Howdah Pistol

[Jim McDougall]

Hi Bill and Richard,
I can see how excited you must be to get this piece Bill, I'm right with ya! I keep thinking of your 'museum' there and it really must be a fantastic place for adventures. I recall my den when I would retreat coming home from the chaos of work, heading straight there and my wife would always say, "where are you headed tonight?" and I would say Africa, India, Central Asia or whatever the mood was. It is truly the passion that drives all of us in our collecting and study of these fantastic historical weapons.

Great observations Richard! Its really exciting to see the incredible posts here on firearms, and the interest and expertise on them that has apparantly been latent for so long. I'm glad that this expanded scope has brought this area forward and very much look forward to learning more these and on all these fields of collecting arms and armour.

On the straight rifling, again I emphasize I am a complete novice at firearms, but just a thought. Since these guns were for firing at extremely close range, could it be that rifling would not be needed for trajectory, and would just propel the load straight?
Actually I didn't think that shotguns were rifled as they were firing shot that was controlled by the 'choke' or pattern of the buckshot which depended on the barrel length. Since this is what seems to me essentially a sawed off shotgun, I thought it would be smoothbore.

I've always thought sawed off shotguns were pretty formidable weapons, and most of my interest came from studying the gunfighters of the 'wild west'.The the 'coach guns' carried by the 'shotgun' rider who was sort of the western version of the gunner on WWII bombers come to mind.

Bill, I know what you mean on the black powder firing. I had a most interesting singular experience firing an old black powder musket, and the dynamics were pretty impressive. Even more stunning was that myself, completely alien to guns, actually hit my target!!!

All the best,
Jim