Just for reference I built a shorty like this for an old friend (now long gone) that not only killed an elk bull up in Idaho with one shot from his shorty, but darn near blew it up the next day hunting grouse. He was an old cattle rancher that had at one time or another run his hands through all kinds of machinery, so he didn’t have much feeling in those old paws. I think in the cold weather he didn’t get the shot load down on the powder charge, or maybe the wad sealed so well it pushed the wad back up the bore after he rammed it down. In either case it kicked him real good, and blew the wood off behind the breech tang. He brought it home and I took it apart. The cross bolts were all bent, and the upward tang screw was also. The barrel pins were almost impossible to get out, and looked like miniature bicycle handlebars. He came as close to blowing a gun up as I’ve ever seen without actually doing it. I measured the barrel on the outside, and ran some oversized wad through it to check for bulges. I checked the breechplug to see if the threads had started to pull, but they were all good. Then we tied it down and shot a few times with his regular charge. All worked out just fine. He shot that little gun until he could no longer go shooting, his son shoots it now.
That is also one of those Belgian unproofed barrels from Turner Kirkland. You wouldn’t dare sell that today.
Hungry Horse
