War Department Recognizes Revolutionary War Gunsmiths, Highlighting America’s Tradition of Building Firearms
America’s independence depended on private gunsmiths who manufactured, repaired, and improved firearms. That history carries significant implications for today’s fight over privately manufactured firearms and the Second Amendment.
As America celebrates its 250th anniversary, the Department of War is recognizing the gunsmiths who helped secure the nation’s independence. These craftsmen did more than repair broken muskets. They manufactured firearms from raw materials, developed new weapons, and kept American forces armed throughout the Revolutionary War.
In a historical feature published May 29, 2026, the Department of War acknowledged the essential contributions of private gunsmiths who supplied the Continental Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and colonial militias with firearms.
The report highlights an important piece of American history that remains relevant today: Americans were manufacturing their own firearms long before the Second Amendment was ratified. The ability to manufacture, repair, and maintain firearms was not merely a popular pastime. It was essential to colonial life, individual defense, and ultimately the fight for American independence.
That historical tradition carries particular significance as gun-control advocates and government regulators continue targeting privately manufactured firearms, frequently labeling them with the politically charged term “ghost guns.”
Private Gunsmiths Helped Arm the American Revolution
During the Revolutionary War, America’s firearms industry looked nothing like the massive manufacturers that supply military and civilian markets today. Most gunsmiths operated out of small workshops, relying on their knowledge of metalworking, woodworking, and mechanical design to produce functioning firearms.
According to the Department of War, colonial gunsmiths frequently manufactured complete rifles, pistols, and muskets from scratch. While certain materials and components were imported, many craftsmen forged their own barrels, shaped wooden stocks, and hand-fitted the mechanisms that made their firearms function.
Unlike modern production firearms, these weapons generally lacked interchangeable parts. A broken spring, damaged hammer, or other mechanical failure often required a gunsmith to fabricate an entirely new component specifically fitted to that firearm.
This became particularly important on the battlefield, where black powder fouling, worn flints, moisture, and damaged components could render weapons inoperable. A soldier could not simply replace a broken part with one taken from another musket and expect it to function correctly.
The Department noted that manufacturing a single rifle could require weeks or even months of work. Gunsmiths needed extensive training, and apprentices often spent years developing the skills necessary to establish their own shops.
Their contributions were important enough that the Continental Congress encouraged domestic firearms production to support the war effort. On November 4, 1775, Congress recommended that colonial governments employ gunsmiths to manufacture firearms fitted with bayonets.
The American Revolution depended heavily on foreign arms and military assistance, but domestic craftsmen also played an indispensable role in keeping American forces equipped and operational. These privately manufactured firearms helped make American independence possible.
Revolutionary War Gunsmiths Were Already Developing Advanced Firearms
The importance of early American gunsmithing extends beyond the production of conventional muskets and rifles. Gunsmiths and inventors of the period were already experimenting with repeating firearms, breech-loading mechanisms, and technologies capable of substantially increasing a soldier’s rate of fire.
One particularly remarkable example involves Philadelphia inventor Joseph Belton, whose repeating flintlock attracted the attention of the Continental Congress in 1777.
As firearms historian Logan Metesh previously documented in AmmoLand’s Fact Check: The Founding Fathers DID Know About Repeating Rifles, Belton contacted Congress on April 11, 1777, claiming to have developed a firearm capable of discharging eight successive shots within seconds. He also claimed his design could be adapted to discharge sixteen or twenty shots.
Congress was sufficiently interested to authorize the construction or modification of 100 firearms using Belton’s improvements. However, the negotiations ultimately collapsed over Belton’s substantial financial demands. Belton continued advocating for his invention and secured endorsements from prominent individuals, including General Horatio Gates, Major General Benedict Arnold, and scientist David Rittenhouse.
The firearm was never adopted by the Continental Army, but its development and consideration by Congress demonstrate that repeating firearms were hardly unimaginable to America’s founders.
Belton was not alone in pursuing advanced firearms technology.
Decades before the Revolution, the Lorenzoni repeating mechanism had already demonstrated that flintlock firearms could fire multiple shots without individually reloading powder and ball through the muzzle after each discharge. Named after Italian gunsmith Michele Lorenzoni, the mechanism used a rotating breech system to transfer powder and projectiles from internal magazines into the firing chamber. The complicated system required exceptional craftsmanship and precise fitting, but it offered capabilities far beyond those of the typical single-shot musket.
Repeating firearms employing similar technology were known in colonial America. In 1756, Boston gunsmith John Cookson advertised a firearm capable of firing nine successive shots, with the shooter controlling the rate of fire.
Another notable innovation was the Ferguson rifle, developed by British officer Patrick Ferguson during the Revolutionary War. Unlike a conventional muzzleloader, Ferguson’s design incorporated a screw-operated breech-loading mechanism that allowed the shooter to load the rifle from the rear of the barrel.
The Museum of the American Revolution explains that the Ferguson rifle could achieve approximately six shots per minute while retaining the accuracy advantages of a rifled barrel. Although the weapon was developed for British forces and produced in limited numbers, it further illustrates the advanced firearms technology available during America’s founding period.
These designs were expensive, mechanically complicated, and unsuitable for widespread military adoption at the time. Nevertheless, they demonstrate that early firearms technology was far more sophisticated than the familiar image of a soldier firing a single-shot musket.
The founders were not strangers to firearms innovation. They lived in an era when private craftsmen were actively developing new ways to manufacture and improve weapons.
Privately Manufactured Firearms Are Part of America’s Constitutional Tradition
The historical significance of these gunsmiths extends directly into modern Second Amendment litigation.
In his 2023 research paper, The American Tradition of Self-Made Arms, attorney and Second Amendment historian Joseph G.S. Greenlee documented the longstanding American practice of manufacturing firearms for personal use.
Greenlee traces private firearms manufacturing from colonial America through the Revolutionary War, westward expansion, and the development of modern firearms technology.
His research establishes that Americans regularly manufactured, assembled, and repaired their own firearms throughout the nation’s history. He also concludes that restrictions specifically targeting firearms manufactured for personal use are relatively recent developments rather than longstanding American regulatory traditions.
That distinction matters under the Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, which requires the government to demonstrate that firearm restrictions are consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation when the Second Amendment’s plain text covers the conduct at issue.
The historical record of American gunsmithing provides powerful support for the constitutional argument that the right to keep and bear arms necessarily encompasses the ability to manufacture and maintain those arms.
After all, possessing a firearm requires some means of acquiring one. For generations, Americans acquired firearms not only through commercial purchases but also by manufacturing them personally or obtaining weapons produced by local craftsmen.
The Second Amendment did not create the right to keep and bear arms. It recognized and protected a pre-existing right, one exercised by Americans who were already manufacturing and repairing their own firearms.
From Colonial Gunsmiths to Today’s Privately Manufactured Firearms
Today’s firearms enthusiasts have access to manufacturing technologies the founders could scarcely have imagined, including CNC machining, polymer frames, modular firearm components, and 3D printing.
The equipment has changed dramatically, but the underlying practice of Americans producing firearms for lawful personal use has deep historical roots.
Modern gun builders may assemble firearms from purchased components, complete unfinished receivers, or manufacture individual parts using specialized equipment. Colonial gunsmiths performed many comparable functions through hand-forging, filing, drilling, and fitting components to produce functioning weapons.
Despite this established tradition, privately manufactured firearms have become the target of increasingly aggressive government regulation.
As AmmoLand previously reported, the Firearms Policy Coalition challenged Oregon’s restrictions on privately manufactured firearms in Montgomery v. Rosenblum, relying in part on Greenlee’s research documenting America’s history of personal firearms manufacturing.
The dispute over unfinished frames and receivers also reached the Supreme Court in Bondi v. VanDerStok. In March 2025, the Court ruled that the Gun Control Act permits federal regulation of certain weapon parts kits and partially complete frames or receivers.
That decision addressed the ATF’s authority under federal firearms statutes, rather than resolving the broader Second Amendment question of whether Americans possess a constitutionally protected right to manufacture firearms for personal use.
The constitutional challenge therefore remains distinct from the question of how federal law defines particular unfinished components or commercially sold kits.
The historical evidence supporting private firearms manufacturing cannot simply be dismissed because today’s gun builders use modern tools instead of colonial forges.
A Right Rooted in America’s Founding
The Department of War’s recognition of Revolutionary War gunsmiths arrives at a time when the constitutional status of privately manufactured firearms remains the subject of litigation and political controversy. Yet the historical record is clear about the importance of firearms manufacturing to the American founding.
Private craftsmen manufactured weapons, maintained firearms, developed innovative designs, and helped equip the soldiers who fought for independence. Their contributions were not peripheral to the Revolutionary War. They were essential to keeping Americans armed.
Joseph Belton’s repeating flintlock, John Cookson’s repeating firearm, and the broader development of advanced weapons during the founding era also demonstrate that firearms innovation has long been part of that tradition.
The right to keep and bear arms cannot be meaningfully separated from the ability to acquire, manufacture, repair, and maintain them. A constitutional guarantee protecting arms while allowing the government to eliminate the ordinary means of obtaining or producing them would be a hollow promise.
America’s founding-era gunsmiths understood something that remains true nearly 250 years after independence: an armed people must have the ability to keep their weapons functioning and, when necessary, manufacture arms of their own.
The tools have changed. The craftsmanship has evolved. But the American tradition of building firearms predates the Constitution itself, and that history cannot be erased by calling privately manufactured firearms “ghost guns.”
About Duncan Johnson:
Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor and editor-in-chief for AmmoLand News and is responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.