Charles Moore shotgun

[andy52]

At no point in my post did I advocate one loading method over another. I simply said what I used on that given day. In most of the years I've shot muzzle loading SXSs I didn't use the skychief load or the one suggested by feltwad and the guns preformed well enough for me. Due to my location I rarely get the opportunity to hunt birds on the wing I shoot mostly squirrels and rabbits , if I get the opportunity on birds it's generally a few quail and they generally startle me and I don't get a shot off....

 

[Britsmoothy]

I would like to know off someone more knowledgeable then myself, like Feltwad, as to whether there was any old English sxs's used with ball.
I know their primary role was to use shot but they existed before any draconian laws came into effect so did they ever get used with a single ball? Do you have anything in your archives Feltwad?
Thanks.

 

[jimhallam]

I REALLY do not understand why "Britsmoothy" and "Feltwad" slag each other off. Life is too short for this sort of thing -- - and recently it has got worse!
Perhaps these "venerable gentlemen" want to be "venerated" --- and neither one will give way. All the while the "antis" are destroying our traditions --- in many aspects of our life. PLEASE -- to use a Cockney phrase (not with a dreadful Dick Van Dyke in "Mary Poppins" accent!) "give over, squire!"

 

[Britsmoothy]

I REALLY do not understand why "Britsmoothy" and "Feltwad" slag each other off. Life is too short for this sort of thing -- - and recently it has got worse!
Perhaps these "venerable gentlemen" want to be "venerated" --- and neither one will give way. All the while the "antis" are destroying our traditions --- in many aspects of our life. PLEASE -- to use a Cockney phrase (not with a dreadful Dick Van Dyke in "Mary Poppins" accent!) "give over, squire!"

Hang on Mr!
Where have I "slagged" anyone?
If you go back a comment #22 you will see I have asked him a question.
If you visit comment #19 you will see I express that I understand feltwads comment but also equally understand Brockennocks comments too.

 

[JCKelly]

Used this Moore shotgun on pheasants in PA some years back. They didn't seem to realize it was just an ol' muzzle-loader. Don't recall what load I used, some fine grained black, shot and wads as suggested by a 19th Century publication. Long before the Internet and 20th Century guys arguing that their Load was the Only load. Me, I read 19th century books & listened to Grandpa, who never shot an Unmentionable til he was 18.

 

[Feltwad]

Used this Moore shotgun on pheasants in PA some years back. They didn't seem to realize it was just an ol' muzzle-loader. Don't recall what load I used, some fine grained black, shot and wads as suggested by a 19th Century publication. Long before the Internet and 20th Century guys arguing that their Load was the Only load. Me, I read 19th century books & listened to Grandpa, who never shot an Unmentionable til he was 18.

View attachment 97798

Sir is that a grip safety if so does it work a underside view would have given me a better answer or is it a wall mounting peg
Feltwad

 

[TFoley]

I would like to know off someone more knowledgeable then myself, like Feltwad, as to whether there was any old English sxs's used with ball.I know their primary role was to use shot but they existed before any draconian laws came into effect so did they ever get used with a single ball? Do you have anything in your archives Feltwad?Thanks.

Not wishing to pre-empt Mr Feltwad, but there WERE British-made SxS that used ball and shot - but the ball-barrel was rifled. Look up Cape gun, of you haven't already done so, that is. TMK they never saw much use here in England, as the name implies. A REAL gentleman here in UK would use his sporting RIFLE to shoot a ball, although with the advent of the metallic cartridge that practice fast disappeared.

 

[2 shots]

cant we all just get along this is a great forum , not the audition for grumpier old men 3

 

[andy52]

cant we all just get along this is a great forum , not the audition for grumpier old men 3

Well dang, I may not be grumpy but I'm old......

 

[andy52]

I generally don't shoot round ball out of my SxSs, but I have with most of them just to see how they preform. I have taken deer with them a time or two for the same reason. None of them shot well enough to replace any of my rifles but were fun anyway. The first deer I ever took with a SxS was with a Wesley Richards that was worth more than the risk of trying a round ball in it but it brought the deer down nicely. Sometimes its just a judgement call on these older guns, if the guns appears to be in good enough shape I'll go for it.

 

[Stumpkiller]

Dear Mod, I'm only speaking for myself, you understand, and have no part in the matter, except as a getting more and more pee'd off reader of the nigh-on continual beef between Messrs Brokennock and Feltwad.

If they want to take their antagonism someplace else, and leave the forum to more open-minded shooters, that's fine by me.

Really, we moderators are just unpaid casual visitors here hoping to increase the knowledge of pursuits we find laudable who try to herd cats and keep them from stepping on each others tails. Sometimes - it's just not worth the energy to try and get oil and vinegar to mix nicely. So we let it play out and go to other enjoyable threads where there is no petty persisting historical animosity between members that is unrelated to the current thread. Such is human nature.

 

[sawyer04]

Gun looks great for it's age. Thanks for sharing

I agree, makes me envious,

 

[Britsmoothy]

Not wishing to pre-empt Mr Feltwad, but there WERE British-made SxS that used ball and shot - but the ball-barrel was rifled. Look up Cape gun, of you haven't already done so, that is. TMK they never saw much use here in England, as the name implies. A REAL gentleman here in UK would use his sporting RIFLE to shoot a ball, although with the advent of the metallic cartridge that practice fast disappeared.

Yes I know about Cape guns and paradox guns.

It was not just gentlemen that used these guns and I don't mean unsavoury characters by that.
Ordinary folk had many a sxs. Were coastal guns sometimes used to take seal? Did a farmer or gamekeeper or an agent take a deer with one? Were any ever marketed as good with ball etc etc.

It seems odd that in the UK going back to the late 1700's and forward there seems little to no mention of using ball to hunt anything except for in Africa. Was deer still being hunted with hound and lance? Archery?
I find it hard to believe that when the sxs started getting popular no one wondered how a ball would shoot from them.
Is there any documentation about it?
I often have asked Mr Feltwad questions, especially with Mr Feltwad telling me and others he is an expert of world fame alas, this knowledge or indepth discussion does not materialise. Some of us have no idea who he is??
Maybe you do, or someone else does. It would be nice to actually know the credentials behind the man. Can you help?

 

[Feltwad]

Thanks a flinter has been on my want list for years, I just haven't come across one that I like and is reasonably priced.

Has I promised enclosed are a couple of images of sxs and s/b flintlock original shotguns from my collection
Feltwad

 

[TFoley]

It seems odd that in the UK going back to the late 1700's and forward there seems little to no mention of using ball to hunt anything except for in Africa. Was deer still being hunted with hound and lance? Archery?

Archery as a means of getting meat here in UK died out in the Middle Ages. True, there was limited poaching with crossbows, but as the punishment for getting caught using one was instant hanging, it wasn't that popular. Most of England back then was owned, remember, and the local bigwigs exercised their right to decorate trees with any miscreants on many occasions. Remember we ARE talking about a time, that actually extended well into the early 1800's, of hanging a criminal, covered with tar to preserve him [or her] in chains at a handy crossroads as a lesson not to break the law.

In any event, deer were not hunted on horseback, but boar certainly were, although when THAT died out as a sport, rather than a means of feeding your family is another uncertainty. What IS for certain is that the average Joe living in the rurals was NOT a horse-owner - that was for the aristocracy and landed gentry. It took the end of the feudal system to bring about a more obvious change in the way that people could acquire meat to eat.

 

[andy52]

Has I promised enclosed are a couple of images of sxs and s/b flintlock original shotguns from my collection
Feltwad
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Nice flinters feltwad, I really like the second one down in the first photo could you tell me who the maker is?

 

[GREENSWLDE]

To be fair I do in fact understand where Feltwad and Brokennock are coming from.

For shooting at a stationary target with shot like our cousins do a turkey or I do occasionally a pheasant then the skychief does indeed help.

Now where conventional loading chains help is shooting on the wing.
No, I'm not saying the skychief load is no good for wing shooting because it is. But under normal circumstances, wing shooting, as Feltwad says, there is no real advantage.

That aside, where some get irritated with messier Feltwad, myself included, is his way with words.
Maybe it's autism I dunno.
All we can do is keep encouraging him.
We do have a duty of care at the end of the day do we not?

In the past I've spent happy hours with Feltwad shooting Clays at MLAGB meetings and have never noticed any sign of Autism. I've always found him to be Quite Articilate.
I've also used that same load in 12 bores and it's won me several MLAIC Clay shoots over 25 years, though I tend to use card-felt-card over powder and at high competition I go up to the Legal 11/4 oz. of 7's.
I am too old to become envolved in long distant arguments. We on this side use our Game Guns, Flint and Caplock in a slightly different way to you from the other side. On wild game or vermin in the field or at simulated game clay shoots.. Lets all respect the thing we have found work for us and respectfully exchange our finding and Ideas-not start slinging mud. Feltwad has been at this "game" longer than most people live and his restorations are second to None. His shooting ability Aint Bad either.. "Very" OLD DOG..

 

[Feltwad]

Nice flinters feltwad, I really like the second one down in the first photo could you tell me who the maker is?

The gun is a late flintlock of L Harrison of Carlisle UK a sporting gun I have enclosed images . May I say lets not wander away from the main heading of a Moore percussion gun
Feltwad

 

[Britsmoothy]

In the past I've spent happy hours with Feltwad shooting Clays at MLAGB meetings and have never noticed any sign of Autism. I've always found him to be Quite Articilate.
I've also used that same load in 12 bores and it's won me several MLAIC Clay shoots over 25 years, though I tend to use card-felt-card over powder and at high competition I go up to the Legal 11/4 oz. of 7's.
I am too old to become envolved in long distant arguments. We on this side use our Game Guns, Flint and Caplock in a slightly different way to you from the other side. On wild game or vermin in the field or at simulated game clay shoots.. Lets all respect the thing we have found work for us and respectfully exchange our finding and Ideas-not start slinging mud. Feltwad has been at this "game" longer than most people live and his restorations are second to None. His shooting ability Aint Bad either.. "Very" OLD DOG..

Thank you.

 

[Britsmoothy]

The gun is a late flintlock of L Harrison of Carlisle UK a sporting gun I have enclosed images . May I say lets not wander away from the main heading of a Moore percussion gun
Feltwad

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Exquisite FW.