Traditionally,  the Mountain Man did not have pockets in their pants, thus the need to have some way to carry and hold items that would normally be carried in the pants pockets. Everything a mountain man owned or possessed, including survival items would have been carried in this bag. These items would have included a flint and steel for making fire, a pipe and tobacco, eating utensils and shooting supplies such as a powder measure, patches, balls and extra flints;  A possibles bag was used to carry anything and everything that a mountain man needed to have immediately available to him.

If you were to ask a mountain man in those days to describe his personal items to you, he would have said, "these are my possibles", thus the name possibles bag. However,these bags were known by other names including hunting pouches, muzzleloader pouches, leather possibles bags, possibles pouches, black powder bags and long hunter pouches. Often, the name depended on the area of the country it was used, and of course, the time period.

These pouches or bags would have been made of leather or heavy canvas, and sometimes had pieces of trade cloth added. When the Indians were traded guns in the early colonial days and then later as Lewis and Clark and then mountain men went west, they too used cloth and leather bags to carry lead balls, patches and other items. They would have decorated the bag according to tribal traditions as well as a means of personal identification. Mountain men would have done the same; no two bags would have been alike. Often a powder horn would also be carried with the bag or attached to the bag itself. 

The strap of the bag also provided a good place to keep things right at hand. Sometimes a small sheath for a patch knife was added to the strap.

Today, these are being recreated for re-enactments and rendevous alike. Offering the finest quality in mountain man accessories, each of these historically and authentically produced bags is hand sewn and finished by Conagher himself.