• Friends, our 2nd Amendment rights are always under attack and the NRA has been a constant for decades in helping fight that fight.

    We have partnered with the NRA to offer you a discount on membership and Muzzleloading Forum gets a small percentage too of each membership, so you are supporting both the NRA and us.

    Use this link to sign up please; https://membership.nra.org/recruiters/join/XR045103

Best Shot You Ever Had

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Best shot? Wasn't a ML, however the target was a milk jug cap from ~25 yards shooting the Winchester '94 chambered
in 45 colt. First shot... Lucky, skill? who knows. It was off-hand btw. My friends were impressed ;-)

Mule
p.s. my vision was better then...
 
Last edited:
Won Hole in a Hole match !

This is a 20-25 yd 2 person shooting match at a large X placed on a cardboard target.
The 1st shooter must be of a smaller caliber & 2nd of a larger caliber.
This match is scored in two ways,,, shots closest to the X & closest together wins.
My shooting buddy placed his .62 cal. trade gun shot almost dead center on the X
& my orig. .70 Jeager shot just slightly egg-holed his.
The prize was a case of black powder :thumb:
This was back in the 80s when BP sold for about $3.50 lb.😂

Rifle still looks the same but can't say @ 81 my carcass has aged as well 🤣
Danish Jaeger; full lockside view.JPEG
 
My "best" shot is a hunting story.

The first fall after completion of my J.P. Beck flintlock, I headed to my stand in a wooded area adjacent to a swamp. As I approached, I stopped at the sound of deer running through shallow water. I actually said to myself, "I'm not even ready". Two deer sprinted past at 20 yds, first a doe, then a really large buck. I cocked and shouldered the rifle, centered the sights on the lung area of the buck and squeezed the trigger. Once the smoke cleared, I was certain of the kill, but after looking for at least an hour, no blood and no deer! I returned to the spot of the shot, and there between me and the route of the deer was a small maple tree with a .50-hole, dead center!

When I related the story to my friend Lew, his response. "Next time, more powder".

I intended to cut the section of the tree and mount it, never did.

I did take a photo of a similar archery shot. There seems to be a pattern here.

Frosty
That happened to me once with my T/C 50 cal Hawkin nice 8 point and I killed a tree then the deer almost ran over me trying to get the heck out of their
 
Best (LUCKIEST) shot was probably shooting a TC Patriot pistol in a trail walk firing at an egg.....sitting inside a 24" pipe....balanced on a steel "t" fence post about 20yds away. The object was to hit the egg w/o touching the pipe which if touched would fall off the fencepost. There were about 25 shooters going through the trail walk and no one had hit it w/o knocking the pipe off. You needed to bend over or squat some to get lined up to see through the pipe. Using 25gr of FFF and a patched roundball, I splattered the egg out of the pipe ....and it never even wiggled.
 
I was hunting ground squirrels in the early '80s with a rebarreled Cabelas kit gun. .45 cal percussion Hawken. My friend packed a .22 semi-auto w/scope. A squirrel lay on a stump about 65 yds away....just his head and upper half of his body showing. The plan was for me to take a shot, if I missed, my friend was to shoot. At my shot, the squirrel twitched ever so slightly....but did not run off. My friend began to squeeze the trigger, but just before he shot the tail started twitching erratically, indicating a head shot. Upon further investigation, we found a 1/2-ball groove right between his ears.
 
I was hunting in a deep hollow when a 4 point came off the top and walked down toward the bottom of the hollow, parallel to me and about 30 yards away. My flintlock had a very fast lock (Roller) so I didn't try to stop him, I was shooting off cross sticks. I put the sight on his shoulder and touched it off, he hit the ground like a sack of potatoes, I was shooting a .44 and expected him to run off for a little way, just like every deer I had shot with the gun had in the past.

Then I noticed the splintered dogwood limb in front of me; I didn't notice that it was in the way when I shot. Turns out my ball had splintered the limb, changed direction and hit the buck right under this jaw in his neck. Pure luck.
 
My best shot was made with my 40mm Whitworth style cannon. one evening I was shooting it for fun at the California State Shoot. Early 80s it was.
One friend had a pistol target posted at 50 yds. Another had a 100 yd yd target posted at 100 yds. Both to serve as sighter targets the next morning.
I made my best guess at aiming at BOTH targets and proceeded to put one golf ball thru BOTH targets darn near dead center.

Next morning we three went forth and they both saw the big ol' hole and jaws hit the dirt at the same time. No question who did it. Only 40mm at the shoot! I earned the moniker "Cannonball". Shining times!
 
Best shot? Wasn't a ML, however the target was a milk jug cap from ~25 yards shooting the Winchester '94 chambered
in 45 colt. First shot... Lucky, skill? who knows. It was off-hand btw. My friends were impressed ;-)

Mule
p.s. my vision was better then...
Interesting, not me but my buddy is an excellent pistol shooter (I can hold my own but not like him) we were at deer camp early a few days and got to shooting the pistols (un-mentionable) the one guy took a bottle cap put it in a tree limb fork at about 10 yards and told my buddy bet you can't hit that, from the holster he drew and fired gone bottle cap, the other fellow said it was a lucky shot and bet 10 dollars he couldn't do it again, I just sat there watching as I knew what was going to happen (seen it before) after thirty dollars was handed out the betting stopped. Told the other fellow who was betting best stop he will break you.
 
I don't even believe I did this. A shoot in southern Indiana. The target was a 5x8 inch card with a picture of a turkey head. The rain had just started and the range officer said to get that last round off and were closing. I aimed downhill at the card 30 yards away and is shot with my 32. the target team braved the down pour. Wow I was the only kill shot on paper and I hit that turkey in the eye!! I won a 15 pound turkey. Now that was a luck shot.
 
It’s Bragging Time!
What’s the best shot you ever made with your muzzleloader? Everybody has one 😊
To start off, I’d boast of me actually splitting a .45 flintlock rifle ball on an ax head at twenty yards and busting the clay birds on either side. That was a nice shot 👏
My shot was in 1999 at deer camp in Texas. They’re with other people who share deer lease. They started giving me smack about how crappy a flintlock shot and I’m eating my time hunting so took them to the homemade range and shot a quarter at 50 yards off hand with my .45. Made them bet 10.00 each also. They wouldn’t pay till I found the quarter, hit just left of Washington’s head. They shut up
 
Shot was in 1990. Walking near the Bob Marshall, don't remember the exact hillside, was "hunting" with a new to me 50 TC Hawken.
All I saw within range on my way out was a covey of Sage Grouse crossing my trail. Decided to invite one to dinner, so chose the most appropriately located, with a good backstop, creased the top of the head with a 370gr TC Maxi on 80gr of GOEX FF It was under 50yrds.

That was dinner that night.
 
It’s Bragging Time!
What’s the best shot you ever made with your muzzleloader? Everybody has one 😊
To start off, I’d boast of me actually splitting a .45 flintlock rifle ball on an ax head at twenty yards and busting the clay birds on either side. That was a nice shot 👏
I Killed an Elk at 165 yards
 
Back
Top