Cheek hold

[dodger]

With head up ya still gotta steady your eye. With your jaw?

Your eye does not need to be steadied . It cannot move within your head .
A consistent gun mount will put the gun in the right place . Then your two hands will steady the rifle and indeed move the rifle relative to your eye and align the sights .
A crescent buttstock mounted between bicep and shoulder will put the gun in the right place relative to the eye .
This is somewhat contrary to modern practice .
A lot of guys that come into shooting muzzleloaders have a background of shooting benchrest or other similar techniques and here the method is for the body to be manipulated around a stationary gun .
Our forebears did not know of this technique and guns were built for use in the field for a more instinctive style of active shooting and this influenced the design .
It really is a joy to shoot these guns in the style for which they were designed .

As an aside , since reading Nathan Foster's treatises on accuracy techniques on his website termminalballistics which include the use of pressing the stock hard into the shoulder with the non trigger hand , I have noticed an improvement in my shooting and a reduction in felt recoil when using a heavy recoiling gun .

Happy shooting folks .

 

[BrownBear]

...pressing the stock hard into the shoulder with the non trigger hand , I have noticed an improvement in my shooting and a reduction in felt recoil when using a heavy recoiling gun .

Zackly! Over 40 years of frequently shooting 375 H&H through 460 Weatherby confirms that. Works just as well with muzzleloading thumpers, too. When a guy divorces himself from the benchrest and quits paying alimony to it, there's another huge drop in felt recoil.

Shot correctly, a 58 caliber packing 120 grains of powder isn't painful to shoot offhand, while a 54 caliber shot wrong from a benchrest with only 100 grains of powder can light up your life.

 

[Irish lad]

As the PMIs explained to me, sometimes painfully, all those years ago Gus.

Irish