18th Century Original Shot Pouches and Ball Bags/Pouches

Can't get much better than this, an excellent short description that speaks volumes.

I would also think amateur manufacture. Mostly though I am thinking it is made of a leftover or scrap piece from other leather work.
Maybe it's the pouch for someone of lesser financial means who was able to obtain it and make a needed pouch. Or was able to get the local harness maker/saddler or shoemaker to make him one he could afford, the pro using scrap to keep the cost down. Maybe for a young man just starting out?

The straps on both of these pouches are interesting. I was reading last night about home weaving of cloth in old Cumberland County, PA. That seems to have been limited to the early ‘pioneer’ period until merchants were established selling textiles. Even then, weaving took place locally in a sort of ‘division of labor’ in the communities where one household would set up to do weaving on a semi-commercial scale. Fiber production and spinning seems to have been prevalent throughout the second half of the 18th century in a majority of households. I wonder how common it was to do small woven articles on something like an inkle loom. 

The leather strap on the vertical bag seems to not have the same wear as the rest of the pouch. Without having it in hand, I’d guess that it’s a fairly recent replacement. 

Which brings up an important point. These relics have had a long working life, as well as a long ‘artifact’ life. I think we do well to remember that the surviving examples as found might not be as made. Straps especially may have been repaired or replaced during the pouch’s long existence. 

I have my grandfather’s axe. The handle has been replaced three times and the head once. 

Which brings up another important idea for our impressions. We don’t use our kit in the same way as the men we're recreating. Our gear isn’t getting the same wear. Things like small repairs or replacement parts can go a long way into improving our impressions. A hem repair with a different color thread. A small patch on a coat elbow. A replaced or repaired strap on our shot pouch. These things can really add to our overall look. 

Perfect! Love it. That’s precisely what I’m talking about and plan to incorporate where I can. 

Is the strap just a piece of linen fabric?? Something else with twine? Nice!

IMO, this pouch is just too crude for a professional to have made it, even as his least expensive work.  The shape of the flap, alone, is enough to see that, but also the crude shape of the rest of the pouch, even though many years have passed since it was made.  The cowhide strap may or even was traded for or purchased from a leatherworker or store, though, and probably was what we would call a belt blank.  It may also have been a later replacement as you suggested. 

Hog Butchering was traditionally done in the late fall in the 18th century.  Since pigskin did not have the trade value of deerskin and since no skiving/reducing of the thickness of the hide was necessary to make a pouch, it was an ideal way to use the skin for the common folk.  I have been looking for a link I had on how long Hog hides had to be processed in a homemade vegetable/bark tanning vat, but can't find it now.  However, it seems it was at least four to six months.  Brain tanning would not have required the same time, perhaps only a month or two.  That meant a farmer or settler could have made the pouch from a hog hide over the winter months.  

Gus

From Spence,


Doddridge wrote:

"Young as I was, I was possessed of an art which was of great use. It was that of weaving shot-pouch straps, belts and garters. I could make my loom and weave a belt in less than one day. Having a piece of board about four feet long, an inch auger, spike gimlet, and a drawing knife, I needed no other tools or materials for making my loom. It frequently happened, that my weaving proved serviceable to the family, as I often sold a belt for a day’s work, or making a hundred nails. So that although a boy, I could exchange my labour for that of a full grown person, for an equal length of time."

Gus

More from Doddridge,

"My reader will naturally ask where were their mills for grinding grain ? Where their tanners for making leather ? Where their smith shops for making and repairing their farming utensils ? Who were their carpenters, tailors, cabinet workmen, shoemakers, and weavers? The answer is, those manufacturers did not exist, nor had they any tradesmen, who were professedly such. Every family were under the necessity of doing every thing for them- selves as well as they could.

Every family tanned their own leather. The tan vat was a large trough sunk to the upper edge in the ground. A quantity of bark was easily obtained every spring, in clearing and fencing the land. This, after drying, was brought in and in wet days was shaved and pounded on a block of wood, with an axe or mallet. Ashes was used in place of lime for taking off the hair. -Bear's oil, hog's lard and tallow, answered the place of fish oil. The leather, to be sure, was coarse ; but it was substan- tially good. The operation of currying was performed by a drawing knife with its edge turned, after the manner of a curry- ing knife. The blacking for the leather was made of soot and hog's lard.


Almost every family contained its own tailors and shoe- makers. Those who could not make shoes could make shoe- packs. These, like moccasins, were made of a single piece of leather with the exception of a tongue piece on the top of the foot. This was about two inches broad and circular at the lower end. To this the main piece of leather was sewed, with a gather- ing stitch. The seam behind was like that of a moccasin. To the shoepack a sole was sometimes added. The women did the tailor work. They could all cut out and make hunting shirts, leggins and drawers.

The state of society which existed in our country at an early period of its settlement is well calculated to call into action every native mechanical genius. This happened in this country. There was, in almost every neighborhood, some one whose natural in- genuity enabled him to do many things for himself and his neigh- bors, far above what could have been reasonably expected. With the few tools which they brought with them into the country they certainly performed wonders.


Their looms, although heavy, did very well. Those who could not exercise these mechanic arts were under the necessity of giving labor, or barter, to their neighbors in exchange for the use of them, so far as their necessities required."

I was very pleased to find this documented evidence of the state of society on the frontier settlements.  

If someone had a professionally made shot pouch on the frontier, it was probably one they or someone else either brought with them or they did well enough to order it from back east.  


Gus