CLASSIC GUNS
A Double Legacy
If rifles could talk, this William Evans .470 would pretty much monopolize the conversation.
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Elmer Keith probably put on his S&W Model 29 .44 Magnum nearly every day of his life, just like he put on his trousers. I suppose my good friend Sheriff Jim Wilson dons a favorite sidearm in much the same way. I do not. I only carry when I'm going hunting or shooting, and although I have some long-time favorites, the guns
I shoot, hunt with and write about make up an incredibly eclectic array.
African professional hunters, on the other hand, carry a rifle every day of their working lives, sort of like a lawman carries a sidearm, a carpenter carries a hammer and I carry a laptop.
The difference between an African PH and a hunting guide most everywhere else, at least in the more remote areas, is the constant presence of a variety of seriously dangerous animals. Actual contact, let alone conflict, is rare, but Mr. Murphy and his Law lie in wait for the unready. Just this past year I know of two people who were killed by elephants (while hunting, but not hunting elephant) because a big rifle wasn't at hand. So professional hunters in dangerous-game country tend to carry their rifles like we Americans carry our cell phones.
Momentary lapses, just to step away from the truck to look at something, are human nature, and that's when Murphy's Law comes in. I've noticed that when such a lapse occurs, one of the trackers is likely to dash back to the truck, grab the rifle and press it into his boss' hands. After all, everybody in the party relies on the safety that rifle provides.
In my experience few African PHs are "gun guys," and even if they are, their choices are limited both by availability and draconian gun licensing. The rifle they carry is a working tool, and it might well be the only rifle they own. In the years when Nitro Express ammo was unobtainable, the bolt-action .458 became almost universal as the professional hunter's working rifle. This has changed. The .458 is still common, but with Nitro Express ammo again available many professional hunters have gone back to doubles. New rifles from Krieghoff, Merkel, Rigby, Searcy and others are perhaps most common, but there is still a scattering of increasingly scarce old classics in use. When I see such a rifle, I wonder what tales it could tell.
My buddy Andrew Dawson, Zimbabwe PH, carries such a rifle every day of his working life, a plain boxlock .470 by William Evans. William Evans was a good gunmaker but rarely considered a top name. Twenty years ago, before Federal began making .470 ammo, such a rifle would have been priced along with dozens of plain English boxlocks from .450 to .500. Today, beautifully reconditioned by William Evans with clean bores and chambered to the desirable .470, it is a valuable rifle. As supplies of good English doubles in serviceable condition dwindle, the value of such rifles is skyrocketing. When I first hunted with Dawson a few years ago I was impressed by his choice of rifle--classy and classic. But that was before any of us, including Dawson, had any real idea of the stories this rifle could tell.
