different version of the Hickock/Tutt duel

[Pancho]

I've had Johnny Bates and Mike Cumpston's book "Percussion Pistols And Revolvers" for many years and have read it in bits and pieces. Came across a strange bit of gossip as quoted from the book page 89."One prominent version of the Hickock-Tutt Duel has Hickock wearing twin Navies when he came to town but carrying a Dragoon to the Springfield Town Square for the famous 75-yard heart shot."
Just another one of those things we'll never know

 

[4v50 Gary]

Thanks for the variation.

Who knows what he carried? Dragoons would have been substantially heavier and as for me, I'd take the lighter gun.

 

[StrawHat]

Somewhere I recall reading that the coroners report is still available. That might clear up the murkiness. If my memory is correct, the bullet entered between two ribs and passed through to the other side. I do not recall the caliber or if it was even mentioned.

 

[Pancho]

Sure would like to keep this thread alive because there is someone out there that knows more about this. I've read and I've used this duel to justify the lethality of the 36 cal. BP round. If it turned out that Hickock used a .44 I'd have to stop using that evidence in an argument.

 

[Old Fuff]

I need to do some digging, and most of my research material is where I'm not at the moment.

Anyway it's highly doubtful that Hickock used a Dragoon, which was obsolete when the Civil War started. Had he prefered the .44 caliber there were plenty of 1860 Army revolvers available. Joseph Rosa is the most knowledgeable person on the subject of "Wild Bill" in the world - past and present, and he's never mentioned a Dragoon in connection with Hickock. However I have read (with no reliable cite) that Tutt had a Dragoon.

 

[mykeal]

I've read and I've used this duel to justify the lethality of the 36 cal. BP round.

If you're using this single incident to prove ('justify' doesn't really work here) the lethality of a particular caliber ball, your opponents are seriously inept at debate.

 

[Pancho]

Mykeal, I never said that I won or lost the debate,but after hours at deer camp no one seems to care.

 

[mykeal]

Aha! A deer camp debate. Honest men (and women too) engaged in honest discussion. The American way. Proceed.

 

[Pancho]

Even nonsense makes sense late night around a deer camp fire.

 

[BHP FAN]

Well, there were a lot of folks killed by the .36 revolver in the Civil War, and I doubt if the .36 is any less lethal, now. Elmer Kieth wrote some on the subject, having talked to actual participants of the Civil War. One old Cavalryman went into the subject of the lethality and accuracy of the roundball vs. the conical. Read ''Sixguns'', by Kieth, for more detail.

 

[eastbank]

i don,t think it would matter if a .36 or a .44 were shot thru your heart,the results would be the same, your next of kin would be notified in short order. eastbank.