Handgun Carry in the Old West

[SleazyRider]

I asked that same question over on the SASS forum a couple of years ago, and you would have thought I was child molester applying for a job at a daycare!

I've found their rules to be hit and miss with historical accuracy, they don't allow rubber soled boots, but you can shoot a 1911 or a lever shotgun. I also commented that in the stack of old Tin Types of my relatives, no one had 2 revolvers, most didn't have a gun rig, and all had a single shot shotgun!

LD

I hear ya, Lawdog! I'd love to partake in some Cowboy Action Shooting, but totin' 2 six-guns is a bit over the top for me. I simply can't afford it, not to mention that my local chapter, part of a sportsman's club, has a waiting list to join. (Also, you need is 500 bucks and a recommendation from two current members.) Can't say as I blame them---it keeps the riffraff like yours truly out!

 

[SabbathWolf]

Sabbath Wolf if I'm correct they have a class in SASS called the Wild Bunch that shoots 1911 and pump shot guns and perhaps same era rifle though I'm not up on all the rules of SASS. No such thing in NCOWS which I do shot however their is even a Zoot Suit Group that has started up from what I've read based on that period of time. It seems if you can pick a period in history there is some group out there supporting it which to me is great fun as long as one can afford the various groups.

OK.
That's kinda how it looked to me too.
Different groups for just about whatever.
I've never been personally involved it, so I am just guessing.
Thanks for the clarification.

 

[Trad Archer]

I stop shooting SASS a long time ago. It's just gotten to be a joke. They have so many different categories anymore, I can't keep up. One if you pick your nose with your right hand and one if you use your left to pick your butt. C'mon, lets just have two categories; one for black powder and one for the non authentic. All I know is I'm not allowed to use my PERIOD CORRECT 1877 Lightning because it can be fired in double action, but there is a category for the NON-PERIOD CORRECT 1911????????????????????????

My wife was once told she couldn't use her side by side because it was a 28 gauge. The reason told to us was because being a light gauge would give her an unfair advantage. Have you seen the squibby 38s these clowns shoot????????????????

 

[qwert65]

I remember reading as a kid some of the little house books, the father had a rifle(muzzleloader), a shotgun and a pistol which she only rembrred him wearing one time.

 

[rcmodel]

I have read more then one anecdotal account of cowboys having gun pockets sewed inside their leather chaps.
Apparently not uncommon to keep the gun protected and out of the way on a horse.

I think Elmer Keith mentioned it more then once in his writings.

rc

 

[timothy75]

I call BS on the notion that revolvers were never carried in saddle bags. I've seen photos of pomel holsters designed for pepperboxes as well as single shot pistols before the revolver was around. Most know the walker and dragoon were carried on pomel hosters by the cavalry also. There are also period saddle bags with holsters sewn into the side which pretty much proves people did indeed carry revolvers on the horse. And why wouldnt they considering the popularity of the rifle scabbard? If a cowboy was bucked off a spooked horse on a ranch, considering the horse and saddle cost more than a revolver, the horse would be retrieved and so would the gun.

 

[NMGonzo]

I'd go along with that for the most part. Open carrying here in Arizona on the hip - on the motorcycle sucks . I can't even imagine riding a horse with a "hollywood" rig danglin' and tanglin' up my life on a daily basis - it's a cross draw for me.

Crossdraw for me for mostly everything.

Or 5 o clock and butt pointing forward

 

[Driftwood Johnson]

Howdy again

At risk of hijacking this thread, I would like to clear up a few misconceptions about Cowboy Action Shooting.

Here is one of my favorite statements in the Single Action Shooting Society shooter's handbook:

'Cowboy Action Shooting™ is a combination of historical reenactment and Saturday morning at the matinee.'

That's what I was trying to say earlier. For those who want to be reenacting life in the Old West, there are other places they should try. SASS is not and has never claimed to be faithful historical reenactment. It is a fantasy sport based in a large part on Baby Boomers' recollections of what they saw in the movies and on TV when they were kids. Cowboys who were paragons of virtue, triumphed over bad men and got the girl all in the space of an hour or an hour and a half. Nothing whatsoever to do with actual historical fact. If you're looking for historical reenactment, try NCOWS.

There is absolutely no restriction against rubber soles in CAS. One category, Classic Cowboy/Cowgirl, restricts boots to 'traditional design with non-grip enhancing (i.e. “NO Lug”) soles'. For all the other categories SASS recognizes that the terrain may not always be ideal and will never sacrifice safety for costume's sake.

Yes, there are a lot of categories. All you have to do is choose one. It ain't that big a deal.

As I said earlier, we shoot two pistols simply because it is more fun than shooting one. When I first started I shot at a club that only used one pistol. Trust me, it is much more fun to shoot two, I would never want to go back to one. Have you ever seen anybody shooting Gunfighter category with both pistols out at once, blazing away alternatively with both pistols? It just does not get any better than that. Particularly when they are shooting Black Powder.

Cowboy shooters are the friendliest shooters on the planet. If you don't have the money to come up with all the guns, all you have to do is ask, and someone will provide you with whatever you need for the match, including ammo. What I see far more often is new shooters who would rather not borrow someone else's guns, but would rather the rules be rewritten to accommodate them. We don't much cotton to newbies wanting the rules customized for them. Would you like that if you were a member of a club and a new guy wanted to change everything as soon as he joined?

I do not recommend starting out with C&B pistols because they are cheap. Have you priced Black Powder recently? It is cheaper to shoot 38 Specials in cartridge guns that shoot Black Powder, the cost savings of the pistols will quickly be negated. Also, a lot of newbies who want to start with C&B have no experience with them. A match is no place to learn the intricacies of shooting C&B. It's a different story if you are already familiar with C&B and how to keep them running without a hitch. I bring a pair of 1860s sometimes, but frankly, I much prefer shooting cartridges.

Wild Bunch is a completely separate competition. Wildbunch competitors may shoot the same course of fire as the Cowboy shooters, but they are always scored separately. The idea is to shoot a match with guns from the movie of the same name. The time period is roughly from 1900 to 1916, but that is not cast in stone. Firearms used in Wild Bunch are the 1911, any Main Match lever gun, and the 1897 shotgun. I have shot Wild Bunch informally with pencil barreled Smiths, but that is not allowed in the rules. The reason Wild Bunch matches came about is because the governing body of SASS has always called itself The Wild Bunch. Kind of hypocritical to have that name and deny a match based on the movie of the same name.

Yes, some guys shoot very light loads. Not everybody, and you are certainly not required to shoot light loads. As a matter of fact, just last year a power factor was introduced to keep loads from being ridiculously light. At the other end of the spectrum, I challenge anybody to shoot my 45 Colt and 44-40 loads, stuffed with FFg, and call them light.

Yes, it is the Single Action Shooting Society. Not the Early Double Action Shooting Society. That's why early DAs are not allowed. Nothing to do with historical accuracy or anything. It's in the name. In truth, I shoot at a couple of clubs that are only too happy to allow me to shoot my S&W DA 44, chambered for 44 Russian and made in 1881. I only shoot it with Black Powder. You would be amazed at how much latitude there sometimes is at the local club level, once folks get to know you.



Bottom line is, what ever the sport is, it is always more fun to dress up and compete with other like minded shooters in action shooting than punching holes in paper by yourself. It is also more fun to get off your duff and participate rather than sniping from the sidelines.

Yes, I tried a Zoot Shoot once. Had a ball. Shot pencil barreled 38s and borrowed a Tommy Gun. What's more fun than that?

End of rant, back to Carrying in the Old West.

 

[CraigC]

The reason told to us was because being a light gauge would give her an unfair advantage.

Apparently they've never shot a properly proportioned, lightweight 28ga double!

 

[Driftwood Johnson]

The reason told to us was because being a light gauge would give her an unfair advantage.

From the Shooter's Handbook:

SHOTGUN GAUGES

• Side-by-side, single shot, and lever action shotguns must be centerfire of at least 20 gauge and no larger the 10 gauge.
• Slide action shotguns must be centerfire of at least 16 gauge and no larger than 12 gauge.
• Side-by-side, single shot, and lever action centerfire shotguns in .410 are allowed within the Buckaroo Category only.

Like I said before, if you want to play the game, you have to play within the rules just like everybody else. At a local match they may cut you some slack.

 

[joecil]

As I tried to say DJ there is something for everyone out there if one wants too look. Even quick draw groups which I was a member of over 40 years ago for a couple of years. To old and slow now for that game but it was fun to say the least.

 

[CraigC]

All I'm saying is that the 28ga in a light shotgun, like my 5lb Merkel, is no slouch in the recoil department. Unlike the typical .38 mousefart loads that dribble out of `73's.

 

[Slamfire]

I looked in a 1901 and 1903 Sear catalog and looked at the cost of Colt SAA's and other revolvers.

I also looked at average wages.

Good guns were very expensive in the day and people today just do not appreciate how poor people were back then.

Even into the 30's. I had an uncle who was a farm kid during the depression. He said they had "no money", bartered for everything, wore shoes only in the winter.

I am of the opinion that the average person did not carry a gun at all. If they had a firearm it was a cheap shotgun, cheap single shot rimfire rifle, or some cheap civil war surplus rifle.

 

[DammitBoy]

Please put cowboy action shooting comments in other threads. I'd hate to see this one get locked up and closed down for off-topic rants.

 

[CraigC]

Good guns were very expensive in the day and people today just do not appreciate how poor people were back then.

Which is one reason why percussion guns and cartridge conversions of same lasted well into the 1880's and beyond. Colt could convert a percussion gun to fire cartridges for a fraction of the cost of a new SAA.

 

[Iggy]

I had 3 uncles (brothers) among other relatives that homesteaded out here in Wyoming in the 1880's and 90's.

These guys would make a 35 mile trip to Cheyenne every three months for supplies. It was a 3 day round trip with a team and a wagon.

At the conclusion of their shopping spree, they would each buy a 5 cent cigar. They would each smoke half of it the first month, chew the second half the 2nd month and smoke the dried up wad in their pipes the third month.

These ol boys ran a small cattle spread and they owned one shot gun between them.

My Dad had a .22 single shot bolt action rifle. They ate a lot of rabbits killed with that gun.
When his horse fell and rolled with him, the stock on the rifle was busted. He repaired it by wrapping wet rawhide around the broken pistol grip. I've still got the rifle. It is so worn that when you close the bolt, the firing pin drops.

I can tell lots of stories about the old homesteaders and how they survived, like the guy that pushed a wheel barrow nine miles each way to Chugwater for supplies, but few would believe them today.

Those folks raised the generation that fought WWII. Those young men knew the cost of freedom and they paid that price with their lives. Ain't many of them left today, or the spirit they represented.

 

[Jim K]

"SASS is not historical re-enactment. It is a fantasy shooting sport based on what a lot of us remember from TV and the movie theater when we were kids"

Heresy! To the stake! Actually, I am glad someone said it and it is true of all those shooting games and re-enactments. I have seen Civil War re-enactors discuss the insignia on their uniform buttons, while ignoring the fact that the uniform was stretched over a belly no CW soldier could possibly have had. The TV show picturing "Confederate troops" marching toward Gettysburg was laughable. I mean no disrespect to folks having fun and teaching us some history, but those overweight, overage guys could not have marched a mile without collapsing. And those nice uniforms and sturdy boots! The CS Army never looked so good. Then, when someone had them take off their shoes to lend "authenticity" to the barefoot Confederate story, their feet were nice and white and clean, with no calluses.

You can't really go back in time, even in playacting; every generation is a prisoner of its own time, whether we like it or not. But I admit, it is fun trying to recapture the past.

Jim

 

[Jim K]

On prices, the Colt SAA fluctuated some, but cost around $15-16. The average cowboy got about $.50 a day, so my statement that a Colt SAA cost half a month's pay was not a wild guess but simple fact.

He got his "found" (food and shelter) and some ranches would even sell ranch hands clothes, and other goods, like tobacco, "on tick" (credit) to be paid for out of wages. In fact, the ranch stocked about anything that would be needed. (Remember, they couldn't just run down to the Safeway; ranches were often 50-100 miles from the nearest town.)

An average laborer got around $1 a day; miners and some others had company stores that sold at fair enough prices where also food and goods could be bought on credit against wages. If a man or his wife overspent, then Johnny Cash's lament "I owe my soul to the company store" became true.

A skilled worker got $2 a day, or sometimes more. My grandfather, a skilled stonemason and brick layer, got $2-2.50 a day in 1900, and that was considered quite good middle class wages.

Jim

 

[Iggy]

Even as late as the 1950's and 60's I got $5.00 a day working on the family ranch. Of course gasoline was a $.25 back then, I thought I was doin' pretty good.

I made my spending money shooting Jack Rabbits in the winter time. A box of .22LR's was $.50 and there was a mink farmer that paid $.50 a rabbit. I had a single shot Stevens Favorite rifle. One of those uncles paid $3.50 new for that rifle in 1915.

It was aim for the eyeball and one shot one rabbit. I was in tall clover in High School. Nobody thought a thing about me having that rifle in my car at school.

 

[Cards81fan]

These ol boys ran a small cattle spread and they owned one shot gun between them.

It's been said in this thread by worth repeating. My great-grandfather had but one firearm, a hardware store single-shot shotgun. He moved from farming near Oppelo Arkansas to Washington County, Oklahoma in the 1920. The gun moved with him and the wife and the kids. It was all he needed as far as a weapon goes, but still a pretty important piece of equipment as far as hunting and prowlers were concerned. A pistol was too much a fighting gun; not versatile enough.

We still have it in the family today.

 

[JRH6856]

Johnny Cash's lament "I owe my soul to the company store" became true.

Actually Tennessee Ernie Ford made it famous in 1955. Johnny Cash didn't record it until 1987.

(and now, back to the thread, please.)

 

[Kernel]

[Unidentified portrait of man with rifle.], 1908-1912
Erwin E. Smith Collection of the Library of Congress
----------------------------------------------------------


Is that ol' boy carrying a pair of binoculars?

 

[Iggy]

Either that or a digital camera
He's got one of them shoot today, kill tomorrow Sharp's rifles, he needs them looka heap glasses.

 

[Cosmoline]

Most "Cowboys" left their handgun in their bedroll in the chuck wagon unless they knew there was trouble afoot.

More than that, very few drovers ever owned a centerfire handgun until the 20th century. They were extremely expensive, and drovers were not wealthy then or now. The men who *owned* the cattle may have had a Colt or other sidearm, but the men who did the work were often unarmed or had to make do with some old muzzleloader.

Those who could own sidearms tended to have them covered with plenty of leather. There may have been some professional shooters on either side of the law who carried in unorthodox fashion for the fast draw, but these were exceptions.

Long guns ruled the real west. And the last frontier as well. We're living, right now, in the great age of the short gun.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

My grandfather was a member of the Cherokee Strip Cow Punchers Association. The CSCPA were real cowboys -- they allowed Tom Mix to join, but only as an Honorary Member. Most of the cow punchers were quite young (Grandpa was only about 15 and could not afford a gun at that age.) But great-grandpa was armed everywhere he went.