A fun video from Garand Thumb.
I love the old Knuckle Duster.
A fun video from Garand Thumb.
I love the old Knuckle Duster.
I have a deep and irrational love for that shotgun.
My grandfather used a Winchester 1897 shotgun in the Marine Corps. There was one in the family for a while when I was a boy. It moved with an uncle to Idaho.
I've been trying to track it down for 15 years, and return it to the fold. This year I was able to get back an old top-break .32 S&W revolver. I hope the shotgun is next.
Incase anyone wants to dig in on the history. tl;dr: most of the hoopla about how effective the trench gun was unsourced opinions printed in newspapers prior to the weapons even shipping to Europe, and in actual use they were really quite underwhelming (compared to the fanfare and old wives' tales). Oh, and nobody called them the "Trench gun" or "Trench shotgun" except the newspapers.
Last edited by TGS; 12-20-2019 at 05:10 PM.
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I would not want a shotgun in WWI just because the paper hulled shells did not hold up well and would cause all kinds of problems. My understanding is that full brass shells were very uncommon at the time due to their expense.
I love Garand Thumb's videos. Some great humor mixed with some solid info.
While I too love the 1897 and own three...I cannot agree with his assertion that the gun is a "reliable and robust weapon" somewhere around the 12 minute mark in that vid.
I don't have enough fingers and toes to count the times mine have gone down over the years in the CAS world. It is a fragile design. I often wonder how much it went down in the many combat theaters where it was used, or if at some point savy users started to baby it instead of running it hard all the time.
When it comes to durability, the 1897 cannot hold the 870's jock.
Last edited by fatdog; 12-21-2019 at 12:05 AM.
I went and looked at the website he said he got that one from. They wanted $1400 for one. I don't know what all they do to it but I'm betting it would run circles around a mint condition original one. It is still a 120 year old design though so I'd rather have a 590. The bayonets aren't as cool though. My favorite line in the video was "Wouldn't it be cool if we mounted a shotgun on a sword?"
They also had a whippet gun for 7 or 8 hundred. If they were in stock I would be tempted.