Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Have you ever "gone fer your gun" in self defense?

Yup

Same here.................

Yes. Three times. First, I was parked with my first wife and three punks started dicking with the car. When one of them went into the trunk of his car and came out with a tire iron and made like he was going to break a window on mine, I tapped the window and motioned him closer. When he got closer I rolled the window down a little and he was looking down the barrel. They decided to go break someone else's window.

Second time two guys were trying to steal my car. I stood on the balcony with the gun in full sight and informed them it was my car, not theirs. One guy decided to sneak up the stairs so I just backed into my apartment and squared off and told him that threshold was a line he hadn't best cross. He decided to go steal someone else's car.

Third time an idiot out bird hunting threatened to shoot me in my own driveway in front of witnesses. He was looking down the muzzle of a shotgun at six feet before he knew what happened and he heard the safety snap off. I told him if he so much as twitched or if his buddy who was looking down the barrel of my friend's shotgun twitched, that was all it'd take. My friend and I had a discussion about whether to disarm them and call the sheriff while they stood real still. They allowed as how they might have been a little hasty and asked nicely if they could just leave.

I chased a burgler out the front door of my uncles house after coming in the back door with an Ithaca 37 loaded with buckshot back in 1983. I had just gotten home from OCS and was home alone when I took a call from my 16 year old female cousin who lived a block away. This guy (if O had a son he could have been him) had tied her up and was ransacking the downstairs and she got loose and called. My dad was a cop so she called our house instead of the police she was so freaked out. I dialed (yeah literally) 911 then was out the door in a flash.

The venetian blinds were still moving on the front door when I came into the living room from the back. It was that close. At the same time my cousin was coming down the steps so I backed us both into a safe corner. Within 30 seconds the cops were coming in the front door.

The first cop in the door was a classmate of mine from high school. He kind of laughed then told me to empty the gun and put it in a closet and then they searched the house.

That's about it. All I know is that mentally I was in full attack mode. Looking back I'm glad I did not have to live with what would have happened if I got there any sooner. I would have shot him, no doubt about it.

Bluedreaux is correct. It is all in the articulation.

Twice but it was a griz on the porch and a pack of pit bulls attacking 2 kids outside of my home in Kotz many years ago. Never with a human situation.

BTDT

Had five incidents. One with a shotgun, one with a rifle and three with a handgun.

Thankfully, the various miscreants on the other side of the muzzle rethought their proposed actions and I didn't have to pull the trigger.

"Skin that smoke-wagon and go to work, boy!"

Yep.

Three times � twice to protect myself, once to protect my wife.

Shots fired all three times (.44 Magnum).

First two turned the attacks with no harm or injury. Third resulted in death.

Badge-toter was furious at inability to hang me.

Please don't ask for details.

Only once. About ten years ago, a dude was driving ridiculously slow on rural road and when I went to pass him, he cut me off and stopped. I pulled out my 9mm and opened the window and said something to the effect of "look azzhole, I would suggest that that you get back in your car and drive off, or call an ambulance NOW, because one of us is going to need one". Thankfully, he complied.

donsm70

Only once, and I won't tell the story on an open forum.

Not yet.

Before he retired, Twin Cities cop Charlie O'Neil stood erect and unbleeding after several gun fights with mob gunsels � some of whom were trying to collect on the mob's contract on him.

After he retired to Montana, the contract was still out, so he always "carried" � either or both a PPK and a 9mm Sig Neuhausen.

His house and shop were a few miles west of Alberton on old two-lane highway 10. Going to town for his mail one morning, he faced only a semi pulling the grade in compound low. Nothing going in his direction � until some dude came-up behind him in an attempt to cross Montana on his coffee break.

The dude had four options �
� head-on into the semi
� wait for Charlie and the semi to get out of his way
� rear-end Charlie
� run Charlie off the road

He chose the fourth, but Charlie wouldn't let that happen. He straddled the center line until he was about to head-on into the semi. The dude had to lay rubber with a screech, dip his front end, and wait for room to go around Charlie.

When Charlie and the semi cleared the road, the dude screeched past Charlie's old car. As he passed Charlie, he shook his fist at Charlie and yelled at him.

He got more angry as he sped down the road. On the flat, with marshy ground on either side of the road, he stopped athwart the center line, got out of the car, and stomped back toward Charlie.

Charlie knew better than to pull-up close behind the dude's car, and he knew better than to sit and wait in his own car. He stopped with plenty of space ahead of him, got out of his car, and stood looking over the top of the open door.

"God damn you, you mother-f*cking old son of a bitch!" the dude cooed. "I'm going to beat the f*cking sh�t out of you!"

Dumpy little Charlie, who looked like everybody's grandfather, just smiled, picked-up his home-made elk-butchering knife (a long piece of sawmill blade) from behind his seat, slammed his car door, and walked toward the dude.

"And I'm going to hang your liver in that tree [pointing]."

The dude skidded rubber off his boot heels, ran back to his car, and left more tire rubber behind. He went out of sight soon, and Charlie never saw that car again.

I never asked him but always wondered what Charlie was carrying that morning. Probably the PPK, which the dude most likely would've sneered at and tried to take away from Charlie. Whatever. I'm sure that Charlie just didn't want to be bothered with the inevitable hassle of leaving a bleeding hunk of meat on the pavement.

When I told Bill Jordan of the incident, Bill grinned � and agreed that its deadly element wasn't Charlie's short sword but his calm, sweet smile.

What?! Standing between a driver and his by-God-given right to disobey the speed limit? I await the righteous condemnation by all others who jelously protect this right. (Way to go, Charlie - I love it!)

Twice.

Overlook parking lot in the South Dakota Badlands.

Three hunter trespassers on my property.

Working in my shop, one day, and happened to see this skinhead coming towards my double overhead door which stood ajar to the alley. This guy was carrying an upright vac that he pretended to try to interest me in. I loudly ordered him to stop, just as he began to duck under my door.

Behind a barrier between us, my hand hovered over my revolver, which he could not see. But he could tell that I was looking through him and had the upper hand. I pointed down the alley and ordered him to leave, which he immediately did. As he was leaving I picked up the revolver and covered that hand with a rag, following him out, to make sure he left.

As I came around the small barrier, I saw the hardwood wheelbarrow handle lying on the threshold. Had it not been for my lucky vigilance, and having a gun, I feel I could have been killed by this POS. No shots fired. No brandishing, which I think is strictly for kids and can get you killed..

Well, yes and no.

I have heard accounts here that made me wonder about whether they should be carrying.

But, with that said, I have had to pull handgun (a Colt 1911 .45) on a couple of guys.
One was in Philadelphia. He got in my passenger door at a red light. When he turned to look at me after closing the door, he had the barrel of my .45 about an inch from his nose. It was weird....he opened the door and exited my truck, politely closing the door. The whole thing was just a few seconds. No words were spoken. Not one.

The second was when I was out of town and a guy asked me for light for his smoke as I walked back to my room from the parking lot. After that he fell in behind me. I didn't think much about it as there were other rooms along the walkway, and I assumed he was going back to his room.

I unlocked my door and entered my room, and went to shut the door and he stepped through the doorway and kept the door from shutting with his foot at the base of the door. I was partially hidden from his view by the door itself, and instantly grabbed my 1911 that was tucked behind my belt, in the small of my back. I opened the door and put the barrel of the 1911 directly on his nose and clicked off the safety at the same time. I just said "Git!"... He did. I don't know what that guy had planned, but a near invasion like that needed some more attention, so I called the cops. They knew his description when they got there, and said he had tried that very thing a couple weeks previous on another guy.

Back to my point....

Brandishing can get you in trouble, or worse.

But, if the hair stands up on the back of your neck, it's for a reason.... I would have shot both guys at the first wrong move from the point I pulled down on them. But luckily, it never got that far. If they had not seen the pistol and seen that I meant business with it...who knows?

Many more are the times while hunting out in the desert along the border that I was stopped by someone for directions or for them asking for help with something like a flat....that I had that 1911 nestled in my lap with my thumb on the safety to see what the situation was first. They never knew I had them covered. But I did....and it pays to be cautious out in the desert not far from the Mexico border.

By far the noblest function of a defense weapon is preventing the necessity of its use.

Once, the very day after I got my CCW.

Trying to pick my kids up from track practice & I'm stuck in the intersection in a traffic jam caused by concert goers, most of whom were already smashed.

Next thing I know the stereotypical overweight, tattooed, shorn head, goatee type decides to run up and bang on my window.

Is shining a laser in some fat douchebucket's face considered brandishing?