with he would have had obviously hemp rope hemp rope was the most common material for ships along the colonies and there were rope walks up to a half a mile long that were dedicated to making ropes from hemp for ships now Manila was also available but hemp was considered the premium rope of the period now along the settlements and along the frontier it would have been much more common to have things like linen cotton and things of that nature as cordage as well as leather Wang's raw hides and things of that nature but he had lots and lots of options available to him and all of them were carrying this week's survival tip on Pathfinder outdoor journal is brought to you by Carbon TV now there were a couple different ways that the frontiersman could have affected fire and for ignition sources he generally had flint and steel which was very akin to the firing mechanism on his musket where you had a piece of high carbon steel and a hard rock Flintshire quartz something like that that would remove material when struck against it in downward fashion to remove material from this metal and when those pyrophoric particles of iron in the high carbon steel are removed they create a spark that is 800 degrees very similar to this those sparks when dropped on a carbonized tinder source or a charred material will ignite that material and that could be used as your ignition source for a bird nest or tinder bundle they also had the ability of magnification and this is a Hudson Bay tobacco box and this is a very typical box of the period that would have been used for carrying pipe tobacco and things of that nature and you would use the magnification lens on this box to light your pipe this could have also been used for ignition with charred material like this well folks I'm Dave Canterbury with Pathfinder outdoor journal I appreciate you joining us Saturday for this episode looking at the clothing and accoutrements of the 18th century woodsman next week we're going to move into firearms and fishing of the period we're going to look at some flintlock accoutrements and what they carried with their muzzle loading weapons and hopefully we're going to hunt a Russian boar with flintlocks in Missouri until then do me a favor take a child to the woods and God bless you

Channel: Self Reliance Outfitters

Views: 78,320

Rating: 4.8571429 out of 5

Keywords: 18th Century (Event), Survival Skills (TV Genre), pathfinder school, Dave Canterbury (TV Personality), self reliance outfitters, hunt tv

Id: Zwd-jMTXv7o

Length: 26min 30sec (1590 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 20 2014