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When I was a teenager a friend of mine cut down an old single shot 12 gauge. He cut the barrel off about an inch forward of the wooden forearm, and trimmed the stock into a very small pistol grip. Not only was this an illegal action, but the thing was an absolute fright to shoot. The very first shot from it opened up the web of his hand as the hammer and beavertail unlocking lever tore into his hand on firing. We ended up sacrificing a perfectly good T-shirt to staunch the bleeding. On subsequent firings, after maintaining a very firm grip, we also discovered that the effective range was not very impressive. Not nearly as impressive as the results achieved by Clint Eastwood in the ‘spaghetti western’ the gun was patterned after. Of course the inaccuracy may have been caused by firing with our eyes closed rather than just maintaining a good squint, but we certainly had the gritted teeth down pat the moment we cocked the hammer back. It turned out to be a firearm that I certainly wouldn’t consider as anything for home defense though, and not something I would ever recommend anyone use.
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