The best shot you've ever seen.

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I was enjoying a cup of coffee this morning and reading through Jeff Cooper's latest commentary. He has a few thoughts in there on what criteria make a person a "good shot", and that got me thinking about the best shot I've ever personally seen. I decided to type up the story and toss it up here, first and foremost because I think it's a good story, and secondly because I think it might provoke an interesting discussion.

For as long as I can remember, my Uncle Jerry has used an old Marlin lever-action .30-30 for deer hunting. While the rest of us spend money on new guns, expensive scopes, and high-energy ammo, Jerry has stuck with the same gun and the same gear. He doesn't even have a scope on it. He just uses those old iron sights. Every year the week before hunting season we get together to zero in our equipment. While we're all tweaking and tuning and measuring groups, Jerry shows up, sets a 2-liter bottle on a stump at about fifty yards, knocks a few holes in it, then puts his gun away and watches us until we're done.

A few years back we were deer hunting up in West Virginia. We'd hunted hard all morning, and around lunchtime we met up in a clearing in the middle of a thicket to sit for awhile, discuss things and get a bite to eat. We probably hadn't been there for 5 minutes (we hadn't even sat down yet) when a big 4-point buck (big deer, small rack) walked out of the thicket no more than 30 yards away.

We froze. The buck froze. Hell, I think the birds in the trees froze. Things got pretty tense for everybody involved. The buck's problem was that there were 6 people with loaded guns not 30 yards away from him. Our problem was that we'd been standing in a circle, so half of us were frozen-in-place with our back to the buck, and the other half had a relative standing between us and our target. The only guy with a clear shot was my 14-year old cousin, who put his gun to his shoulder, took careful aim, and promptly got the worst case of buck fever I've ever seen. Seriously. It was bad. I mean, buck fever alone is bad enough, but can you imagine being 14 years old, with 5 grown-up relatives looking at you, and it's all on your shoulders? Geez. Poor kid locked up tighter than the Gold Depository at Knox.

So there we were. No one could move, and the one guy who could shoot wouldn't. Something had to give, and naturally, it was the buck. Hyperdrive, Mach 2, whatever you want to call it, the male North American whitetailed deer can go from not moving at all to moving very very fast in the blink of an eye. He'd turned slightly to his right to blast back into the safety of that impenetrable laurel thicket, and appeared to be doppler-shifting steadily into the red as he went.

Now, remember my Uncle Jerry? He's the point of this whole story, because he's about to make one hell of a shot. Two of them, actually. Jerry had been one of those guys with his back to the buck. In fact, he'd leaned that old .30-30 against a tree, and was in the process of lighting a cigarette when the buck made his dramatic entrance from stage left. When the buck started moving, I hollered "There he goes!" and before I got all three words out, Jerry had dropped his Bic, grabbed his gun, spun 180°, put his gun to his shoulder, took aim, and standing there off-balance and practically on one foot, drilled a running deer, quartering away in mid-jump, through the left lung, up through the heart and out through the right lung. Then, almost as if to add insult to injury, he racked the lever on that .30-30 and did it again. All of this, mind you, in less time than it took for that buck to cover about 10 yards, which was all that stood between him and that wall of laurel. The buck died and nose-dived into the ground right there like a big furry lawn dart, but slid at least 15 feet into the thicket before he came to a halt.

Now, I'd like to think I've seen some good shooting. A decade and a half ago, the Army considered me an expert marksman, and I went to a three-week sniper school in 1987. I've seen guys put bullets into tiny little bullseyes from the kinds of distances that are usually described as "way the hell over there", but I don't believe I've ever seen a shot like my Uncle Jerry made that day in the woods, with iron sights on a .30-30 at about 25 yards.

How about you?
 
Shooting Rock Chucks with a buddy. He was proud of his new laser rangefinder, and his Ruger No. 1 in .220 Swift. He was lasering everything in sight.

Wind really kicked up in the afternoon, and the shooting got tough. We saw one 'Chuck just poking his head out of a "V" in the rocks. Lasered distance, 297 yards. Wind was straight crosswind at probably 15mph. I'd like to say he made the first shot. But I called it for him at 4" low and a foot left.

He hit it with the next shot. Best I've seen personally.
 
A shot like that deserved a special mount.

And I'd like to add that your post should be required reading for new forum members, as an example of how to make a long post readable via paragraphs and quality grammar. :D
 
I grew up with my brother-in-law Tony & his family. His dad was a Texaco gas distributor, supplying all the little stations way out in the middle of Nevada. I would ride with them on occasion to make those deliveries out to Austin, when it was (then) a very narrow road (haven't been there in decades-don't know if the road is better now).

Back then, literally herds of cottontail rabbits would run across the road; I'm talking 20-30 or more, all at once. It seemed like they would stop not too far off of the road, and we'd jump out. Frank, Tony's dad, would just stand there with an iron-sighted .22 and wait. Before too long, one of the rabbits would break and he would shoot it in the head, on the run, every time. Not just once, but every time. I remember once, since I was about 4 years younger than Tony and it was customary for me to stand back near the truck, a rabbit broke from where they didn't see it. I hollered "Frank, Frank !!" He turned around to scold me to be quiet when I pointed & hollered "There goes one!" He spins around & from probably 60 yards, running away, pops it right in the head. My reward for alerting him was I actually got to go out into the sagebrush & bring the rabbit back!!

Sam
 
friend of mine was being annoyed by a wasp,who then went and landed on the road several yards from us. friend drew single six and shot abdomen off of wasp. could'nt convince him to take another shot to finish him off though.
 
Back in 1974 some friends and I were exploring old silver mines in Western Nevada. As we were approaching the entrance to a mine shaft a small mouse ran out. My friend, Mike, watched it run past him and when it was about 10' away and still running he cross-drew his Ruger Old Army from his holster and hit it on the first shot.

I bought the gun from him and still have it. It's a tried and proven mouse gun.
 
This thread really made me go back.
When I was a kid I had this friend named John. John wore these huge lens glasses. You know the type. Lens as thick as the bottle of a coke bottle.
When he looked at you his eyes appeared as large as a bug! LOL
Anyway Old John couldn't see very well.
One day we were driving around the pasture in a pick-up. I was driving and John was in the back holding a .22 SingleShot iron sighted rifle. We drove by a stock pond. Just then a dove flew over us and flew to the far side of the pond and landed on the ground. John yelled STOP! I stopped and he said he was going to take a shot at that dove. I laughed and said "Oh yeah, right. Bet ya $20 you miss it." He grunted yes and took aim. I'm thinking the entire time there is NO WAY he can make this shot. I couldn't even see the bird(although I had seen it land). AND he was firing off-hand.
POP! goes the .22 and I see the dove start flopping! He had hit it!. OMG! Went down and sure enough there it was, dead as a hammer.
Paced it off TWICE. 190 yards! I would NEVER had beleived it if I hadn't witnessed it. Especially from blind Old John.:what: $20 was a LOT of money to us then.:mad:

Another great shot, although it was with a bow and arrow, I witnessed was several years back. This guy who I hunted with was a really good bowman.
We were sitting in camp and goofing around one day. We got to plinking at cans. I shooting a .22pistol and he was shooting his bow.
I had taken a 16penny nail, walked over to a fence post about 30yds away, and tapped the nail into the top of the fence post. I walked back to Mr.Bowman and told him that $100 was his if he hit that nail with an arrow.
He smiled, drew, let fly, and PING! There went the nail! :what:
I paid him as he laughed at me.:cuss:

I never learn.:banghead:
 
I don't know if this counts but I made a 150yd one shot kill of a turkey. Kneeling position, open sites, .50cal flint longrifle w/PRB.

Oneshooter
Livin in Texas
 
I had 20 acres once. 440x220 yards. Mostly swamp that grew these thumb sized things about waist high I'll call trees. There was a little pond dredged with the dredge fill placed around the pond.

I was positioned on the north side of the pond on the fill, sitting, with a good rest. My friend Larry started a slow walk through the trees. He was looking intently in front of himself for deer. After about 200 yards of walking, a doe slowly got up about 20 feet behind Larry. The deer had just let him walk by and waited about a minure to get up.

I called out to Larry to turn around but he could not hear me. I waited and yelled more. I did not want to shoot a deer that someone else had done the grunt work to get to move. Finally, the doe got some real oaks between herself and Larry so she was lost to him. 280 yards from me now.

All I could see by then was her head and part of her neck as the short trees hid her pretty good. When she stopped I fired. We never found a bullet hole from my new Bicentennial Ruger .25-06. All I can think of was I put one into her ear. I had the hide tanned with the hair on as that was, and still is, my only head shot deer.

I shot a lot then and the Sierra 117gr PBT bullets were 1/2 MOA accurate. I would not try that again. Back then I thought, "head shot or clean miss, sporting enough".
 
My grandfather (b. 1896) was good with any gun but out of sight with a pistol. When I was a youngster I would throw charcoal briquets up in the air and he would shoot them with a 9mm Luger. I'd get tired of throwing before he would miss -- which means I never saw him miss one.
 
Lemesee -- onct upon a time, when I was about 13, I jumped a herd of deer when I was taking feed to the cattle. I fired one shot with a .22, leading them about 20 feet, and the last one went down with a bleat and bawl.

That shot I stepped off to 167 yards -- it hit high in the back, grazed the underside of the spine, and paralyzed the deer's hind quarters.

And then there was the two deer I killed with one shot with my Dad's .30-30 (I still have the bullet) and the duck I knocked out of the air with a rock.:D
 
of the two best shots ive seen one of them was mine. out on my buddies ranch shooting squirrels. we were hiking around looking for the squirrels and we were comming up a creek and i saw one a little over 100 yards away. i got everyone in the group stopped and i got on my knee and wrapped the sling around my arm and shot. i was using a old remington 721 in 30-06. i got the squirrel in the neck. my friend thought i meant to hit it there but i was aiming for his body. it was a cool shot anyway.

the other best shot ive seen was my buddy who nailed a sparrow flying by from the hip with a bolt action .22lr. ive never seen anyone hit moving targets like he does.
 
In 1978 I'd just returned home from Army Basic Training. I was 21 and bought my first pistol, a Ruger Mk I bull-barrel.

I took it to a local range and sighted it in at 25 yards. I took some more shots at 50 yards.

I walked out to the 50 yard target frame to clean off my paper. I found a Colt Police Silhouette target flopping in the weeds. It had a few .38 holes in it.

It was getting late in the day and the light would fade soon. Nobody else was on the range. I had my stapler in hand, so I walked out to the 200 yard frame and stapled up the Silhouette.

I walked back to the firing line and sat with my back against a tree. Elbows on the inside of my knees, I slowly squeezed off three rounds of CCI Stinger. I knew I'd jerked the second shot slightly to the right.

I walked back to the target, hoping to find one or two .22 holes somewhere on the paper. I found two .22 holes about two inches vertically apart, just to the left of the X-ring. I found a third .22 hole about four inches to the right of the first two and level with them. They were a bit farther from the X-ring on the opposite side.

I've never fired another group as good as that one.

Bill
 
Some people are just naturally very good shots. They got that "good eye". In more sophisticated parlance, they have excellent depth perception and tactile skills. You can get better with practice, but what you are born inherently capable of matters a lot too.

My late grandfather was such a man. He favored .38 caliber revolvers which would fit in the front pockets of his trousers. He would stuff one in there and off he would go. I got to shoot with him as a child and I, my father, my cousins, and my uncles were constantly amazed at his feats of marksmanship.

We would set up a soda can and pace off 50 yards with a tape measure and he'd pull out a Colt or Smith and Wesson with a 2" barrel and put all five or six shots into it, assuming the can didn't fall off the post. That was his warmup.

He used to pick off rabbits, snakes, and other small animals at distances so far out there I couldn't even see the animal.

He hated scopes, claiming they just slowed him down. The last time I ever got to go shooting with grandpa, he took his beloved Marlin model 60. Feeling sick and weak and tired with shaky hands, he put 1100 rounds of .22 LR into a 2" circle at about 25 yards in about an hour and 15 minutes. I think that's the last time he ever fired a gun. He passed away just about 2 years ago, and hadn't fired a gun in years; he'd been too sick.

Of course in WW II he used to pick off Japanese planes in the air as a gunner in the Navy.

He never bragged, and he never understood why everyone else was so impressed. Some people just have it in them.
 
I went to see my cousin, my aunt said he was down at the barn. As I walked the 200 yds I heard him shoot several times. He was in the barn lot, shooting carpenter bees as they hovered at the peak of his large hay loft barn. I shot a box of .22s missing every time. He shot maybe 15 times, missed maybe four or five. I nevered figured out how he did that.
Mark.
 
In 2003, Dam Neck, VA. I shot in the Atlantic Fleet / All Navy Rifle-Pistol Matches.

Rifle is standard NRA Highpower Rifle.

I was on the 500 yard line shooting my 20 rounds in 20 minutes (slow fire).

I was having a great run, 1st shot was a 9 at 9 o'clock, came 2 clicks right on my Springfield M1A Super Match, and proceeded to hammer the X and 10 ring for my next 15 rounds.

For those who may not be familiar with NRA Highpower, the target are on sliding frames, and after each shot in the slow fire portions of the match, the target is pulled down into the pits, and they stick a 4" cardboard shot spotter into the bullet hole from your shot.

On my 16th shot the target was a little slow being pulled down, and stayed down in the pits for a long time, 45+ seconds (it usually takes 10 to 15 seconds for the guys pulling targets to pull the spotter from your last shot, plug it in to the new hole, put a paper paster on the old hole, and raise the target).

When I called to a line boss to ask where my target was, he got on his radio and said they were doing "target repair".

My target finally reappeared and I finished my last 4 rounds.

Turns out that 16th round hit EXACTLY on my 15th shot, shattering the little plastic spindle in the middle of the shot spotter, tore up the the target.:D.

The guys who had been pulling my target handed me the spotter later as a souvenier and I was told that that VERY RARELY happens on the 500 yard line.

Best and LUCKIEST I ever made.:D :D :D
 
Talk about old men and 30-30's...

I have no less than 5 other witnesses to this...

we were in deer camp at noon, gathering for lunch, when a deer wandered out into the field in front of camp...

a couple of us with scoped 30-06's saw it was a buck, and guessed the range at roughly 400+ yards... nobody wastaking the shot...

My dad, always a darned good rifleman, said "screw it, they don't die unless the lead flies", grabs up his gun, a Sears/Winchester 30/30, and begibs hammering away,

I am serious when I say it looked like one of those "gallery games"... Dad shoots, the deer jumps, and changes direction 180 degrees... dad shoots again, deer jumps and changes direction again... repeat process 2 MORE times...

all in all, 5 shots, 4 hits, all heart and lungs, in roughly 3 seconds...

we paced it off... 455 yards... and as I said, there are 6 witnesses, (me included)...

that old man and his 30/30... flippin' deadly!
 
Beware the man with one gun! After buying his first one, he realized it was pointless because he had no talent at all for using it. So he never bought his second.
 
At my local club, there is a guy by the name of Charlie.
Charlie is former Navy, and he absolutely loves the old bolt guns of the military.
He shoots regularly in our High Power Match(es) and tears up the X, 10 and 9 rings.

I've seen him shoot cast bullets in his '03 that just seem to be lumbering along at 800 - 900 fps (true bullet speed unknown) and drop them into the black EVERY time!

He's one heck of a marksman!!!!!!
 
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