What did homesteaders have as weapons?

Answer 1

Basically, they took whatever firearms they could afford. Pistols and revolvers are not "farmer's guns" and the most common arms carried West would have been single-shot shotguns or Kentucky/Pennsylvania style rifles. Prior to the Civil War these would have been percussion muzzle-loaders and probably a few obsolete flintlocks. Many would have been conversions of military muskets used in the Revolution 80 years earlier. Even after the invention of fixed ammunition many would have still opted for "cap and ball" arms due to the uncertainty of being able to obtain cartridges on the frontier. There were only a few sizes of percussion caps, any gunpowder would work, and the balls could be made from any lead available while there was a bewildering assortment of fixed ammunition, only one of which was suitable for your gun. Imagine traveling over a hundred miles to the "local" store and finding it only had .44 Colt cartridges in stock when you needed .44 S&W! By the time my grandfather went to western Kansas around 1880, the railroad was only 5 miles from the claim and there was a town 4 miles down the track in either direction so "store bought" ammunition was not a problem and he had a variety of cartridge arms but little need for weapons as the area was quite civilized.