# How Did Dueling Work? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 23, 2004, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008 "2004-03-23T22:21:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dolphinboy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dolphinboy/32/330_2.png) [@dolphinboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dolphinboy)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2004, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/1 "2004-03-23T22:21:06Z")
During the mid 19th Century, dueling, while not all that common, did occur among the upper classes in Western Europe. For example, if you were caught flirting with someone’s wife they could challenge you to a duel. Apparently you couldn’t back down, so you would select a time and place… choose the weapons… and the duel would occur. Honor was more important than life apparently! A few questions arise: 1. Did women ever duel or was this a male-only game? 2. If you chose to use pistols, walked your standard number of paces away from each other, turned and shot a variety of things might happen. A) You might miss your target, get shot yourself and die. In that case YOU LOSE. B) Alternatively, you could hit your target and your opponent might miss you (YOU WIN). C) Or both you and your opponent might miss (YOU BOTH WIN?) or both you and your opponent might hit (YOU BOTH LOSE?), or one of you may be fatally wounded while the other isn’t. 1. What happens in the case where you both miss each other on the first shot? Do you keep shooting until someone falls down? 2. If both people are killed in the duel is someone declared the winner of the duel? 3. If you win the duel are you then free to marry the women in question? It all sounds very iffy to me… ---
**Author:** ![MMI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@MMI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MMI)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2004, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/2 "2004-03-23T22:44:18Z")
IIRC in colonial/federal times both parties missing was the optimal outcome - the honor of the offended party was satisfied by his manly challenge of the offendee, yet need not go to jail for murder. Similarly the challenged had bravely stood behind the rightness of his words/actions, yet he need not be imprisoned either. (This presupposes that dueling and murder are both illegal and both parties are gentlemen). It was only if there were really bad blood between the parties might an actual kill be attempted. I would tend to think that a women dueling would be problematical for the challenged party as I would imagine that accepting and declining and winning or losing would all be bad outcomes, with declining being the minimally negative one. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2004, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/3 "2004-03-23T22:52:53Z")
Women occasionally fought each other in what were known as “petticoat duels.” ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_Bowe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@Doug\_Bowe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_Bowe)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2004, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/4 "2004-03-23T23:08:56Z")
Here’s a little something from PBS > **[The History of Dueling in America | American Experience | PBS](https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/duel-history-dueling-america/)** > > The fatal duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr shocked the nation. But it was the identity of the man killed that produced such dismay. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/5 "2004-03-24T00:03:43Z")
The legal issues concerning dueling varied from country to country. In Britain it was definitely banned by the early 19th century, and possibly earlier than that. After you won a duel, you had to flee the country, which presumably means that you can’t marry the woman either. I believe that I once heard that it was also banned in France shortly after the revolution. In the United States, there were various rules in various different states. For instance, the state of Kentucky’s Constitution once required all elected officials to swear that they had never fought in a duel before they could take office. Voters decided that this language was “archaic”, and they voted to remove it … in 1998. ---
**Author:** ![slipster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@slipster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slipster)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/6 "2004-03-24T01:11:57Z")
The ritual involved in conducting a duel evidently varied from place to place. In **Fathers and Sons** Ivan Turgenev describes a duel in which the opponents begin by facing one another at a prescribed distance and then walk towards one another. As they reach various distance markers they are entitled to take a shot. It was generally the custom for the party challenged to be able to choose the weapons to be used. Abraham Lincoln, it is said, was once challenged to a duel, and chose broadswords. These are particularly heavy weapons, and require both hands even to lift them. His challenger thought it was inadvisable to go against an extremely tall man who had spent a good deal of time splitting rails, and withdrew the challenge. Sometimes a participant would make a point of firing first, and firing away from his opponent. According to some witnesses, Alexander Hamilton did this in his duel with Aaron Burr, but Burr went and shot him dead anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/7 "2004-03-24T01:24:09Z")
> [@slipster](#): > > It was generally the custom for the party challenged to be able to choose the weapons to be used. Abraham Lincoln, it is said, was once challenged to a duel, and chose broadswords. Do you happen to have a handy link for this? I’d like to see a description of what 19th century people called a broadsword. ---
**Author:** ![joshmaker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a587f6/32.png) [@joshmaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joshmaker)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/8 "2004-03-24T01:50:51Z")
According to my history professor, dueling in america only rarely ended in a fatality. The most common wounds were to a person legs – the point was not to kill your opponent, but rather to prove strength of your beliefs. After the famous duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr a rumor quickly spread that Aaron Burr had been _practicing_ his aim before hand – in clear violation of the spirit of dueling as it was commonly known. > [@](#): > > Do you happen to have a handy link for this? I’d like to see a description of what 19th century people called a broadsword. Here is a site for the duel [http://www.thelincolnmuseum.org/new/research/stories.html](http://www.thelincolnmuseum.org/new/research/stories.html) > [@](#): > > In 1842, Lincoln wrote a series of anonymous letters published in the Sangamo Journal, mocking prominent Democrat James Shields, the Illinois State Auditor. After Mary Todd (to whom Lincoln had been engaged the year before) and Julia Payne wrote a similar letter, Shields demanded that the editor reveal the identity of the author. Upon learning that Lincoln had written the letters, Shields challenged him to a duel. Lincoln, who was always awkward with women, mustered a rare show of gallantry and made no mention of Mary’s involvement in writing one of the letters. > > Since Shields was the challenger, Lincoln had the privilege of naming the conditions for the contest. He proposed the ludicrous spectacle of a fight with “Cavalry broad swords of the largest size” while standing in a square ten feet wide and about twelve feet deep, which would put the much shorter Shields at a serious disadvantage. Lincoln may have hoped that the silliness (as well as the danger) of the proposed contest would bring Shields to his senses, but both men went ahead with their preparations for the duel until their seconds managed to arrange a peaceable settlement. Lincoln afterwards was embarrassed by the incident and rarely spoke of it. Another slightly different description from [http://www.smithsonianmag.si.edu/smithsonian/issues03/book\_special/excerpt\_page\_1.html:](http://www.smithsonianmag.si.edu/smithsonian/issues03/book_special/excerpt_page_1.html:) > [@](#): > > Sources differ on the choice of weapons; some say Lincoln suggested they throw cow dung at each other. They settled on sabers, archaic but not a bad idea for Abe, considering his famously long arms. Everyone showed up as planned on the sandbar and waited around while the seconds conferred, trying to mend matters. > > Presently a statement was agreed on, in which Lincoln is said to have said that he didn’t mean anything exactly personal in the article; he was just complaining about the tax policies. ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/9 "2004-03-24T02:01:26Z")
Sabres would make more sense given the time period, and likely most people at that time would have zero proficiencie with such weapons. Anyway, a sabre isn’t very heavy and it’s meant to be used with one hand. ---
**Author:** ![Wumpus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8c91f0/32.png) [@Wumpus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wumpus)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/10 "2004-03-24T02:45:59Z")
The PBS link Doug Bowe posted includes a link to the [Irish Code Duello](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/duel/sfeature/rulesofdueling.html) i.e. The Rules. I thought this one was interesting, since in fiction the Noble Hero often fires into the air: “Rule 13. No dumb shooting or firing in the air is admissible in any case. The challenger ought not to have challenged without receiving offense; and the challenged ought, if he gave offense, to have made an apology before he came on the ground; therefore, children’s play must be dishonorable on one side or the other, and is accordingly prohibited.” ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/11 "2004-03-24T17:12:21Z")
An important fact is that duelling is something that, in the strictest sense, was limited only to gentlemen i.e. members of the gentry or aristocracy. A gentleman did not duel with a commoner. If he thought you had been impertinent or otherwise offensive, he’d just have you beaten or, perhaps, give you a sound caning himself. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/12 "2004-03-24T17:34:16Z")
[Smithsonian Magazine had a fine article in 10/97 on the history of the custom.](http://www.smithsonianmag.si.edu/smithsonian/issues97/oct97/dueling_full_1.html) > [@](#): > > Even though an apology or a few drops of blood often ended such matters, it has been claimed that during a peak 180-year period, 40,000 Frenchmen died of dueling wounds. The figure does not seem so preposterous when you learn that in just one decade under Henry IV, as many as 6,000 dueling deaths occurred. Even women joined in. In 1721, a Lady de Nestle met the Countess de Polignac with pistols in the gardens of Versailles over the handsome Duc de Richelieu. Their first shots went wild, but in the second round de Nestle was badly wounded. In the reign of Louis XIV, Madame de St. Belmont, dressed as a man, met a cavalry officer on the designated field and promptly disarmed him with her sword. > … > Nobody mentions that Hamilton, not quite the textbook’s martyred innocent, had been a principal in 11 previous affairs of honor, mostly aborted, including clashes with the abrasive John Adams and the otherwise easygoing James Monroe; or that Hamilton’s son Philip was killed in a duel. > … > Most famous of all was the more-or-less-official national dueling ground in Bladensburg, Maryland, a convenient mile or so beyond the District of Columbia line. Here, on 15 vine-choked acres, a hundred or more duels were fought. It has been described as “the court of last resort, in which weighty points of etiquette, social and political problems and questions of veracity, propriety and right were expounded by the convincing power of gunpowder.” It was here that Gen. Armistead Mason died by a shotgun slug from his cousin, Col. John McCarty. It was here that Commodore Stephen Decatur, a brave and dashing officer, fell. > > The Navy had long treasured its dueling tradition; a copy of the Code Duello was in every midshipman’s handbook, and until the Civil War no niggling official rules hampered naval dueling. In 1808 Decatur sat on the court-martial board that suspended Capt. James Barron, in effect, for mishandling a confrontation with the British Navy, and Barron went abroad to brood. Decatur became the wildly popular hero of the War of 1812 and coiner of the phrase “Our country, right or wrong.” When Barron came back and asked to be reinstated, Decatur opposed him. Barron called him out, and they met at Bladensburg, eight paces apart. Decatur, 41 years old and by all accounts as sweet-natured as he was brave, died that night; Barron lived to be 89. ---
**Author:** ![legion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/838e76/32.png) [@legion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/legion)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/13 "2004-03-24T17:42:54Z")
If your interested in duels, get yourself a copy of Ridley Scotts 1977 film "[The Duellists](http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0075968/). ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/14 "2004-03-24T22:38:31Z")
[Here](http://www.anvilfire.com/21centbs/stories/blacksmith_duel.htm) is a story similar to the Lincoln story, but it is set in Louisiana. DD ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/15 "2004-03-24T23:45:09Z")
> [@dolphinboy](#): > > A) You might miss your target, get shot yourself and die. In that case YOU LOSE. > > B) Alternatively, you could hit your target and your opponent might miss you (YOU WIN). > > C) Or both you and your opponent might miss (YOU BOTH WIN?) or both you and your opponent might hit (YOU BOTH LOSE?), or one of you may be fatally wounded while the other isn’t. [minor tangent] Wow! A textbook example of a [prisoner’s dilemma](http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/prisoner-dilemma/). [ul][li]The manly outcome is to shoot your opponant dead, while your opponent misses: you “defect” while your opponant “cooperates” by politely aiming away (perhaps not intentionally).[/li][li]The not so bad outcome is for both of you to miss (both “cooperate”).[/li][li]The horrible outcome is for you to miss and him to blow you away (you “cooperate” and he takes advantage of your weakness by “defecting”)[/li][li]The worst possible outcome is for you both to die (you both “defect”)[/ul] [/li]As is standard in prisoner’s dilemmas, the payoff is ordered as such: DC \> CC \> CD \> DD (D = Defect, C = Cooperate) [/minor tangent] ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2004, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/16 "2004-03-24T23:49:12Z")
> [@Kinthalis](#): > > Sabres would make more sense given the time period, and likely most people at that time would have zero proficiencie with such weapons. Anyway, a sabre isn’t very heavy and it’s meant to be used with one hand. Actually, by “broadswords” he was probably referring to the basket-hilted Scottish affairs, which were carried by Highland units well into the 19th century. While they may not have been two-handed weapons, they were certainly heavier than any saber. ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2004, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/17 "2004-03-25T00:08:57Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Actually, by “broadswords” he was probably referring to the basket-hilted Scottish affairs, which were carried by Highland units well into the 19th century. While they may not have been two-handed weapons, they were certainly heavier than any saber. Granted, but not much heavier. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2004, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-dueling-work/236008/18 "2004-03-25T00:20:24Z")
In England: only if the quarrel was a particularly deep one would a further exchange of shots take place if the initial one had no effect. Usually the first one was enough. When the Prime Minister, the Duke of Wellington, fought Lord Winchilsea over an insinuation that he had personal reasons for introducing the Bill for Catholic emancipation the Duke deliberately fired wide and Lord Winchilsea then fired in the air.