doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com How did you get into SxS's...

Bought my first gun at 13. Just happened to be a lc Smith fw12. 35 bucks hard earned priming tobacco. Shot my first doves that labor day weekend. Learned quick 3dram ounce and an eighth killed on both ends. One box of shells for two birds and a black and blue shoulder. But man was I hooked! Still have it (cracked stock and all) Now shoot a Silver Hawk or Reilly hammer gun. Seven eights oz 1200 much more to my liking. Also have my granddad's lc fw 12 he bought new in 1939 of course I cherish it the most even with the 13" stock. (I'm 6'3") lots of good times and memories.

I like the name we've ran across a few tamoto stakes on here before...

There were no sxs guns in the family when I was growing up. The men who hunted used pump guns or automatics. I started with single shots and progressed to pumps, a Rem. model 31 20ga, and an Ithaca model 37 12ga. I shot the pumps until I was 40 and then switched to automatics.

I had traded a few doubleguns but never really shot one as my regular choice until my mid 40's. Now they're pretty much all I shoot and I've accumulated more than I need. Some are just collectibles. My collection idea was a representative low grade gun from all the American Classics (Parker,Fox, Elsie, Ithaca and Lefever). Then I discovered there were many many more...Geo

I blame a lot of that on this bulletin board.

Hi joe
I was born (1957) & grew up in Somerset in the south west of England. I was driving farm machinery on a neighbors farm at a very early age, and remember when I used to drive the big combine harvester, the farmers would be walking ahead with a couple of guns, mostly Greener martini singles, waiting for rabbits, pheasants, partridge or the odd hare to flush . but I remember one gent had a real nice Goggie sxs...he let me shoot a couple of shots off into the stubble, I remember well the engraving & lovely wood, also the beautiful waxed blue & red cartridges, they seemed like jewels to me. I remember I stole one from him, I thought I might go to prison if caught..
I have loved them ever since
i moved to Ireland around 18, & used to shoot alot of rabbits with a mates sxs...I always thought they were beautiful guns.
Cheers
franc

Always good to hear from you, Franc Otte. You�ve been pretty quiet as of late. Hope you�re well.

Great thread, I've enjoyed reading your posts about how you came to own your guns.
A faulty Belgian boxlock came my may for the price of a couple of beers. A quick strip, clean and a gentle touch with a smooth file got it cocking and firing, it never let me down, then I was drawn towards my first Brummie boxlock and sold the Belgian on to a guy who hammered it for years.
2 nice English boxlock 12's and an AYA 20 which I bought from an old friend who's no longer with us live in my cabinet and I've no intention in moving to the guns with the barrels on the wrong way
There's just something about the way a SxS looks.

hi LeFusile,
Hope ye are well mate
Do you need a nice Greener Hammer Gun, by any chance ?
cheers
franc

Franc,
I don�t, I�m afraid. Although I would love to have a nice quality hammergun. I�m currently tapped out on double guns at the moment. I need to find more time to shoot the ones I�ve got! I think I did manage to get each gun I own out for at least 1 hunt this year...obviously some more than others. Not too many folks can say they shot birds or game with every gun they own in a single year. :-). Stay warm.

My dad borrowed my neighbor's sxs .410 and let me use it on a squirrel hunt when I was in the third grade. I got a squirrel and wanted to own a sxs from that day on. I was 14 before I actually owned one. It was a lousy gun, but I did become a decent wing shot with it and would have used it as my main shotgun for decades if it hadn't fallen apart.

I bought most of my early guns from a good friend of my father who was a sporting goods rep. I knew that he was a Garcia rep and he got me several reels. What I didn't know at the time was that Garcia was the USA importer for Beretta in those days and he could have gotten me a GR2 for about half of retail and I could have grown up using a decent gun. Oh well

I went duck hunting with my grandfather when I was 10 years old, in 1970. He was shooting a Stevens double and I thought it was the coolest gun ever. For my 12th birthday I received a Spanish 20 ga. sxs. It's been sxs guns ever since. I have a couple of classic pumps and autos but I rarely use them.