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The pioneers carried what is called a "tinder box".
A small box with the stuff to make a fire in.

What goes in the box:
1) A piece of steel (maybe from a rifle)
2) flint (maybe from a rifle)
3) Char Cloth
4) tinder

EVERYTHING in the box is dry. The tinder is gathered long before the guy even thought about lighting the fire.
It could be dry pine cones, small twigs, anything that catches fire easily.

The Indians used twigs from sassafras trees. Look at a sassafras tree sometime and you will notice they always have lots of dead sticks on them that are less then 6 feet high off the ground. The Indians would gather these sticks because they have sassafras oil in them and they catch fire REAL easy and it won't get wet. It's called "SQUAW WOOD" because the squaws gathered it. Making fire was women's work to the Indians.

Something that's been charred catches fire more easily. Try lighting two pieces of wood. One from an old fire and another piece that's fresh. I guarantee the charred one will catch fire MUCH easier and quicker.

How to make char cloth:
You need two tin cans the same size. Cut a slit on one can so you can "nest" them together. Slip one can into the other with the un-opened ends on opposite side. You put some old cotton cloth inside the cans and slip them together. Poke a small hole in one end for smoke to come out.
Toss this can with cloth inside into a fire. (you have to already have a fire to make your firemaking supplies)
When the can starts smoking, let it go a minute or two and then pull it out. After it cools pull out the char cloth. It should be all black and kind of burnt.

To start the fire is super-easy at this point.
You build a little fire with the char cloth at the bottom and the tinder on top. The char cloth will catch fire with JUST ONE SPARK. It's amazing when you do it. That's how a pioneer lit a fire.

Easiest way to ID a sassafras tree is the leaves. Sassafras has three different types/shapes of leaves on each tree, and is the only tree like this, as far as I know. There will be ones with three lobes, ones with one lobe (look sort of like a mitten), and ones with no lobes, just oblong. Short of that, just strip a little bark from a twig and you'll be able to smell it easy.

What you are calling char cloth, I have heard refered to as carbonized material. You can do the same thing by putting in in a glass jar and closing the lid, then set in fire like your directions. Also, with the jar, you can see the cloth as it starts to discolor.
I'm pretty sure they showed the process on on of those men vs wild or bear grylls (SP?) type shows.

It's the same principle I use when making my charcoal. You just burn something in an oxygen deprived environment, and it cooks out all the impurities and water, whether cloth or wood. Then you're left with a highly combustible material that only needs a little spark and oxygen to catch.

When I do my charcoal, I let the can sit upside down overnight. Supposedly you can open it after a couple of hours, but I wait longer. Things done like this are so combustible, that if there's even a small spark left, if you open the lid and let in oxygen, there's a good chance it can explode.

QH's Paw wrote:What you are calling char cloth, I have heard refered to as carbonized material. You can do the same thing by putting in in a glass jar and closing the lid, then set in fire like your directions. Also, with the jar, you can see the cloth as it starts to discolor.
I'm pretty sure they showed the process on on of those men vs wild or bear grylls (SP?) type shows.

I remember seeing that on survivorman. Ha placed the material in a piece of folded sheet metal and into the fire. All you need to do is is burn organic material in an oxygen deprived environment untill all thats left is carbon, then cut off the oxygen completely.