Shooting Styles

[northmn]

We have commented on the hockey stick like drop on original rifles and their rather interesting buttplate design.  The butplates were designed to be shot off the upper arm not the shoulder.  Were the stocks designed with a head up style as compared to our current method of "getting down" on the stock?  Was the cheek piece more of a chin piece?  Maybe some of those rifles survived because no one wanted to shoot them after the original owner was done with them 

DP

[Pvt. Lon Grifle]

Seems to me that when gunmaking was really localized you had to take either a trade type pattern, or the local construction, however it was stocked, unless you could take time off your survival farm  to go back to Charlottesville or Winchester, or Lancaster,  and get one of theirs.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Most muzzle loading rifles and fowlers, in my opinion, are best shot by raising the gun to your eye with your head erect, rather than the way I see a lot of people trying to crawl onto the stock.  If you keep your right arm at least parallel to the ground or a little higher, for a right eyed shooter, it brings the comb up to your face, so you don't have to drop your face onto the stock, thereby inclining the head so that the right thumb whacks your nose when you touch her off.  We'll have to take some pictures, perhaps, to illustrate this shooting style.

[northmn]

If one looks at shotguns made in the late 1800's you will also see more drop.  I understand that that was the head up shooting style.  As to taking what is made, the originals were custom guns made to suit customers, not off the rack weapons.  Complaints on NWTG's were that they were too straight.

DP

[James Rogers]

Most muzzle loading rifles and fowlers, in my opinion, are best shot by raising the gun to your eye with your head erect, rather than the way I see a lot of people trying to crawl onto the stock.  If you keep your right arm at least parallel to the ground or a little higher, for a right eyed shooter, it brings the comb up to your face, so you don't have to drop your face onto the stock, thereby inclining the head so that the right thumb whacks your nose when you touch her off.  We'll have to take some pictures, perhaps, to illustrate this shooting style.

Bringing the gun to the face is always the best option for rifle or gun. I prefer a 45 on the elbow angle for fowling pieces.
An upright shooting position is had by the design of the stock as much or more in the way it is mounted. The butt drop must be designed to allow full contact with the shoulder (or arm on the scoop plates) while at the same time the comb must be at the right height to allow for a solid mount just under the cheekbone. Even when bringing the gun to the face, if there is not the right butt drop, the shoulder contact will be off either by by having only the toe making contact with the heel above the shoulder or the heel too low on the shoulder. Trap shooters use an upright rifle style of shooting because their shots are all outgoing and not so varied (more like rifle shooting). Many of their stocks use a monte carlo style to give enough heel drop and allow for a higher comb to meet the cheekbone without creating such a drastic angle to make felt recoil worse. If one is shooting off the bicep, they are a further distance from the face so a narrower stock, more cast, or a more exaggerated shooting across the body is needed to compensate. 

There is no way some of those original guns that the OP is speaking of can be shot to full potential because they will not fit anyone correctly. Correct form and fit was not perfected and style was a bigger factor. I would have to use a chin weld to shoot one of those things. Can one be a great shot with one of these stocks? Yes they can but they could shoot it much better if actually fit them.

[Mike R]

Rifles vs shotguns--the 'hold' is usually different because of the way most learned to shoot IMHO: shotguns need to fit when brought up quickly to the shoulder because they are shot 'offhand' starting from some carry position, typically at rapidly flying targets. Rifle shooters can adapt to ill-fitting stocks because most shoot from a bench or rest at still or slowly moving targets--they 'crawl' onto the stock [as well said above] because you almost have to from a bench where most ammo is expended these days. The true expert offhand shooter needs a differently fitting rifle because he tends to hold and shot more like a shotgunner [but not exactly--he aims, typically, although point shooting is often better]. The scoped modern gun also requires a shooter to hold differently--we open sight MLers tend to shoot more offhand and with open sights.  I cut my teeth on opensighted .22s and developed a 'hold' memory that has been built over nearly 60 yrs of shooting. Human body build has an effect on what stock shape fits best.  I like a lot of drop in my guns, some do not.  Read old English texts on wing shooting for excellent advice on shotgun holds and mounting...

[Daryl]

The reason English styled hutning rifles fit so well and are very fast shooting is because the fit like a shotgun. The gun is brought to the shoulder while you are looking at the game and when the gun hits your shoulder you are looking down the sights, already aligned on the spot you want to hit.  If there is not enough drop in the comb, you have to fit yourself to the gun- takes time and also tilts the head. Once tilted, your balance co-ordinators, your inner ear, is slanted and you balance isn't as good.  Crawling a stock puts you off balance - there is no other way to describe it, I don't think.  Heads-up, is the most stable and that's why Olympic shooters, even today, shoot heads-up.  the more parralel your eyes are, the better your balance. With proper drop at heal and comb, this method of holding is ensured.

Hooked butts, made to be shot off the arm itself, defeat this as much as not having enough drop, as the hold is not natural, as in mounting a shotgun.  Swiss-type butts with big hooks to go undreneath the arm pit allow extrememly heavy guns, which allows steady holding AND a headsup hold. The pocket of muscle inside the shoulder joint 'cups' the wide, quite flat butt of a shotgun, as it should the wide flat butt of the 'ultimate' rifle.

imho, of course.

[northmn]

In one respect rifles differ from shotguns.  I rarely find a rest to shoot a shotgun from and do as much as possible with a rifle out in the woods.  Offhand targets is the most natural "hold", but I have used trees, knees, and X sticks out in the woods as rests.  Jack O'Connor one time commented that he had seen more rifles made to "fit" than shotguns, yet a rifle can be scrunched up on in a variety of methods and made to shoot fairly well.  Shotguns need to fit.  Even so I also make my rifles fit. I think I ahve shrunk as recently I ahve found those I made about 20 years ago or so have too long of a pull (I target shot and made them for shirt sleeves) now wearing a coat they do not fit as well.  My drop was for a slightly bent over head, not heads up.  This old dog is getting kind of old to change but it would be interesting

[hanshi]

Most muzzle loading rifles and fowlers, in my opinion, are best shot by raising the gun to your eye with your head erect, rather than the way I see a lot of people trying to crawl onto the stock.  If you keep your right arm at least parallel to the ground or a little higher, for a right eyed shooter, it brings the comb up to your face, so you don't have to drop your face onto the stock, thereby inclining the head so that the right thumb whacks your nose when you touch her off.  We'll have to take some pictures, perhaps, to illustrate this shooting style.

I read and was told long, long ago that longrifles were (suppose to be) shot with a "heads-up" position.  I'm short and have always had a problem with lop on rifles being way too long.  I got really tired of crawling up the stock in order to see through the scope.  There were very few rifles that ever "fit" (sorta) me.  My longrifles were made with my lop and when I close my eyes, mount the gun, the sights are already aligned.  This has enabled me to mount/fire accurately in one smooth motion when necessary.  With my neck problem "heads-up" is comfortable and natural.

[The other DWS]

"Hooked butts, made to be shot off the arm itself, defeat this as much as not having enough drop, as the hold is not natural, as in mounting a shotgun.  Swiss-type butts with big hooks to go undreneath the arm pit allow extrememly heavy guns, which allows steady holding AND a headsup hold".

Having come to this site from a background in the the ASSRA (schuetzen) shooting side of things, maybe I can clarify things a little bit.  I have several original schuetzen offhand rifles, and a couple modern repros,  most have "hooked" buttplates.  In general the shooting style was very upright with the buttplate hooked around the upper arm, in fact many of the originals, both cartridge and M/L are too tight to fit modern bodies, particularly the double pronged type.  I do have one single shot  a BSA international with a later 1970-ish Freeland buttplate that fits against the shoulder with the hook curved to fit under the arm and "around" the body.   It is correct that the pronged/hooked buttplate, and perhaps the deeply crescent ones of the M/L era do help  stabilize a long heavy barrel for formal offhand shooting.  the favored posture wiht these rifles is pretty much standing with the shoulders aimed at the target and the rifle held pretty much across the chest with the "off" hand serving as a balance point, usually just forward of the trigger guard.

I am wondering how much the "long rifles" were actually shot in what we call the "off-hand" position.  I seem to recall that some form or rest was more commonly used whenever possible and that a freestanding offhand position was avoided if at all possible. 

[northmn]

One thing about originals, especially the mid 1800's or so was that the hook was on top and would not stabilize a long heavy barrel although it is possible that they were of enough crescent to do so.  Comments were made about the later "Golden Age" rifles as having straighter heavy barrels whcih with their length would be awkward to hold off hand.  I do not know if maybe the excessive drop is better for heads up over the log rest type shooting   I always built offhand rifles.

DP

[Don Getz]

Daryl.....you were talking about "crawling" up on the stock.    How much do you want to bet that all, or most, of the top
trap and skeet shooters crawl the stock?    Now, when you look at the top rifle shooters, they are shooting highly modified guns, high combs, etc, which brings their head right up in line with the sights....I'm talking here of small bore and
air rifle stuff.    If you go to Camp Perry where all of the military shoot standard weapons, how do they shoot them?   I would be willing to bet that most do some crawling on the stocks.    The first real "chunk" gun I had was one built by Ron
Borron, an iron mounted southern type gun, 1 1/8" straight barrel, heavy, with a lot of drop.  I shot it for one or two years, but not well.   It wasn't until I built up the cheek and comb with several layers of leather, to the point of where I
could cheek the comb hard and be in alignment with sights that I shot it well.  The first year I did this, I placed 5th at the
York shoot.  As for original guns, they did not modify their guns to suit an individual, maybe the length of pull, but if you look at a J.P.Beck, or any one, they have basically the same architecture.   Joe Long rifles all have the same look.  If you
were to buy a gun from one of these old masters you would have adapted your shooting style to align the sights......Don

[Daryl]

As far as length of pull goes, a short stock is very much easier to shoot than a stock that is too long.  Shooting a variety of rifles, with different lengths of pull from 12 1/2" to 14 1/2" is not a problem, one merely holds the right shoudler forward to get the fit right, but a 15" pull or longer can have you all 'out of sorts' trying to get good accuracy from the standing position.

Different stock styles admit too different lengths of pull.  A heavy recoiler must be short enough and have width enough to tuck into the pocket inside the arm - or shooting suffers from the pain inflicted.  I would not want to shoot a Hawken, for instance, if in 16 bore or larger with hunting loads.

[James Rogers]

Daryl you are on the mark about stock styles. Grip and trigger design can cause one to need a different LOP.

I agree that it is easier to shoot with a stock that is TOO small than to shoot with a stock that is TOO long. There is however a range in between those that can be comfortable and it is generally agreed that the longer you can go in that range, the better the conditions for the shooter.

[Daryl]

Daryl.....you were talking about "crawling" up on the stock.    How much do you want to bet that all, or most, of the top
trap and skeet shooters crawl the stock?    Now, when you look at the top rifle shooters, they are shooting highly modified guns, high combs, etc, which brings their head right up in line with the sights....I'm talking here of small bore and
air rifle stuff.    If you go to Camp Perry where all of the military shoot standard weapons, how do they shoot them?   I would be willing to bet that most do some crawling on the stocks.    The first real "chunk" gun I had was one built by Ron
Borron, an iron mounted southern type gun, 1 1/8" straight barrel, heavy, with a lot of drop.  I shot it for one or two years, but not well.   It wasn't until I built up the cheek and comb with several layers of leather, to the point of where I
could cheek the comb hard and be in alignment with sights that I shot it well.  The first year I did this, I placed 5th at the
York shoot.  As for original guns, they did not modify their guns to suit an individual, maybe the length of pull, but if you look at a J.P.Beck, or any one, they have basically the same architecture.   Joe Long rifles all have the same look.  If you
were to buy a gun from one of these old masters you would have adapted your shooting style to align the sights......Don

Yes Don. I agree and know the trap and skeet shooters all crawl the stock - I did so when I shot that game.  I am also reminded of the kid who blew all the 'expert' trap shooters away with his field M12. It didn't even have a vent rib.  All his shooting, even doubles were taken form a 'down' position, mounting the gun as the bird left the trap, and dusting them 20' from the house with his crimped full choke.  

I'm referring to muzzleloading hunting rifles, not modern competition(other than deeply hooked butt Scheutzen shooting) where the heads up position puts a properly stocked gun on the game and aligned as soon as the stock touches the shoulder.  There is no hunting for the sights to align, nor hunting for the target of game once it is aligned.

Taylor's long .50 Virginia points and holds well for a 10 pound rifle, with it's wide butt, placed just inside the chest beside the arm. It doesn't need a hook and man, he shoots it well.  It also allows a heads up hold, but due to the barrel weight, isn't a good 'pointing' gun, not like an English 1/2 stock design, which is a bit better than the Jaegers and flint English varieties.  Most of the American originals I've seen and handled, also allow for a heads up hold, however most of the new production guns, have very straight stocks, where, unless they have excessively high sights, one has to 'hunt' around on the cheek piece looking for a place that won't bruise the cheek bone, but still allow you to see the sights.  Most of us have attempted to shoot one.  With normal mounted sights, many of them won't allow you to get down to the sights, cheek crushed into their high comb.  2x6's don't make good stocks.

[wmrike]

I'll have to say that this is a tricky subject and it's most likely that two elements are at work here, style and function.  Those two elements don't always work in harmony.

If we were to draw sides, I suspect most of us would tend to favor straighter stocks, the fitted, cheek weld approach.  Modern rifles and shotguns are made to that dictum.

Some favor a heads-up style that took the face at least partially off the stock.  Evidence of this can be seen in the handmade weapons going back at least a couple centuries and in many of the commercially made guns up to about WWII. 

If one peruses the old magazines such as "The American Rifleman" you will find articles that talk about almost violently throwing the gun to the shoulder, eye always on the target, and firing as soon as the buttplate touched the shoulder.  In all of these articles, speed and pointing were the lesson.  Certainly not my cup of tea, but there you have it.

No less an authority than Charles Askins in his 1910 "The American Shotgun" describes one method of wingshooting in which the gun is instinctively pointed at the target.  He likened the style to the point-from-the-hip emthod that might be employed by an Old West gunfighter.  Obviously, a modern-dimensioned gun would be ill-suited to this method.

If we are conceited enough to think that we are better shooters today, it would be due in large part to better rationalized techniques and better designed equipment.  But today our impetus is quantitative, that is, how good a score can we turn in.  Center Xs are what carry the day.  Two hundred years ago the impetus was survival, and if a little speed was the cost of a shot that went a little wide but always killed, you could live with that.

And never discount fashion.  It's everywhere all the time.  Twenty years ago we were all hot to build Bedford rifles.

[James Rogers]

 It wasn't until I built up the cheek and comb with several layers of leather, to the point of where I
could cheek the comb hard and be in alignment with sights that I shot it well.  The first year I did this, I placed 5th at the
York shoot.  As for original guns, they did not modify their guns to suit an individual, maybe the length of pull, but if you look at a J.P.Beck, or any one, they have basically the same architecture.   

The "average Joe hunter" back then adapted himself to whatever gun he had the same way the "average Joe hunter" still does today. Some of those are better shots than others. There were a few that were "in the know" even back in the old days that knew how to make a gun fit them or their customer to give them the edge.
I have not seen much evidence of this in America though.

[James Rogers]

If we are conceited enough to think that we are better shooters today, it would be due in large part to better rationalized techniques and better designed equipment. 

Absolutely, and also add the time and ability to fire many more practice rounds down range.

[northmn]

As to adaptation in American guns, I was amused at the number of Brown Bess muskets I saw with scooped out cheek pieces at Fort William.  Too much drop at least didn't belt you in the cheek. The heads up style for shotgunning is English according to some writers.  The ides is to raise the shotgun and eye the target and have everything in line so that the gun fires when the buttplate hits the shoulder.  They used to teach "instintive" shooting for rifles in the Vietnam era similar to that.  I believed they used bb guns up close.  The early Revolutionary rifles seemed to be more like our modern rifles.

DP

[Leatherbelly]

Daryl you are on the mark about stock styles. Grip and trigger design can cause one to need a different LOP.

I agree that it is easier to shoot with a stock that is TOO small than to shoot with a stock that is TOO long. There is however a range in between those that can be comfortable and it is generally agreed that the longer you can go in that range, the better the conditions for the shooter.

This statement is so true. The last sentence says it all.The illusive perfect length of pull changes with each rifle style. So, if that statement is true, how does one get fitted up for a  particular rifle, I dunno?

[Daryl]

I odn't know, either, LB.  Trying a lot of different rifles for something that 'works' is about the best. Diferent styles require different lengths of pull. The straighter the stock, the shorter it will be.

Bess's and especially the French guns require hollowing out the cheek piece due to not enough drop and sharp or wide combs.

[James Rogers]

Bess's and especially the French guns require hollowing out the cheek piece due to not enough drop and sharp or wide combs.

Daryl,
just to clarify..........I assume you are making this statement concerning your personal fit and not as an across the board fact.

[Daryl]

Wellllll, maybe - of all the guys on the firing line on any day, there seem to be few indeed who are not hit in the cheek bone by the cow's face French gun and most Bess's. Custom made guns allow us some leverage in stock design, putting in a bit lower comb, etc.  As well, few indeed, are the original (or replica) 1777 Charleville's not dished at the comb to protect the face.  These guns were meant to be pointed and volley fired, not aimed. When we take deliberate aim, we get hit- not as hard as the ball does, but it doesn't take many shots to leave a bruise in an unmodified gun of these designs.  The 1728 Bess had perhaps the best design(lowest comb), along with the India Sea Service Bess.  The 1745(I think it was) French musket also had sufficient drop in the stock to be comfortable shooting.  Yes we are of larger, average stature than common then. Some other 'whackers' come to mind - modern Italian & Spanish full stocks, TC's and the like also fit ME poorly.

Personally, if I cannot see down the top flat without crushing my cheek into the comb, there isn't enough drop in the comb or heel.  All the above guns display this lack of drop.

[northmn]

The Brown Bess display at Ft William had more than one Bess with a hollowed out cheek area.  I had one and sold it because it belted me in the cheek.   I replaced it with a copy od an American mucsket I made mayself in 12 bore that was easy to shoot.  Daryl is not just talking about his own preferences.  I would call it pretty clsoe to an across the board fact.  Military use of a musket required fast loading and commonly trrops were taught to point at the belt buckle, such that high shooting guns were the norm, even through the Civil war.  I would not be too sure that the amount of drop in military muskets was also due to economies as more guns could be made out of less lumber.  Never had experience with French fukes, but some of the repos I have seen make me shudder as they break every rule for good fit with their slanted buttplates and curved cheek pieces.

DP

[James Rogers]

Thanks Daryl and DP for your replies to my inquiry. I know you were speaking about majority.
My main inquiry was of the Bess type stocks and I have seen some of those scooped out deals.

It's been a long time since I even shouldered a bess.  I don't remember them having such a lack of drop as much as a parallel comb which can be a good thing only if the heel is dropped below it. Not the case on a bess stock.

Does anyone have the drop measurements off an original bess both at the nose of the comb and at the heel that they could share? I would love to add that to my information.