My first shotgun was a Savage single barrel with a manually cocked hammer. The first year I was allowed to hunt, one of the neighbors offered to take me with his son and my dad let me take his 16 gauge Stevens Springfield sxs. I killed my first pheasant with the gun and was hooked. My next shotgun was a Bernardelli Gamecock 20 gauge with 25 inch barrels that I got as a graduation present from my parents and (now-ex) wife. I still have and use that gun. Since then, there have been a host of sxs find a home in the vault, about half of which I still have. Of the ones I've sold, I most regret a Greifelt 16 gauge sxs with 29-1/2 inch barrels and tight chokes. If I recall correctly, that briefly lived at Larry Brown's house, from which I'm sure it has long since moved. My favorite today is a William Moore 12 gauge hammer gun with sleeved barrels which I bought off another member of this board. It's my primary pheasant gun, although preserve birds are all that still are available in Pennsylvania. Hammer guns have become something of a passion, with my vault now holding them in 10, 12, 16, 20 and 28 gauge. I've owned a number of O/Us over the years and still have a few and one lonely Remington 870 Express that I bought for the southern NJ duck marshes when I lived there, but the last of my guns to go, should I be required to send them off, will be a sxs and is almost certainly to be the Moore.
