Westerns

From the other thread: The Gunfight

From such movies as "High Noon", we know the Hollywood version. But just how deadly is it?

Two gunmen line up, slowly walk towards each other, and quick draw, shooting from the hip.

Just how likely is it they will kill each other?

Test with paintballs, then get some professional quick shot artists to try it out.

Death by Shrinkage

One mythical method of execution was to sew a victim up into a wet cowhide, then put them in the hot sun. As the cowhide shrinks, it crushes the victim.

Variations include just using cowhide straps around the body, or even just around the neck, so they will constrict and strangle the victim.

Buster could get a workout on this one.

According to eyewitnesses, Wild Bill Hickok could hit a dime tossed into the air nine out of ten times; he could knock an apple from a tree with one shot and then hit the apple again with another bullet before it hit the ground, all at 25 paces.

Could a modern expert duplicate this feat?

I do not doubt that it was a side effect of putting sawdust on the floor that they noted in Deadwood, I heard the idea was the sweepings were put into wooden troughs the heavy gold sank to the bottom where it could be collected.

I don't think however that it was the thing that started sawdust on the floor, people have been placing absorbent material such as sawdust on the floor of buildings like pubs and butchers shops for centuries.
It goes back to when they used to use rushes on the floor.

www.deseretnews.com/article/865629712/Whistlers-and-whittlers--boys-of-Nauvoo-organized-to-protect-the-Prophet-Joseph.html

The Whistling & Whittling Brigade was, basically, a Wild West psy-ops unit.

How it worked was that teenage boys in the city of Nauvoo (and some other communities) would take turns pretending to mill about town as if they had time on their hands, performing such seemingly idle tasks as whistling and whittling.

The town was close-knit enough that if they spotted someone they didn't recognize, they'd slowly tail the person at a casual pace, just enough to keep eyes on them. The idea was that people who had no ill intentions would eventually recognize that something was up and try to start a conversation with someone, while those who did have ill intentions would get a bout of paranoia and leave town at the earliest opportunity.

Thing is, could something like that still work, if it could work at all?

revolvers were originally only available in single action, because single shot pistols were only made in single action. the very first revolvers had to be manually rotated as well. the question is not whether there was any other means of rapid fire with single action pistol - the question is whether it was safe, reliable, and sufficiently accurate. (in comparison to two handed operation, but squeezing the trigger for each shot.) (edit: note: single action is defined as requiring the hammer to be cocked separately from pulling the trigger. - if the trigger is capable of cocking the hammer, the gun is defined as double action.)

I am going to question your contention that shoulder holsters were more common than belt holsters.

while there is support for their use, and the "wild west" holster is more a hallmark of the TV western than the real west, I don't see evidence of common use.

From what I remember from High School history, when we looked at many images of Cowboys taken in the American West, they broadly fell into two categories.

Those that were posed and taken in a photographers shop, in these the Cowboys often wore their guns in the "classic western" style in a holster at the hip.
If the photograph was an attempt to do photojournalism and show Cowboys in their everyday working life then often the gun was in a holster that was elsewhere on the body, at the front of the waistband alongside other tools like a hammer, sometimes just tucked into the waistband.

I was staying away from that one just because it depends more on the quickdraw artist.

modern professionals seem to pretty universally prefer a low slung strong side holster. they rock the gun back out of the holster, slap the hammer with their free hand, and fire. (they usually have a modified hammer with an extra tall spur to facilitate the slap)

I kind of get the idea the real "gunfighter" was more about the willingness to draw and fire, and he practiced with the rig he felt comfortable wearing.

a crossdraw holster was best suited to functioning on horseback, it places the gun in a position where it is not in the way, is not likely to fall out, and is easy to get to and draw. in fact, many styles of cavalry oficer's uniform included a crossdraw holster. - I've seen more than one picture of a two-gun cowboy wearing one gun in a standard holster and the other in a cross draw holster. this is consistent with the fact few people are accurate with their off-hand - although another western trope is the "border roll" which is when the gunslinger draws the second gun with his off hand and passes the guns hand to hand rather than fumble to reload. according to what little I could find on period shoulder holsters, they were worn for the same reason they are worn today - discreet carrying of a pistol.

[Edit, scratch this, Cyber already came up with the same history that you needed to cock before firing.]

Question on that...
Before the repeat mechanism, didnt the old style revolver need manually cocking for each and every shot?.. the old style didnt forward the chamber by one every time you pulled the trigger, you needed to pull back the hammer to advance the chambering manually.
The firing mechanism "Just" fired the thing... it wasnt expected that you needed to fire the full 5 or 6 chambers all at one go.
It was also its own form of safety, that you had to pull back the hammer in order to fire it.