There is strangely little in writeng about this M1807 infantry rifle with the Kyhl flintlock, both in Denmark and in Norway. As far as I have seen, neither Th. Møller nor his successor has mentioned it at all, neither have I found it in Hærmuseets årbøker.
The musket is a slender and lighter long-gun than the pre 1794 models. It has a conical touch-hole allowing gunpowder from the barrel to fill the pan and thereby enabling faster loading. The bayonet (I need one of these) also has a leaf locking spring designed by Kyhl.
The M1807 is really more or less identical to the M1794, with the exception of it having the Kyhl’s flintlock instead of the more conventional lock with the hammer on the outside of the lock plate, a different side-plate and another angle of the butt-plate. The M1807 just seems to have replaced the M1794 “in running production” and due to the English blockade, few of these ever came to Norway.
In 1808 it was decided that a number of the M1794's should have the barrel shortened to 89 cm and the front sight and bayonet stud moved. Why the Danes then continued producing of the M1807 in full length when they at the same time were shortening down the M1774 beats me. It would have been a lot less expensive producing shortened versions than shortening existing ones.
The picture shows from the top the M1807 Kyhl, a rather sorrowful M1794 in M1794/1841 percussion version and a conventional flintlock (M1774). The M1794 is the upper rifle on the picture of the side-plates. |
