It’s not outside the realms of possibility that it is. I’m not an expert on early airguns, but Beeman certainly is. As you say though, it does seem a tad convenient.
On a related note, there’s a joke in the military surplus gun collecting community which involves a collector walking into a gun shop in South Africa- chequebook/platinum credit card in hadn- and asking the owner if he knows where Winston Churchill’s Mauser C96 Broomhandle pistol is, as he would like to purchase it for his collection.
“Certainly” replies the owner. “How many would you like?”.
Another proverb goes thusly: “Buy the gun, not the story.” Possibly the best advice any gun collector or military historian could receive, IMO.
Hello. I am a writer researching a small fact about firearms for a book. Admittedly, I know nothing at all about firearms, so please forgive the simplicity of this question. I’m grateful for your knowledge and help. All I need to know is, how long has the 20-gauge shotgun been around? More specifically, I’m writing a section about a rural hunter in Italy around the 1840s, but he owns a 20-gauge shotgun that he had used as a young man. Is it possible that such a person, of that part of the world, might have owned and used a 20-gauge shotgun at, say, around 1780, when he might have been a young man?
I apprenticed a summer at the gunshop in Colonial Williamsburg -------- if we’re ever in the same country, we have GOT to go drinking together.
I shot a gun once; rather odd shotgun a guy brought back after service in Germany both during and after WW II – say pre-1950ish. The stamping was Sauer (& Sohne) and it was a semi but like none I ever saw before or since. Best way to describe it is a Garand-style top action and a 2 shell box magazine. Seriously, at a distance, it looked like a slightly sporterized Garand with a big-assed barrel. Any guesses or some odd one-of-a-kind?
(My drilling is a Sauer and I also pack an old Model 27 .32 ACP now and then. I have a weakness for the old pre-Sig company.)
Also – more to your line and nationality ------- why the freak are .303 versions of the Martini-Henry so freaking hard to find in shootable condition? Wallhangers are easy but to find one worth doing a standard Camp Perry type match with you need to shell our grands; multiple grands. Did they all get lost in colonial service or shot to shit or what?
Jumping in as someone who does N-SSA now and then — under enemy fire its hard to say but 4 a minute with say a 61 Springfield does need some practice to be do-able but its not as tough as you would think. One trick is to use your bayonet as a ramrod holder in the ground at your side. In combat, not a good idea – but fine on the qualification line.
Odd thing is we get more shots faster from a flintlock musket than you do from a percussion musket. For one thing we only make one move to the belt since we prime with the cartridge; capguns have to make a second move to the belt for the primer. Secondly, in combat fire, we “bare-ball” or “spit-ball” bypassing the rammer and just thumping the butt before coming to the shoulder. No good over 50 yards or so but it really opens up the fire rate quite a bit. One of the guys I shoot with can usually do 7 or 8 a minute with 6 or 7 hitting a man target at 50 yards.
danrach, the timestamp in the upper left indicates this was a thread from 2006. I’ve just PM’d the author, Martini Enfield to let him know you have a related question. However, I also see that Martini hasn’t posted here since May of 2014. That causes me some concern.
What is the point of “sporterizing”? I inherited a SMLE that’s been sporterized, and I’m a little bummed every time I see it that it’s not the cool WWII movie looking beast it was born as.
What benefit did somebody get from modifying the furniture?
ETA:
Son of a bitch! Just noticed that this was a zombie.
I’ve been away for a bit but I figured if I’m going to return, it should be in a thread about Lee-Enfields
Regarding sporterising, the main reason it was done was to make the guns lighter and easier to handle. A full-wood .303 weighs something like 10lbs, which is a lot of rifle to be carting around on a hunting trip (unless, like me, you like that sort of thing :D).
The ironic thing is the sporterised .303s themselves are becoming collectible in some circles - not sure about the US, but in this part of the world there wasn’t anyone (as far as I know) commercially converting them - most of the sporterisation work was done by individual gunsmiths so although there’s a general pattern to sporterised .303s, most of them are sporterised slightly differently from each other, if that helps (and isn’t a year too late :p)
“Not many” and “A lot” are the short (and admittedly glib) answers
They only made about 1000 of them originally; assuming it was in decent shape and could be verified it’d be worth potentially tens of thousands of dollars to the right collector, from what I understand.
Two questions about double rifles since they seem to be coming back. Krieghoff, Holland & Holland and even Purdy are back: 1. Is it true that, before 1942, the vast majority of big game hunting rifles were doubles, and 2. With the barrels soldered together, tested, solders stripped off, reset and then re-soldered, what kind of long range accuracy can one get from them?
My interest in double rifles is almost entirely British so I can’t speak authoritavely on the German rifles, but I belive the Germans in East Africa around World War I were quite fond of sporting rifles based on the Mauser 98 action and chambered for the 9.3x62mm round - just squeezing into the same class (albeit with less power) than the .375 Holland & Holland Magnum round.
I have seen Colonial-era German Drilling and Zweiling rifles with two and three barrels - typically one or two rifle barrels and a shotgun barrel.
As for British rifles, yes, most of the Big Game rifles were double rifles for a few reasons. Partly because, up until World War I a lot of the repeating rifles were based on the Lee-Enfield (awesome design but with an action not strong enough to handle elephant gun cartridges) and partly from a cultural belief that hunting was a gentleman’s pursuit and if you couldn’t bring down your prey with one shot (two as a concession to the dangerous game nature of hunting in places like India or Africa) then you really shouldn’t be out there in the first place.
The .375 Holland & Holland round was released in 1912 as both a flanged round (for use in single/double rifles) and a belted round for use in bolt-action repeating rifles (invariably based on the Mauser 98).
It’s not commonly thought of as a Big Game round but the .280 Ross round, used in the Ross straight-pull sporting rifles - was very popular as a “plains rifle”-type cartridge in British East Africa around the turn of the century/WWI era. The Ross was extremely accurate but terribly finicky, with reports of some catastrophic failures in early versions of the sporting rifle.
As to how accurate the double guns were? They were very accurate for the ranges they were designed to be used at, which were typically 100-300 yards or so. They had to be accurate because quite often whatever the hunter was shooting at was possibly coming at him and (understandably) not too pleased with the situation.
I’m not sure what sort of long-range accuracy you’d be looking at with a fully tuned-up one, but bearing in mind they were almost never used with telescopic sights so realistically you’d be wasting your ammo shooting at the vital areas of anything smaller than an elephant more than 500m away, in my opinion.
Thanks, ME. Doubles are starting to pique my taste. But except for the Russian Baikal, one will set you back at least $10k. I’d like one in 45-70 and a carbine-sized 30-30.
They (double guns) are pretty pricey - even in their day, they were largely guns for Sporting Gentlemen who tended to have quite a bit of cash available. So they’re fantastic quality guns, but extremely expensive, even today (and I really don’t like the way the Baikal double rifles look).
One way you can get that Double Rifle Elephant Gun feeling on a budget is firing solid slug through a double-barrelled shotgun. Check the shotgun has the choke to handle it first, though!
Another economy way to a double rifle is the pre-Pedersoli Kodiaks in black powder/percussion. You can pick up a really nice shooter for like $300 or sometimes less. I had one for quite a few years in .58 that was a lot of fun and fairly accurate on the range.
(The Pedersoli versions get pricey and IMHO aren’t any better than the earlier ones from 30-40 years ago)
Given a choice between the Brown Bess he grew up shooting and the Dickert rifle he now has an opportunity to trade it for, will Our Hero make the trade? The rifle is the better gun, but there will be a learning curve that frontier living might not make allowances for. What think you?
