Edwardian's suggestion of using specially concocted loads for home defense is a terrible one, IMHO. There is a plethora of suitable loadings available for any caliber that would be useful for this. I never want to have to defend myself on a witness stand against a prosecuting attorney trained to make me look like a bloodthirsty white man with an itchy trigger finger. But, how much harder would it be to do so when he says to you something like "You WANTED to kill somebody didn't you? You wanted to so bad that you went to the trouble to load the bullets UPSIDE DOWN! You couldn't wait until you got the opportunity to shoot somebody with one of your specially prepared MAN-KILLER LOADS, could you? It's an obSESSION with you, isn't it?"
Don't for a minute think that this scenario couldn't happen to you. I know it's better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6, but there are plenty of good s.d. loads that can be bought over the counter.
Personally, I'm a "shotgun man", for defense. Jeff Cooper, the great .45 ACP guru once wrote that a pistol should be used to fight your way to the closest shotgun, or something to that effect. I read, yesterday, a report on findings of a lengthy investigation of about 1500 shootings, with everything from a .22 RF, up through .44 Mag., and including centerfire rifles and shotguns. No pistol caliber had a good record for one shot incapacitation, not even the old vaunted .45 ACP. The centerfire rifles and shotguns, however, were upwards of 80% in effectiveness. It went on to say that many "one shot incapacitations" are not the result of death, or complete immobilization, but rather the result of the "shootee" giving up in surrender. Whatever ....... the idea is not to kill a man, it is to prevent that man from doing you harm. If he takes a round and gives up the fight, fine with me. I'll hold him 'til the law arrives. I'd rather bet my life on my being able to put 1 1/8 oz. of lead shot in him than my being able to put a well placed bullet in him, and I'm an old pistol shooting competitor. And, I sure feel better about stopping him with one round from a shotgun.
SRH
