The Alamo (1960) question

[Silver Creek Slim]

I bought it at Walmart last night. Jim Bowie had a long gun that I couldn't identify. It looked like a six barreled mule ear shotgun. Anyone know what it was?

Slim

[Irish Red O'Toole]

It's called a "volley" gun.  Stricly flintlock.  If I remember correctly, it's primary use was on board ships.  Marines would use this monster gun to sweep the decks of enemy combatants.  Then, they boarded the enemy ship.  Kinda like primative prepatoryt fire to soften up the objective.  You had, in effect, a seven-barrel shotgun.  Pretty devestating at close range.

[Uncle Eph]

right you are Red, recoil must have been murder.

the French had something like it that was built on a rolling block style action,  but it might have been selective fire and volley.

man, that would impress the folks at the next shoot

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[Capt. Hamp Cox]

Check it out at:

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=www.nmm.ac.uk/collections/images/med/E8623.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nmm.ac.uk/collections/CollectionsDetail.cfm%3FID%3DAAA2519&h=300&w=300&sz=8&tbnid=zN4lrqduS3kJ:&tbnh=111&tbnw=111&start=18&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dvolley%2Bgun%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DG

[Silver Creek Slim]

He only shot one barrel.

Slim

[Capt. Hamp Cox]

He only shot one barrel.

Slim

Figure it's one of two reasons.

     a.  The instructions were in British, and he could't read them.

     B.  He'd tried it once with all seven barrels loaded, and decided from that point on that he couldn't "shoulder" that much responsibility on a regular basis (he got a real kick out of it).

Hamp