doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com How many hunting seasons for you?

65 Using a Stevens 410 bolt action, clip fed, my first animal was some sort of small hawk, which were fair game in those days. A few weeks later I got to go with my dad on the Sunday hunt of the Sure as Shoot'n Fox hunting club. We had about 15 to 20 hunters, walking into a mile square section from each side. Sometime, there would be action. Saw my first fox [red] and he was running along a hedge [osage orange] row toward me. I shot and he tumbled. I could not believe it. When I got to him he was alive, but had three broken legs. I could probably never do that again. Also, got a jack rabbit that day which was rare in southwest Iowa. My first and only one of those. It was almost as big as the fox. A friend made sausage out of the jack, and it was terrible. The fox was taken by the club. They used the hide and bounty money for an end of the year feed. I thought that unfair.

I got a late start. Dad didn't want guns in the house after his WWII experience and with 10 kids in the house. He was wounded twice and hospitalized for 16 months after the last wound. When I left home for good, I hunted with friends and bought my first shotgun, a Browning Sweet 16, over 50 years ago.

The first hunt in which I was allowed to carry a gun myself was in the fall of 1962. My next door neighbor loaned me his .410 Winchester 24 for a squirrel hunt. My dad left me beside a tree with the gun and 2 shells, with strict instructions that I load only one barrel at a time. A squirrel came by and I managed to get him, and so began my hunting career and my fascination with sxs shotguns.

The neighbor was willing to sell the gun, but he wanted $40 and my dad said that was too much. I've tried to buy the gun a couple of times since but it has passed down to the third generation in their family now so I have accepted the fact that I will never own it.

I learn something(s) new almost every day. A friend from boyhood got a used Win M24- 20 gauge, 28" barrels about the same time my father gave me his M12-20 gauge. I still have that shotgun, and he has his M24. But I never knew WRA offered that double in .410 bore- I believe at one time WRA had a break-action single barrel in .410, and of course, the M42 pump, which I think they offered first in about 1933. Often called "the baby M12!

The 2 shell limit your dad followed somehow reminds me of the late Ernest Hemingway, who received a 20 gauge single shot around the age of 12-from his paternal Grandfather- and Hemingway's father, Dr. C.E. Hemingway, only gave him 3 shells per day. You learn at that early age not to waste your ammo.

It might have been the late writer, Charley Waterman, who wrote two phrases regarding shooting afield: (1) A good shot is frugal with his ammo. and (2) Don't bet your folding money against the man who shoots a well-worn pumpgun. I would add, well worn double shotgun to that!!

Started hunting with a bow and a BB gun when I was 12. About that time I got my first squirrel with a BB gun...a fox squirrel shot in the eye at about 8 feet! Soon after a cottontail with a arrow...he was in his bed. That was 1960. My father couldn't afford to buy me a gun so I first bought a .22 bolt gun around 1960, and then a shotgun in 1962. I was working on a ranch so I had money. No car, but a bicycle. I read all the books and magazines about hunting and fishing I could. An early favorite was Scattergunning, by Ray P. Holland. I remember him liking #7 shot and 12 gauges with IC/F chokes.

I first bought an Ithaca Model 37 12 gauge for $74.48. With it I killed the first bird I shot at... a dove with the first shot. Went on to shoot the first duck, a Susie, and the first pheasant...each with the first shot at the species. I killed the first two squirrels I shot with the 12...a pair of grays running through the tree tops. Then I found geese...shot the first three geese I shot at...a triple on lesser Canadas...

Is that enough history?

Now I shoot as much as ever and use doubles but miss many shots!

Thanks for posting this. I tried to look it up and I couldn't find any evidence that Winchester ever made the model 24 in 410. So I think you have corrected a "memory" of mine that is incorrect.

To be honest, I have just assumed it was a model 24, and I have assumed that for decades. It was certainly a sxs .410 with DT, and I remember that the man who owned it wanted the outrageous price of $40 for it because it was a Winchester. The gun was not in very good condition in 1963 and I don't think it could have possibly been a model 21.

I was 9 years old when I used it and have no memory of actually noting the model number, but I did get to handle the gun again sometime in the 70s. The owner at that time told me his father had owned it before the neighbor and he would never sell it. But I thought I remembered verifying that day that it was a Winchester.

I think my memory must be flawed, and the gun must have been of some other make. Thanks for correcting me.

Coosa;
I too was never able to own the first shotgun I ever shot. It belonged to an uncle (Married to Mom's Sister) & had been his father's. He was going to pass it down to one of his Grandsons. The Grandson doesn't have it & no one seems to know where it went. This one was a little H&R 28 gauge single. He did let me borrow it & use it once later in life & while I had it I weighed it 4lb 2 oz.

That first day I used it I killed 2 rabbits with 2 shots. The first one my uncle had spotted sitting in a clump of briers & called me over. He told me to aim at his nose & shoot his head off, so I did, He then told me I was now blooded so the next one had to running. I then jumped one but he was in such thick stuff he was out of sight before I could get the gun up. Next one my uncle spotted again squatted down at the base of a small tree in an open area, so he called me over again. He reminded me this time I couldn't shoot until it ran.

I started walking toward that tree & got so close I could have kicked him. I kept wondering why isn't he running. I would later learn this was typical of a rabbit if he thinks he has not been spotted. I then paused to think how was I going to make him run. When I paused he, of course, bolted like a streak of lightning, running so fast his ears were pushed back along his back.

How I managed I'll never know, but I cocked the hammer back on that little H&R as I brought it to my shoulder, swung on the rabbit & pulled the trigger & he Somersaulted. Needless to say, I was walking on air after that shot. Ah, the memories.

Add me to the list that never got to own his first shotgun. My Daddy owned a huge country store on my Grandad's farm here. He was very confined by it and didn't get to hunt much, as the store hours were something like 7 am until 8 pm, 6 days/week. Sunday was church day and Sunday hunting was forbidden in my household back then. We had a neighboring landowner who had made a lot of money in the cookie business, Murray Cookies, and was a great friend to us. When I was eight yrs. old he took me down to his house one day and gave me a J C Higgins .410 S x S, with Tenite stock and f/end. Killed my first doves, quail, rabbits and squirrels (and one owl) with that little gun. I shot it for several years and he took it back and gave me a 20 ga. M11 Remington. When I turned 16 Daddy gave me a new 1100 Rem. 12 ga., and the M11 went back to Mr. Murray, too.

The little .410 is now in the possession of one of Mr. Murray's grandsons. I thought, awhile back, I wanted to buy one like it ..................... until I saw what they were/are selling for. Yikes!! No, thank you.

SRH

"Never got to own first shotgun" !! Well, I am lucky enough to have my first one. Stevens, 410, bolt action, clip fed. Stock is some light wood. I refinished it all many decades ago. Still has a couple of paint brush hairs in the finish and a black forend tip. I'm not sure if the original gun had a black forend tip, but it wasn't either horn or ebony, but this one is painted on with whatever black paint Dad had around the house. Thinking about it , now, I should shoot it again. Maybe the first time since the 50s.

Darn right you should! If I had mine I'd still be using it. I've got the first .22 I ever shot, my Grandad's. It is in my pickup right now. It's a Remington 33, single shot.

SRH