Gun superstitions/phrases

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"Cold enough to freeze the balls off of a brass monkey". I saw something on television once that said that in the old cannon ball days, the balls were stacked in a pyramid shape next to the guns. Since they are round, and would roll away on their own, the first row was set on a holder of some sort, made of brass and called a monkey. In really cold weather, the brass would contract and the cannon balls would then roll off of the monkey.
 
kdf101 said:
"Cold enough to freeze the balls off of a brass monkey". I saw something on television once that said that in the old cannon ball days, the balls were stacked in a pyramid shape next to the guns. Since they are round, and would roll away on their own, the first row was set on a holder of some sort, made of brass and called a monkey. In really cold weather, the brass would contract and the cannon balls would then roll off of the monkey.
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Wikipedia has a more likely explanation;
 
I am surprised that no one has mentioned it is bad luck regarding future hunts to shoot an albino deer yet.;) This was always mentioned in the family for as far back in my youth as I could remember.
 
HARDTARGET - "The phrase "the whole nine yards" to mean you "got it all done" comes from WWI fighter pilots meaning they shot all their ammo. The machine gun was fed with a 27 foot (9 yards) ammo belt. I hope that is really true."
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I've always heard it was from WW II in which the .50 BMG machine guns in the American fighter planes were loaded with "9 yards" of ammo.

WholeNineYards.jpg


L.W.
 
FROGO207 said:
I am surprised that no one has mentioned it is bad luck regarding future hunts to shoot an albino deer yet.;) This was always mentioned in the family for as far back in my youth as I could remember.
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Well, an 11 year old boy in Michigan harvested an albino deer this year with his crossbow. Due to the media coverage of the rare event, anti hunting hatemongers came out with a flood of death threats against the kid. So there may be some truth to that, since he may never want to hunt again.
 
sawdeanz said:
I heard for the first time about a superstition that says it is bad luck to light 3 or more cigarettes with one match. Apparently this originated from WW1 when doing so could get you killed by a sniper. I don't know how true this is, since I don't smoke but I was wondering what other common superstitions or expressions come from gun firearms.
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I know it's bad luck from a health standpoint to smoke any cigarettes
 
From what I read "Bite the Bullet" comes from the muzzleloader days. Alot of times the powder charge and bullet were wrapped into a paper cartridge. Made it easier for soldiers to carry and load quickly than loose powder and made sure they always paured the right amount of powder in the heat of battle.

To load it you had to bite off the end of the paper wrapping to pour the powder out of it and down the barrel.

Also "Busting a cap" on someone is alot older than the rappers who use (or used?) the term.
Comes from cap and ball revolvers. When you shot at someone, you busted a cap on them.
 
From what I read "Bite the Bullet" comes from the muzzleloader days. Alot of times the powder charge and bullet were wrapped into a paper cartridge. Made it easier for soldiers to carry and load quickly than loose powder and made sure they always paured the right amount of powder in the heat of battle.

To load it you had to bite off the end of the paper wrapping to pour the powder out of it and down the barrel.
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From what I read, "bite the bullet" refers to having to do something painful. Quite often on the frontier, the lack of anesthetics meant surgeries or setting broken bones produced a lot of pain and the patient was given a bullet to clench between their teeth to help endure the pain. Hence, bite the bullet came to mean to prepare for a painful experience.
 
JRH6856 said:
From what I read, "bite the bullet" refers to having to do something painful. Quite often on the frontier, the lack of anesthetics meant surgeries or setting broken bones produced a lot of pain and the patient was given a bullet to clench between their teeth to help endure the pain. Hence, bite the bullet came to mean to prepare for a painful experience.
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+1

That is what I always thought.

Besides, it just makes more sense because the phrase means to "man up".
 
How about this one...

He has an itchy trigger finger....

or

Hair trigger...as in He has a hair trigger - the gun or the person goes off easy....
 
Three on a match is bad luck. Match gets lit, sniper sees it, aims on the next, fires on the third.
"...the ones we hear nonstop..." Like shot by a handgun/rifle.
 
"Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey" - The brass monkey was a device for holding cannon balls. Since the balls were steel and the monkey brass, they would expand/shrink at different rates. It would get cold enough that the balls would pop off the brass monkey.
 
Actually the common naval explanation for the "brass monkey " phrase is wrong. It had nothing to do with cannon balls.
Firstly, cannon balls were never stored on the deck of a ship because even if they were in a tray, they would go rolling all over the place as soon as the ship hit rough seas and be quite a danger. Also the deck was to always be kept clear and storing cannonballs there would get in the way of the crew performing their daily duties. At best they were stored in special wooden racks along the walls of the ship to let them be easily accessible.

Not to mention the cannonballs and "brass monkeys" would have to be made to some very exacting tolerances in order for the slight contraction to cause the iron balls to pop out. The kinda tolerances you're not going to see on 18th and 19th century naval equipment.

Lastly there's no evidence of any naval documents referring to any equipment as monkeys.
 
Nickel Plated said:
... Also the deck was to always be kept clear and storing cannonballs there would get in the way of the crew performing their daily duties. At best they were stored in special wooden racks along the walls of the ship to let them be easily accessible.

...
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Which brings up the saying, "Balls to the Wall." When you are getting ready to do battle, you prepare to go "Balls to the Wall" - meaning all out to do battle.

Woody
 
"Keep your powder dry"
I understand it to mean stay ready, especially in a tough spot.
Likely originated from early woodsmen that hunted using flintlocks in bad weather, and needed to make the shot or go without food for a while.

"Don't shoot 'till you see the whites of their eyes"
? Did that originate from the story of a battle in our Revolutionary War?
Something about our Militia keeping their nerve 'til the Redcoats were in range, or ??
 
DeepSouth said:
I was told the term "deadline" came from Andersonville Prison, GA during the War of Northern Aggression. Apparently at some point they built a "expansion" that was little more than a single board fence, but if you happened to get caught crossing the fence you were immediately executed. That obviously earned it the nick name "the deadline"

It's semi-related, and I'm not sure if it's even true, but the OP reminded me of the tale.
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Partially right about the origin of "deadline" from Andersonville. If was used on both sides of the American Civil War.

Dead wrong in believing there was ever a war accurately described as "The War of Northern Aggression". No credible historian describes the American Civil War as being a war of Northern Aggression.
 
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