Straight Case

Name that Gun - Edition Two! SOLVED!

Today, I had the distinct honor to have an old friend introduce me to a neighbor of his who has a magnificent collection of blackpowder cartridge guns of yesteryear. I got to spend almost two hours with this fine collection.

I'll write a post or two on this collection, which the owner allowed me to photograph part of, on the condition that the photos not identify him or the location.

Without further ado, here is the first "Name that Gun". Usual rules apply, first to get it right gets their name in Glorious Bold letters right here!

You shouldn't need a hint, but this type revolver predated our War Between the States by a full decade or more...

So, you're feeling cocky, eh?

I can tell you that this is the only handgun I looked at (didn't touch, either). The rest of the firearms included a series of fine double fowling pieces, all blackpowder cartridge arms, and this:

So, smarties, name that gun! To get full credit for this one, you'll have to guess the manufacturer (not so hard as it might seem), and I'll give you TWO stabs at the gauge.

We'll talk more and have more photos when there have been some tries at the correct results posted. Yes that's a "tease", and you know how I hate teases, so it's hard for me to wait, also!

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You give up too easily. That's NOT a scattergun, it's a dangerous-game DOUBLE RIFLE!!! Yep, a Holland & Holland 10-bore "Elephant Gun"

BTW, 10-bore is .775 caliber! An 875-gr bullet travelling at 1900 feet per second makes over SEVEN THOUSAND foot-pounds of muzzle energy, and in the double-rifle, you have TWO of those at your immediate command. Wowza!

Is that a Bulldog 44 in your pocket or are you happy to see me?

Heh-heh!

On the Second most important anniversary in my life, the 44th anniversary of my first enlistment, I decided to commemorate the occasion.

Off to the local gun emporium, Keith's, and NOT waiting for a consignment I have there to sell, I got the last Charter Arms Bulldog 44 in the place. It was my second choice, actually, I REALLY wanted this one, but the one I bought probably would have gone to the big Gunshoe this weekend, and might not have been there next week when the rifle I was selling got sold.

First impression: GAWD, THIS THING IS LIGHT! Less than 21 oz, more than 4 ounces lighter than my Ruger SP-101s. It fits in the same holsters as those Ruger snubbies, too. I bought a Galco Hi-Ride OTB unit to carry it in, but it's the wrong one, has to go back, the restraint strap doesn't clear the hammer spur. Both of my Uncle Mike's Size Zero will fit, though.

Here's the as-yet un-named heavy snub, not ready for action:

Here it is, charged, with two reloads standing by. Extra credit if you can name those quick-loaders:

Give up on the quick-loaders? They're chargers for the venerable Enfield No. 4 Mk 1, one of my ready-to-go battle rifles.

The ammo? For now it's Cor-Bon 165-gr JHP. That will probably get heavier as time goes on and I get more familiar with how the gun handles. My objective is to load up something with the Xtreme Bullets 240-gr Copper-Plated Round-Nose Flat Point. Probably not up to Keith-level, but maybe something like this:

240-gr Xtreme CPRNFP, seated to cannelure, heavy roll crimp. Powder 14.0-gr Hodgdon H-110, increasing in stages to 16.0 maximum. Speed should start around 900 with the light charge, and work up to around 1050 with the heavier load, which is SAAMI-standard, (not +P). Muzzle energy there starts at 430, very respectable, and ends up at 588, SERIOUS level. I hear that Elmer hisself had run as much as 19.0gr of H-110, which would CUP-out at around 30K, pretty hot, maybe too hot for the light revolver.

Can't wait to get to the range, but first, I have to get to the bench. I priced out some cowboy loads at the shop, and they were $35/50, a bit steep for my blood, so I will brew up some light 240-gr LSWC loads to get started, maybe 6.0-gr Unique. A couple boxes of those should get me used to the trigger and the feel of the gun in my hand. Next trip out, I'll move up to the Xtreme-bullet stuff.

Re-Do: Lyman 44 says 6 grains of Unique is too light, start with 9. Speer # 8 says 6.0 is a fine starter with a 250-gr cast boolit, Hmmmm....needa refereee here.

 

This .44 Magnum kicks A**!

The .44 Remington Magnum, invented by Elmer Keith in the mid-1950's, is no longer the most powerful Straight Case handgun cartridge. Actually, I'm not sure it lasted more than about 20 years, until the .44 Auto Mag was invented, and a pistol built for it. I had an opportunity to buy one of those back in 1974, but it was pay the house payment or buy the gun, not both. A friend of mine with more of the necessary wheeled out a roll of bills and paid the guy $200 in cash for the gun (after I fired up the teletype machine and determined it wasn't a stolen firearm).

The Auto Mag used a cut-down 30-06 or .308 WIN battle-rifle cartridge case, with the bottleneck sliced off. It had a rotating bolt with 6 locking lugs, and it was a DEVIL to clear. You had to have King Kong's grip strength to pull that bolt back past the locking cam.

IIRC, it fired a 240-grain bullet at right around 1800 fps. Ammo was over a dollar per round, and I could buy a whole box of 30-30 for little more than that. Milsurp 7.62 NATO was about 9-12 cents per round then, with 30-06 about the same or cheaper. I think they gave .303 British away, and a REAL Jungle Carbine could be had for about $49. My Savage 99E was still considered a modern firearm, not the antique it is today.

...and the .44 Magnum was for macho guys who could hang on to either a Ruger Redhawk DA or a 3-screw Blackhawk SA in that caliber. Yep, they were "thumpenboomers", more of a curiosity then than the staple of the gunny scene that they've become since.

Today, the .44 Remington Magnum isn't even considered a "thumpenboomer" round any more. That honor goes to the 50 Alaskan, the .475 Linebaugh, the 500 S&W, or maybe the .454 Casull. There is also a pair of Ruger cartridges bigger than the "old" .44 Magnum now.

For Yours Truly, though, the .44 Maggy is all the big-bore Straight Case round I'll ever need, and I have a fine revolver, the Colt Anaconda, and a levergun, the Marlin 1894 to shoot it in.

Today, I received (in only 3 days, WOO-HOO!) my order of Xtreme Bullets' offerings, and some Starline brass to load it in. The .44 bullet is Xtreme's 240-gr Copper-Plated Lead Round Nose, Flat Point. It's a heavily-plated bullet, could probably pass most folks' definition of a FMJ round. You need a Flat Point round for the tubular magazine in the Marlin, so the rounds in the magazine, lined up end-to-end,  don't touch each other off under recoil from firing the chambered cartridge.

The recoil from my "thumpenboomer" round will be STOUT. The round is loaded for the rifle, with a powder that will need most of the 18.5" barrel to burn in. I use Hodgdon's H-110, which followed Elmer Keith's original 2400 powder as the go-to load for large-capacity handgun cartridges in guns with long barrels. I use 25 grains of that fine powder, just shy of the SAAMI-max load of 16.7. I haven't run this load past a chrony, but it would probably do 1500+ out of a long revolver barrel, so I'm guessing 230 more fps for the carbine barrel. That will give it 3/4 of a ton of muzzle energy, and it will still have 500 #/ft energy out past 300 yards (but a 6-foot POI drop). With this round, the rifle is very useful out to just over 200 yards, where it drops about 14".

I COULD shoot this round in my Anaconda, but why? In the revolver, I'm more than happy with a half-ton of muzzle energy, and Green Box Reminton just about gets me that.

In the below photo, these "thumpenboomers" are on the left. These are the trial rounds (loaded in once-fired cases). If they shoot as well as they should, I'll load a couple hundred more in new brass.

"No Case" respect

For almost 90 years, the Colt Dragoon 44 was the heaviest pistol load available (60 grains FFg powder), and it stayed that way until the .357 Magnum was invented in the mid 1930s. The Dragoon was a Black Powder (No-Case) hogleg. The Texas Rangers were the first to carry them as a service weapon, in the form of the Walker Colt, an early model of the Dragoon.

Here's a video of a scene from Lonesome Dove, and it's a story about old men and an old pistol getting some respect. Note the exaggerated motion needed to cross-draw that hogleg, but the actor does it perfectly. The only spoiler in that scene is that the pistol should have made much more smoke when it was fired.

The Colt Dragoon was also prominently featured in "True Grit", the first one with John Wayne.

Name that gun! UPDATED! WINNER! Dwight G is Da Man!

It was US-made.

It was semi-auto, fed from box magazines of various sizes.

It used a Straight Case round.

It fought in the last war we had with Mexico (the Punitive Expedition of 1915)

It was the first weapon specifically purchased to arm US aircrews for air-to-air battle, and it served Great Britain in that role also.

It was sold to most of the Allies of WW1, one of which modified it to use as a LMG.

What was it? It was the Winchester Model 1907

Put your answers in Comments. First correct answer gets their name in lights.

UPDATE: 022111 2231 PST: Little known fact - I owned a Model 1910, the .401 version, briefly. It was my Dad's, and many deer fell to it, including one I witnessed, but I had no use for it 20 years ago when I inherited it, so I sold it and the goodly store of Kynoch loads for it. I didn't like the HUGE force on the op handle to open the action, and especially, I didn't like the fact that the only way to op that handle was to put the butt of the rifle on the ground and push down to overcome the 25# spring, which made you dangerously close to the muzzle when you did it. The op rod handle was right under the muzzle. For it's weight, 8#+, you could damn near carry a Garand into the woods.