How Deadly are Shotguns?

[Caballoflaco]

SD shotguns are a relative new thing that will probably better serve the needs of more urban dwellers than a pistol, especially if they never shoot it, which I believe is the case. I did a search for tactical shotgun classes near me and came up blank. Mostly what I see is opportunities for tactical pistol and AR training. Most people aren't willing to travel to train when an overnight stay is required. Might be different where you live.

Considering that Winchester model 97 riot guns were used by American troops in the Philippines during Spanish American War that ended in 1902, and were already in the Winchester catalogue and not a special order item your statement is not factually correct. In fact every successful repeating shotgun from the 1900’s onward was offered in a riot gun configuration from the factory.

Up until the late 90’s shotguns were by far the most popular long arm for both police and citizens. They only recently fell out of popularity because:

A. the North Hollywood Bank Robbery/ Shootout ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nort...ywood_shootout ) shootout where they (shotguns) weren’t effective due the distances involved the bad guys using body armour and police only having buckshot. This led to the wide-scale adoption of carbines by police departments and the dropping of shotguns by same. At the time police/swat were the biggest influences on popular gun culture and gun mags were full of “death of the police/combat shotgun” articles for the next decade.

B. Expiration of the AWB which meant that new gun buyers could now buy new AR mags that didn’t cost $60-$100 dollars each and reliable brands other than Colt became available on the market.

C. The Global War caused the drivers in the market to go from Police to Military and those guys were killing the shit out of people with carbines and by the mid 2000’s had really worked the kinks out of the design, and refined manipulation and technique to a level that we hadn’t seen before. Plus, optics and accessories were improved and proven in field use at the same time.

[Borderland]

Considering that Winchester model 97 riot guns were used by American troops in the Philippines during Spanish American War that ended in 1902, and were already in the Winchester catalogue and not a special order item your statement is not factually correct. In fact every successful repeating shotgun from the 1900’s onward was offered in a riot gun configuration from the factory.

Yeah, I know. I have one with a 20" barrel with no choke from the factory. Built around 1917 I believe. I know where it came from because I knew both of previous owners. It was never used as a tactical shotgun. The cyl bore was popular for deer hunters using slugs. That was the reason the 20" barrel was ordered with the original purchase. The gun also came with a 30" full choke barrel which I also have.




These shotguns were used by prison guards, the military, and police for riot control. They were never purchased in large numbers by civilians as a tactical weapon until somebody figured out there was a market for them in the last 20-25 years.

It's all good. Lots of people feel it's the answer for HD. I'm not disagreeing with that.

Not too long ago I remember seeing barrels of 870 shotguns with 20" barrels for sale for $150, all police surplus. I think that's where the tactical shotgun trend in the civilian population originated. Good, cheap, effective, one shot HD. Joe Biden approved.

[03RN]

I honestly have no idea why anyone would use a shotgun over an AR aside from old cops that have 30 years experience with them and almost none with a rifle or states where you’re so handicapped legally that most other options are outlawed.


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I still defer to the shotgun for home defense. I cannot find a shot passed 75 yards around my house unless you count the lake a quarter mile away.

The shotguns effectiveness is significant enough that I have no qualms with the reduced capacity. Add a side saddle and soe micro rig and I'm fully confident in my ability to face any possible or probable threat. Hell, even the improbable ones too.

As an out an about, GP/ hunting longgun I do take rifles sometimes as bumming around clear-cuts can present shots a few hundred yards out.

[Standard]

I still defer to the shotgun for home defense. I cannot find a shot passed 75 yards around my house unless you count the lake a quarter mile away.

The shotguns effectiveness is significant enough that I have no qualms with the reduced capacity. Add a side saddle and soe micro rig and I'm fully confident in my ability to face any possible or probable threat. Hell, even the improbable ones too.

As an out an about, GP/ hunting longgun I do take rifles sometimes as bumming around clear-cuts can present shots a few hundred yards out.

I feel the same. And being in CA, modern rifle options are limited, so I defer to shotguns anyway.

[03RN]

Yeah, I know. I have one with a 20" barrel with no choke from the factory. Built around 1917 I believe. I know where it came from because I knew both of previous owners. It was never used as a tactical shotgun. The cyl bore was popular for deer hunters using slugs. That was the reason the 20" barrel was ordered with the original purchase. The gun also came with a 30" full choke barrel which I also have.




These shotguns were used by prison guards, the military, and police for riot control. They were never purchased in large numbers by civilians as a tactical weapon until somebody figured out there was a market for them in the last 20-25 years.

It's all good. Lots of people feel it's the answer for HD. I'm not disagreeing with that.

Not too long ago I remember seeing barrels of 870 shotguns with 20" barrels for sale for $150, all police surplus. I think that's where the tactical shotgun trend in the civilian population originated. Good, cheap, effective, one shot HD. Joe Biden approved.

Shotguns have been the primary self defense weapon since the Europeans settled North America.

Even with muzzleloaders. Muzzleloading shotguns easily outsold rifles back then because they were cheaper and more versatile with hunting.

The spread west? Sure, Hawkins and then Winchester's were popular but there cost was prohibitive to most of the sod busters moving out west. What do you think most houses had for self defense if not shotguns?

Movie's and literature have romanticized the American rifleman as they certainly did exist but shotguns have always been our country's bread and butter self and home defense weapon.

[MandoWookie]

My recollection may be off, but wasn't 3-gun, with it's big focus on the shotgun, an outgrowth of SOF magazines original practical matches, who emphasized the shotgun as the third gun precisely because it was the most common police and civilian practical long gun?

And in the eighties, the huge explosion of "tactical" shotguns, like the SPAS, Streetsweeper and the like seems to me to demonstrate a market for the shotgun as a primary weapon, at least for police primarily and civ second. They certainly didnt have a huge military appeal.

[Borderland]

Shotguns have been the primary self defense weapon since the Europeans settled North America.

Even with muzzleloaders. Muzzleloading shotguns easily outsold rifles back then because they were cheaper and more versatile with hunting.

The spread west? Sure, Hawkins and then Winchester's were popular but there cost was prohibitive to most of the sod busters moving out west. What do you think most houses had for self defense if not shotguns?

Movie's and literature have romanticized the American rifleman as they certainly did exist but shotguns have always been our country's bread and butter self and home defense weapon.

Well, I guess I have to disagree. We always had more rifles in the house for game, which was important to people in the west. So did our neighbors. That was AZ in the 60's and I knew a few of old timers who had been ranchers and cattlemen in AZ before it was a state. These guys were all in their 70's-80's so that means they were born before 1900. They might have owned a shotgun but I never saw one and they never talked about ever using one. None of them were bird hunters. What I did see was a lot of lever rifles in use. They used them to hunt deer and to slaughter cattle because they ate what they raised or could kill hunting. When I was a kid I also paid attention to who owned a revolver because I was fascinated by those. I never knew anyone who owned one. The mystique that almost everyone in the west had a single action revolver is just plain Hollywood.

The reality is a firearm for strictly home defense wasn't really a thing until about 50 years ago because they just weren't needed. Hostilities with native Americans ended around 1886. The first successful pump shotgun was introduced in 1897, about 10 years later.

A search for lever action rifles, 1895 and earlier will easily yield 10 times more antiques than shotguns of the same vintage. That should tell you something. There is a hole of about 75 years there in your theory.

[Joe in PNG]

A search for lever action rifles, 1895 and earlier will easily yield 10 times more antiques than shotguns of the same vintage. That should tell you something.

Survivorship bias is a thing?
Plus, the 1890s was the transition to smokeless powder. Most of the previous consumer grade shotguns were dangerous with smokeless shells, and there wasn't much nostalgia value to an unshootable old break action single or double.

[JTMcC]

Ammo capacity is up there IMO, but ease of use is my primary reason. An 11.5” SBR in 5.56, with truly enhanced (not gimmicky) controls is exponentially easier to use effectively and is more versatile. People love saying that the shotgun is versatile and while it is to an extent, that’s based around the actual shell in the gun. 00 buck at 3 yards may well have better terminal ballistics than my 75gr Gold Dot but I could use my round with the same level of effectiveness from contact distance inside my bedroom to the end of the street if someone was doing a drive-by on our neighbor’s house.

I can go from a 16.1” OAL barrel in commie states to a 10.3” barrel where SBRs are allowed without worrying about on board capacity. I can suppress it to preserve some level of night vision and hearing, and because recoil is lower I can achieve first round hits and faster follow up shots easier and faster.

Plus I’m not worried about pumping or getting an auto that’s actually reliable with light recoil loads.

I honestly have no idea why anyone would use a shotgun over an AR aside from old cops that have 30 years experience with them and almost none with a rifle or states where you’re so handicapped legally that most other options are outlawed.


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Have you done much shooting at moving targets in low light?
I'm fortunate that on my range we can practice moving targets all we want from various angles. That's (for me) reason #1.
#2 is that I can't hit my neighbors with anything launched from a shotgun. Rifles for sure I could. That gives me 360 degrees of shootability without regard to hitting people/cars/houses.
#3 is that at night, when I most have to step outside to see what the dogs are agitated about, a shotgun is effective as far as I can illuminate & identify targets.
#4 is that in my rural life there are a lot of various critters mostly predators that get shot on the regular, reverting back to #1, those critters sometimes are moving right along at high speed.
#5 is that the same gun is effective on everything from snakes to coyotes to Cuban paratroopers to dangerous, much larger than human size animals with a simple change in the chambered shell.

If I need 240 rounds to defend my home, at ranges past 100 yds, I can step inside and pick up tools to do that but my 1st choice going out the door is a 12 gauge.

[MandoWookie]

The reality is a firearm for strictly home defense wasn't really a thing until about 50 years ago because they just weren't needed. Hostilities with native Americans ended around 1886. The first successful pump shotgun was introduced in 1897, about 10 years later.

A search for lever action rifles, 1895 and earlier will easily yield 10 times more antiques than shotguns of the same vintage. That should tell you something. There is a hole of about 75 years there in your theory.

I think there is a disconnect. Shotguns were the default for home defense, because they were the default for everything. That 20 inch 97 may have been purchased for larger game hunting, but it is also perfectly set up for use as a defensive firearm.
Also you may have location bias. Arizona from what I recall passing through, is pretty wide open in every dimension.
Same timeline for here in the Ozarks, single-shot and later pump shotguns where the default for anything. If they were particularly well off or a hardcore deer hunter, you might see someone splurge on a lever-gun, but all the stories my grandfather tells of his youth and the old timers he learned from, was shotguns were the be all and end all.


His default for a bump in the night gun is his Light Twelve Auto-5, and hanging on the wall is the ragged old single shot 12 gauge held together by bailing wire and a replacement firing pin made from a nail, that he learned to hunt with, and wasn't retired from use even after it wouldn't lock closed reliably. The majority of in use shotguns were cheap store-brand single or doubles, used until destruction, and often treated about as well as the average hammer. This continued long after repeating shotguns hit the market, that were of equivalent quality to the lever-guns of the era. I cannot remember off the top of my head what brand that gun on the wall is, but I do recall when I researched it, it was made in the 1910s, and was purchased used by my great-grandfather in the 50s.

That might have to do with the area around here, between hills and brush, not allowing practical shots beyond 75 to a 100 yards, and any longer ranges of clear and flat being dedicated to livestock, so likely to have cattle in the possible line of fire.