Letters
Cover Commentary
I love your magazine. Most of the guns are out of my reach, but it’s fun to dream. The picture on the cover of September/October shows a dog breaking to flush, which I think is dangerous. I think it’s a cool picture, but I don’t think it portrays what we as dog lovers want to display.
I just think it is a poor choice for a magazine of your caliber. We have all hunted with that one person who shoots first, then thinks after (usually only once)—but it takes only one time to lose a good dog and a friend.
Just my two cents.
Don Amidon
Via e-mail
In fact, that dog—Cannon Valley’s “Fred” of Dansmirth—is an English springer doing what a flushing dog is supposed to do: encourage the bird to flight. Photographer Lee Thomas Kjos assures us that when Fred returned to earth, he immediately “Hupped,” or sat, instead of continuing the pursuit. (He also was steady to shot.) Excellent point about safety, though. One should never shoot until the bird is sufficiently into the air (“blue sky rule”) and the dog is out of the way.
A Question of Rank
Just wanted to let you know that I have looked forward to my copy of SSM while I have been here in Afghanistan for the past year. I especially have looked forward to reading the latest doings of the Major.
I do have a question, though. Major Peabody’s title includes “USA, ret.” That would mean he had a regular Army commission. It would be highly unusual for an RA officer to retire as a major. What is the history behind the major’s military service? Was there a transgression in his past that ticked off a superior that kept him from getting promoted? Perhaps a story involving his past would be in order. Being a major myself, it makes me curious for an explanation.
I enjoy the magazine, especially Mr. Hughes’s articles. I will be back in my favorite “pa’tridge” covert in upstate New York this fall making up for another lost season.
US Army Major Brian Perazone
Afghanistan
President, Kabul Southwest Asia Chapter, A.H. Fox Collectors Assoc.
Galen Winter responds:
First and foremost, Maj. Perazone, we at SSM appreciate and thank you for your service. Second, I must say that you are, indeed, perceptive. In Vol. I, Issue 1, of SSM the reasons for Peabody’s low retirement rank are suggested. “For most of his career, he was an attaché at various Latin American embassy posts. He was regularly passed over for promotion because of an unfortunate tendency to be coolly insubordinate to his superiors, but warmly familiar with their wives.”
In Vol. I, Issue 2, Peabody’s attainment of first lieutenant status is chronicled. As part of a scheme to checkmate the American ambassador’s move to get Peabody cashiered, a Latino duck hunting friend arranges for Peabody to receive the Order of the Tarantula. The friend happens to be the son-in-law of the president of the republic. “The ambassador never knew how strong were the bonds that bind duck hunters together. He never knew only one Order of the Tarantula was ever awarded. He never knew that Peabody had lost interest in his wife. He never knew how he had been maneuvered into a position where he had to commend Peabody’s work and recommend him for promotion.”
In Vol. V, Issue I, Peabody’s elevation to major is reported. The responsibility for that advancement rested with the British ambassador’s plot to remove the Russian embassy’s attaché.
Peabody never explained how he attained his captaincy. I’m afraid to ask.
Who’s the ‘Best’?
I enjoyed the comments about the Beesely action in July/August (Game & Gun Gazette) in response to Mr. Roosenburg’s thrown-down gauntlet. Who is the “best” has always been a topic of the sporting press, from the Field Trials in 1883 to the present. Many gunmakers produce objects of extraordinary art, craftsmanship and function, and in spite of anyone’s claims to superiority, they are still mechanical devices and subject to failure. In my experience, I have had a new Boss Robertson with a failed single trigger; a Rigby with a bad extractor; Hollands needing new mainsprings, action swivels and safeties; and a friend recently broke a mainspring on a modern Purdey. Even the best-regarded-gunmakers’ efforts can and do fail. When it comes to repair, a gun’s simplicity of design shines. A gun such as a Purdey, whose design requires supreme workmanship to build (yielding kudos for the maker), requires similar abilities to repair and maintain. I can find many gunsmiths who will repair an H&H action, but very few will tackle a Purdey. As my father once said in buying cars, “Ignore the salesmen, the balloons and the fancy showroom floor. It is the service department you are marrying once you drive off the dealer’s lot!”
Richard T. Kilby, MD
Anchorage, Alaska
Praise for ‘Papa’
From the online bulletin board at www.ShootingSportsman.com:
Great photos and story (“Wingshooting with ‘Papa,’” Sept/Oct) by Roger Sanger, Silvio Calabi and all the others involved. Two things about my all-time favorite writer, the late Ernest Miller Hemingway, came through loud and clear in this splendid article: 1) His dislike of phonies and his love of Idaho, because the “locals” didn’t treat him or Gary Cooper or any other guests any differently due to “celebrity status,” and 2) in spite of his drinking, he was strict on no drinking when the guns were involved—après the shooting or the hunt, OK; not during or before.
The little things great men do are a true measure of their greatness. His act of giving the farm family in need the game they took on that farm, and then passing the hat to help get the family’s truck fixed is telling. Even more so were his quoted words to Life reporter Bob Capa: “Report that in your story and I’ll wring your neck.”
I think his early years as a struggling writer with “Hash”—his wife Hadley Richardson Hemingway—in Paris may have instilled in him the importance of helping others. Possibly his boyhood in Michigan and seeing his father, Dr. Ed Hemingway, help the Indians in the Horton’s Bay area without ever being paid for his services led to his many acts of generosity later on when he had the means to do so.
The photos in the article bear credence to some of Hemingway’s words about guns and shooting: “A gun is to shoot.” I see a well-worn Model 12 and a Browning over/under—no engraving, no fancy walnut checkered stocks, just the practical and functional tools of a masterful gunner who enjoyed getting others started.
In Bernice Kert’s book, The Hemingway Women, she quotes Martha Gelhorn as saying, circa 1940, “He bought me a pair of long underwear and a 20-gauge double shotgun for hunting in Idaho, from A&F in Yew York.” A.E. Hotchner hunted with Mary and Ernest in Idaho later and mentioned two Model 21s in 20 gauge—Mary used one and Ernest let him use the other. Hotchner had never hunted or shot before meeting E.H., again proving how Hemingway loved to teach shooting and the ethics of hunting.
I look forward to the next article by Roger Sanger about “Don Ernesto.” We as subscribers are indeed lucky to have both Messrs Sanger and Calabi writing for Shooting Sportsman.
Joseph Plummer
