doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com 1870s Sportsmen

Doesn't look like Russia to me.

Canada would be my guess.

With kind regards,
Jani

Don't have a clue where it is, but I sure know where it ain't. It ain't the deep South. Four dudes with hats like that and guns woulda been turned around at the train station.

SRH

That's my guess, too, Jani.

My guess is that the picture was taken in Eastern Europe because of the high thin leather may even be canvas boots on the right also the fur hats and coats look as if they come from that part of the world also. The guns look to be of a larger calibre 12 bore may be and of some quality especially with the silver ovals in the stocks and being of rather light build so may be Brit, Belgian, French, also the animal on the floor in the left of the picture does look distinctly like a European Fox.
Though as we all know being a posed Photograph it could be any country in the World.

I don't think its Canada. I'm with the Eastern European crowd, in particular because I think I see a Slavic appearance to them all. Reminds me of the faces I see in the old photos of the ancestors of my Ukrainian friends in Manitoba.

Please read my post again where I speak of "Russian America". This is/was basically Alaska. This is fur trade history, 99% of which I will not go into. But it is a fascinating history.

In the 19th century there were still posts and settlements there, but the whole infrastructure was on its last legs by the mid 1800's. I think this picture was shot as representing this area and endeavor, maybe as a kind of homage to it . The posters who brought attention to the Eastern European flavor of the clothing were spot on. The men look like promyshlenniki, the independent hunters and fur traders. They were the men who ventured deep into the interior to get the furs, sometimes by their own efforts, sometimes by stealing them from indigenous people.

Also, I tried to bring attention to the animals (pelts, as someone correctly pointed out) because they looked like those that were trade items. True, there aren't any sea otters, but perhaps one of them is a sable.(these were the top 2 furs as trade items)It's very hard to make out various animals in the photograph. But I think thee was a market for marmots, martens, fox and the like as well. Or maybe those pelts were just what the photographer had on hand!

Humpty-Dumpty, you might be the guy who can straighten all this out. I see you live in Russia, but I don't know if you are native Russian or of some other ethnicity. I've only got my grandmother's Russian blood, the rest is Polish, but then again, at one time just about all Slavic people were living in what was called Poland, so who can possibly break down which part is which.

In the 1870's and they're all holding breechloaders? No muzzleloaders? Doesn't look right. That background doesn't look right either. It looks like a picture. Maybe it is a staged picture, like a postcard or something.

Eastern Europe? I live in SE Europe, and collect old photos with guns, and I do not think so. English stocks and slingless shotguns are a strong indication this is some other part of the globe.

With kind regards,
Jani

Krakov Kid, I'm Russian. Couldn't care less about ethnicity issues, but the only person who looks Russian to me is the second one from the right (he sort of looks like Putin, hehe). The rest to my eyes look just like American frontierspeople. So are the clothes. The one on the left, I think, is wearing an old Civil War army cap, and the boy with the dog, neckpiece and all, is as un-Russian as can be.

Three things that emphatically label them as not "promyshlenniki", specifically, are the dog, the boots, and the guns. "Promyshlenniki" very seldom used shotguns, and by 1870s definitely not breechloading shotguns; their dogs were laikas (they looked like huskeys), not bloodhounds.

I'm not saying this pic wasn't taken on Alaska, I'm saying it is highly unlikely that this pic was taken within Russian Empire. The fact is, that by 1870s the country was still recovering from the economic downturn caused by the abolishment of serfdom. The only people who could afford breechloaders were the high-end nobility and the wealthier merchants (the latter didn't shoot, as a rule). Both groups didn't dress like the people in the pic.

I'd admit it's only a speculation on my part.