|
"Shooting
Flying"
Birdhunting with
smoothbores probably got its start shortly after the gun was invented,
when someone discovered how easy it was to knock over a covey of birds with a
cloud of small shot. By 1650 the art of wildfowling in
England
was well developed, and arms were cheap enough that even the common folk could
afford the new sporting guns.
The hunter of that day is pictured
in long frock and full length hose, carrying a matchlock gun with
an immensely long barrel which he would thrust through the shield he used
to camouflage himself from the birds as he approached them.
He used loosely mixed black
powder, weak by modern standards, because there wasn't any better. His barrel
was necessarily long because the burning rate of the powder was slow and needed
plenty of length to develop decent velocity. Later on he traded his by then
obsolete matchlock for one of the newer wheel-locks, if he were wealthy, or for
an English Doglock, a variety of flintlock with a ‘dog’, or hooked catch
that acted as a safety. His flintlock was large and clumsy as the greatly
improved French lock, which combined
all the best features of the various styles of flintlock then available, the
same one that we moderns use, hadn't yet come from the Continent. He was still
chipping crude shot off a lead block then rounding it between metal plates, and
gunpowder, although eventually improved by ‘corning’ was more readily
available, it was still quite expensive. His armament was just clumsy enough,
and shot and powder hard enough to come by, that taking a shot "on the
ground” was considered very sporting.
At about the
turn of the 19th century, bird shooting got a sudden boost. Henry Nock developed
his famous patent breech, which promoted faster ignition and made it possible to
join two barrels together in side-by-side form
and still get a slim wrist that handled efficiently. Steels had improved
to the point that much
lighter yet stronger barrels were available and powders had been improved to the point that
they would produce good velocity in
shorter barrels. Shot towers had also been invented with vast improvement in the
roundness of shot and uniformity of pattern and ammunition was not nearly so
hard to obtain. This culminated in the sudden appearance of the double
flintlock fowler and in the rising popularity of "shooting
flying."
Within 25 years, highly
competitive English gunsmiths had developed the flintlock fowler into the
epitome of shotgun perfection. Except for the flintlocks, the English shotgun of
1815 is barely discernible in form or function from the modern "Best"
double produced by the world's finest craftsman.
Relatively few were made as they appeared only shortly before the percussion
system was developed in 1815, and percussion doubles displaced them rather
quickly once the high hat type cap was successfully marketed. By 1840, the
double barreled side by side flintlock shotgun was a thing of the past.
I was
lucky enough to be offered a
flintlock double in 1961 and purchased it with considerable sacrifice.
This gun was made by Staudenmeyer, a London-based Austrian, in about 1800-30. It
sported double 16-gauge rose pattern
Damascus
barrels (fine for black powder pressures) 28 inches in length, a finely
checkered Circaussian walnut stock and double flintlocks with both water-proof
and self-priming features. Both barrels were cylinder choked and weight was less
than 7 Ibis. The little gun was a delight to handle and literally flew to the
shoulder.
Late in a 1970’s November, my good friend Greg Roberts, who was manager of
Green River Rifleworks in my hometown of
Roosevelt
,
Utah
, came over for a visit. As usual, the subject got around to muzzleloading guns,
and the Staudenmeyer found its way into his hands. The day was a fine one and
the look on his face as he handled it made an invitation to do some pheasant
shooting well nigh irresistible. He accepted with pleasure and we
headed for some private
property near home where the ringneck rooster was known to hang out.
Greg
was adept with any flintlock. I’d never known him to shoot anything else. He
quickly loaded each barrel
of the little double with 75 grains
ffg Curtis &
Harvey
black powder, a 1/2 inch
fiberwad and 1 ounce of #5 shot.
He didn't use a plastic
shot collar as we expected close shooting. .I’d brought along both my German
shorthair pointer and black Lab bitch. After he checked then sharpened the
flints and primed the flintlocks we struck out, dogs ahead, Greg following and
me behind with a camera. I have every bit as much fun seeing other shooters fall
in love with the flintlock as shooting it myself.
I
brought both dogs because the cover was quite variable. Small fields of short
sage and cheat grass were interspersed with areas of willow and tamarack, plus
cornfields grown high with sunflowers now dry and brittle with autumn. The
Spotted Monster (my pet name for the shorthair) hit her first point within 75
yards of the truck at the edge of a willow thicket. Greg stepped back to where
he could get an angle on anything coming out and I sent in the black Lab. She
jumped into the brush with tail-wagging enthusiasm and crashed noisily about.
There was a sudden crackle and thrashing of wings, and a long tailed rooster
came roaring straight up out of the willows, clawing for altitude. I heard the
click of a flint hammer cocking, then a scratch-boom.
The
air was filled with the "sweet" smell of burnt sulfur as the bird
collapsed in midair and plummeted into the brush. More thrashing followed and
the Lab appeared in a moment with the rooster in her mouth. I was so excited
that I forgot to get a picture.
I had
known from the start that the Staudenmeyer would be a natural for upland game
but tried it first at skeet. To my consternation I broke only 6 of 25 birds on
the initial round, although I did my best to shoot the flintlock as I would my
Winchester
101 by swinging through the bird and
slapping the trigger as the front sight passed it. The fast and uniform
.03 second lock speed of the
Winchester
had let me do this, but the relatively slower, variable and unreliable .05 -
.15 second lock speed of the flintlock would not let me copy the technique. I
later found that I had to use the constant lead system in order to hit consistently, being careful to maintain
the same lead from when I pulled the trigger, through the punch of recoil to
impact of shot on bird or miss. After mastering this technique, my skeet score
improved to 23/25.
I had found the same shooting
technique advisable for field use, except that I had to learn the compensating
angles for the huge variety of shots offered by flushing upland game. We do this
when using a modern shotgun too, but the angles are greater and the lead longer
because of the variable lock time of the flintlock. Despite that, patterns,
velocity and impact energy of the loads are similar to what we are used to in a
modern shotgun.
Loading
the little double is much like re-loading a shotgun shell at home. Pour in 75
grains of black powder (don't use any other powder). Ffg is preferable, although
fffg is usable as well. Then separate the powder from the shot by ramming down a
commercial 1/2 inch felt or fiber 16-gauge wad. Ram it down firmly over the
powder then thump it with the ramrod until the ramrod will bounce high out of
the barrel. Follow with one ounce of shot and then top off with a 16-gauge
overshot wad. A one ounce charge of 7 ½ shot works
on quail and chukkars as well as clay birds. Pheasants and duck need #5 or #6
shot but stick with the one ounce
charges. If a longer shot than usual is anticipated, then ram down a plastic
shot collar on top of the fiber wad and pour the shot into it then top off with
overshot wad. I'll often
load the left barrel without and the right with the collar. I've found that the
collarless load patterns 55-60% while
the same load with collar patterns 65-70%.
Greg
had seen my frustration at missing a good picture and boomed a laugh at my
expense. I took the bird from the lab and looked about for the pointer. She had
the awful habit of getting a solid point deep in the brush when I wasn't looking
and getting lost for 5 or 10 minutes at a time. I noted that Greg was careful to
open the frizzen of the unfired barrel before he loaded the fired side. He would
re-prime both barrels only after the fired one was reloaded.
Priming
powder should be ffffg black powder only (that’s 4 f’s), and should be used
sparingly. The priming charge should be kept below the top of the pan and not
heaped up since compression of the powder slows ignition. I always make sure the
touch hole is clear before loading, and shake the prime to the side just
before firing. I also check to see that the flint is sharp and free of residue
from the last shot. If it isn't sharp, I take the time to sharpen it with a
brass punch and small hammer before loading the barrel. If the flint and frizzen
are too dirty, I wipe them off with
a finger or rag.
Also make sure that the finest
flints are in the gun at all times. Both cut and knapped flints can be used but
they must be sharp and tough to last. It's
awfully inconvenient to have to change flints in the middle of a round of
skeet or a fast session in the field. It's easy enough to spot a good flint. It
will have a sharp, serrated edge and will throw sparks that dance and sizzle
around in the pan before extinguishing. If the edge of a new flint is not
serrated, then serrate it with the punch and hammer in your shooting bag. Be
sure that the edge of the flint is square with face of the frizzen and that it
is tight in the jaws of the cock. Normally, the flint is placed with the long
side up, but some few locks fire better the other way round. Be sure you know
which way your lock prefers before you ever get into the field. They can be
finicky if the lock architecture is incorrect. If
the lock is a particularly good one, and few classic English doubles aren’t,
then nearly every flint will perform correctly..
We headed into a more open area of heavy grass interspersed with sagebrush. When
I saw the lab's tail wagging her whole body I knew she was on the trail of a
bird and was ready when she put up a fat hen. Greg let it go and the lab grinned
disgustedly. In the meantime the Spotted Monster had another point in some deep
grass 40 yards further on. I called the lab to sit while Greg walked into the
point. He got to within 15 yards of the shorthair when a rooster thundered out
of the cover. The Staudenmeyer was up in a trice and the shot caught the bird in
a steep climb. Feathers exploded in the air and the bird tumbled only to right
himself with the left wing drooping. I
saw Greg cock the second hammer and get off another shot at 40 yards, long range
for an open bored flinter. But the bird went down for keeps and the lab charged
wildly down the field to make the retrieve.
I was not at all surprised at how easily Greg got off
the second shot. The Staudenmeyer is so well designed that cocking the second
hammer after a miss is downright easy. The technique is to fire the left barrel
first, and if you miss, to rock the right hand up, catch the cock of the right
lock with the thumb and click it to the rear as you swing with the bird. The
thumb naturally falls back over the wrist as the forefinger slaps the
fore-trigger for the second shot. It doesn't take much practice to become adept.
We continued into the grass and
brush, getting up several hens and killing two roosters in the process. Both
were easy shots over the pointer at relatively close range.
"Hey,
Doc," said Greg, "let's get into the corn and sunflowers over yonder.
The shootin' here is too easy." A
large field of corn,
too infested with sunflowers to harvest, and been left standing. We turned into
it, knowing that the shooting would be much more challenging. The sunflowers
were so high that I could see only Greg's head and shoulders sticking out. I
couldn't see the dogs at all but heard them crashing about in the thick
undergrowth. There was a sudden cackling and thrashing and thundering of wings
and three hens buzzed out to our right. Greg swung on them but dropped the
flinter to his side just as two roosters boomed up to the left. Greg swung
around at the sound, surprised at the sequence of flushing birds, but recovered
enough to pick up the slower bird and bust him with a snap shot. The rooster
disappeared into the corn and I sent in the lab while Greg reloaded.
Again, I wasn't much surprised
at how quickly Greg had manhandled the little flinter into position for a snap
shot despite being off balance from concentration on another covey of birds.
Staudenmeyer had his share of genius and his double handles faster than a
man can think. He must have held the opinion that a really good shotgun should
not require conscious thought to point the gun where the shooter's reflexes want
it pointed. I have become so used to the Staudenmeyer's excellent handling, in
fact, that I judge all other shotguns by how well they stack up against it.
My
reverie was broken as Greg moved off in the corm. I followed his line of motion
to where the Spotted Monster was locked into a rigid point, half hidden by a
screen of sunflowers. The Lab was not to be seen. For once the angle was about
perfect, and I got into position for the flush, camera at eyeball. I watched
Greg walk towards the dog through the viewfinder, his bulk miniaturized, by the
wide-angle lens. I heard the rooster before I saw him, also miniturized, appear
in the viewfinder, climbing steeply out of the sun flowers. I wanted the photo
to show the Staudenmeyer wreathed in smoke and the bird plummeting towards the
ground. But, as the finger is faster than the eye, I pushed the shutter before Greg
got off his shot and captured a picture of a big bird flying away from a man in
the weeds. The flinter boomed a mili-fraction of a second after and the bird
thumped on the ground another fraction after that. Greg whooped like a
Commanche, tickled at his good shooting and the pleasure of the day.
Birdshooting
hasn't changed much, when you
get right down to it. Whether you shoot 'em on the ground for meat, like
our 17th century ancestor, or whether
you delight in the performance of the dogs and the beauty of the day, it
truly hasn't changed. The basic ingredients are all there, whether you do it
with a "best" grade modern double, or with a flintlock
like the Staudenmeyer, or with a long doglock fowler. As for me, I'll
take the flintlock and lucky I am to have
it.
Good Hunting
DOC
|