I got over not ever getting a coon skin hat as a kid...or a adult for that matter, but I always wanted to do the thawk throwing , there has to be good and bad ones to be had ,I don't know how the Indians/mtn men balanced the one they threw at each other, I'd like to try it anyway, anyone?
I got over not ever getting a coon skin hat as a kid...or a adult for that matter, but I always wanted to do the thawk throwing , there has to be good and bad ones to be had ,I don't know how the Indians/mtn men balanced the one they threw at each other, I'd like to try it anyway, anyone?
I don't know about tomahawks, but if it's anything like knives, it's all about practice and judging distance.
Look on Amazon for the Cold Steel Trail Hawk. Buy at least two and a couple spare handles.
Tomahawks are easy to throw.
Travis
This! We'd throw them around camp of an evening. Start at 5 or 6 paces Or so. Let the tomahawk do the work. Get it to make one revolution. Don't whip it out of your hand. Let it slid out. You will figure it out.
Do you have any Black Powder clubs close. Hawk and knife as well as fire starting are often part of the competition at rendezvous. You can get a half decent hawk at Cabelas. The target is usually a playing card in the center of a wooden block. Think large slab of softwood.It is not as hard as you might think. We can usually get a novice sticking the hawk in the first ten throws. You must find you distance from the block to get a full revolution of the hawk. I have a block set up out back and it is a fun thing when the boys get together. Lots of quarters changed hands over the years out there. Scoring is stick = 1 point nick the card = 2 cut card in half is three. Warning you can get into the Mountain Man craze big time. If your not careful you can end up camping in 18' Tipi.
You'll see the first one he throws is one handed which is how I like to throw. But it is easier to throw two-handed like he does the last couple. It keeps your body square so it is easier to learn to stick. Gruff taught me that.
I mess around with hawks now and then. For throwing, you need a well made, forged hawk. I like the ones I get from H&B Forge. Well balanced, sharp, nice haft.
On top of what has already been said, it is more fun if you build a nice big target. Don't worry about accuracy until you can stick the target regularly. It is all about revolutions and letting that handle slide out of your hand. The most common thing I have seen the beginners do is throw the hawk too easy. You have got to throw it hard. Think fastball.
I got over not ever getting a coon skin hat as a kid...or a adult for that matter, but I always wanted to do the thawk throwing , there has to be good and bad ones to be had ,I don't know how the Indians/mtn men balanced the one they threw at each other, I'd like to try it anyway, anyone?
Throwing hawks is easy. It's catching is what's hard.
I got over not ever getting a coon skin hat as a kid...or a adult for that matter, but I always wanted to do the thawk throwing , there has to be good and bad ones to be had ,I don't know how the Indians/mtn men balanced the one they threw at each other, I'd like to try it anyway, anyone?
Throwing hawks is easy. It's catching is what's hard.
Have the Atlanta Cutlery Windlass one, been used as hatchet, ax and thrown for 20 years. Rig up a good target, endgrain is best, handles are a maintenance item.
Hit a guy square in the forehead with a tomahawk? The Mohawk Rev. War leader Joseph Brant did that very number on Colonel Ichabod Alden in November of '78, Cherry Valley...
One of the last to flee was Col. Alden, pistol in hand. Brant gave chase, and Alden heard the pursuit and stopped! Turning around, he committed his final act of stupidity and took aim with his pistol. But a tomahawk was already loosed from Brant's hand, and it caught Alden square in the forehead.
Throwing 'hawks was usual in combat in the backwoods back then, especially by Indians, who took a virtuosity in that art for granted. One of them things that happens when ya grow up in the woods without video games and such.
...and note that from the accounts, Brant had to let fly on the spur of the moment as Alden pointed his pistol at him.
OTOH, I haven't heard of a single instance of guys throwing away their knives in combat back then.
If you throw them long enough (again, it is not nearly as difficult as people are lead to believe) you can start throwing "on the fly" pretty quick. You can also increase your distances pretty easily.
Gruff has a huge double-bit and I've seen him connect with it at 30yds.
(This is a reference to an axe and not a cock joke)
Hit a guy square in the forehead with a tomahawk? The Mohawk Rev. War leader Joseph Brant did that very number on Colonel Ichabod Alden in November of '78, Cherry Valley...
One of the last to flee was Col. Alden, pistol in hand. Brant gave chase, and Alden heard the pursuit and stopped! Turning around, he committed his final act of stupidity and took aim with his pistol. But a tomahawk was already loosed from Brant's hand, and it caught Alden square in the forehead.
Throwing 'hawks was usual in combat in the backwoods back then, especially by Indians, who took a virtuosity in that art for granted. One of them things that happens when ya grow up in the woods without video games and such.
...and note that from the accounts, Brant had to let fly on the spur of the moment as Alden pointed his pistol at him.
OTOH, I haven't heard of a single instance of guys throwing away their knives in combat back then.
Birdwatcher
I liked the scene in the movie The Patriot where he used the tomahawk on the squad of soldiers that had his son.
We used to throw a Pulaski at trees before we felled them. It was fun and I got to win a few rounds as I started the game. 1 revolution and 7 paces was about perfect. That long handle was fun to watch, luckily we never broke the handle, not sure how!
If you throw them long enough (again, it is not nearly as difficult as people are lead to believe) you can start throwing "on the fly" pretty quick. You can also increase your distances pretty easily.
Gruff has a huge double-bit and I've seen him connect with it at 30yds.
(This is a reference to an axe and not a cock joke)
This again! All three of our kids were throwing before they were in elementary school!! It ain't hard!
Also (and this is just what we have found) the 20-24" handles seem to be a lot easier to get the hang of. The 19" and shorter seem to give people more trouble.
Hessian Officer Von Ewald describing the Stockbridge Indians in the Rev War, the Stockbridges were an agrgegation of Christianized tribal remnants from Massachussetts, who fought on our side....
Their costume was a shirt of coarse linen down to the knees, long trousers also of linen down to the feet, on which they wore shoes of deerskin, and the head was covered with a hat made of bast. Through the nose and in the ears they wore rings, and on their heads only the hair of the crown remained standing in a circle the size of a dollar-piece, the remainder being shaved off bare.
Their weapons were a rifle or musket, a quiver with some twenty arrows, and a short battle-axe, which they know how to throw very skillfully.
...and a Roger's Rangers guy twenty years earlier, if a movie showed Indians throwing 'hawks with cords attached to retrieve them they'd be hooted down nowadays, doesn't fit the pop image.....
"The expertness of the Indians in throwing the tomahawk is well known. At the distance of ten yards they will fix the sharp edge of it in an object nearly to a certainty. I have been told, however, that they are not fond of letting it out of their hands in action, and that they never attempt to throw it but when they are on the point of overtaking a fly foe, and are certain of recovering it. Some of them will fasten a string of the length of a few feet to the handle of the tomahawk, and will launch it forth, and draw it back again into their hand with great dexterity; they will also parry the thrust or cuts of sword the tomahawk very dexterously."
_The Narrative of Thomas Brown_ (1757) Brown was a member of Rogers Rangers and captured by Indians:
..and in the hands of White folks....
"We traversed the country backward and forward, carefully watching the Indian warpaths until we arrived at one of the forts or stations ... , where we remained a day or two to get washing and mending done and a recruit of provisions, and at every station would spend an hour or two in the exercise of the tomahawk and rifle, not only for our own improvement in the use of these weapons of warfare but also to alarm the savages if they should be lurking in the neighborhood."
The Revolution Remembered Eyewitness Accounts of the War for Independence
Australians using the tomahawk to defeat the British.
One night they had us all gather in the BIG mess tent as the were going to show us out takes that had been shot over then past several weeks. We were all settings pm onward the screen. I bet there were 500 of us in tent. Unknown to us, Gibson snuck in side door and set down with us to watch. The last take we saw was the tomahawk throw scene. Dead silence in the tent!!!My little ahole bud from Louisiana says out loud " I'm sure glad that sumbitch is on our side!!!!" The tent exploded including Gibson!!!!
No surprise that the European colonists reverted back to the small ax under the inspiration of the American Indian. The Merovingian Franks were no slouch at throwing an ax in battle as I'm sure a few Romans found out.
No surprise that the European colonists reverted back to the small ax under the inspiration of the American Indian. The Merovingian Franks were no slouch at throwing an ax in battle as I'm sure a few Romans found out.
Is that how it all shook out?
Did the Indians here make their own iron or steel?
I would have thought that it was the other way around...
Well ok. But there is a much nicer photo available at the post office!
The zenith ( and sunset) of my "acting career was in a horror/western flick filmed here where I played the part of an Indian (feather kind) scout! It was withthe wrap of this immense production that I decided I didn't want anything else to do withthe film industry!!!
Did I say they Amer-Indians were smelting iron or forging out the small ax? The Indians ( inspired ) the frontiersmen, who then developed the small ax using materials they were familiar with. The small ax was a tool similar to the ancient francesca. The Indians had their own war clubs. Indian boys used throwing sticks to kill rabbits as a form of early training for bigger tools. not too hard to figure out really.
We would form a tight circle facing out board and take turns peeing. Blocking view of others on set. Got to where the director was not giving enough pee brakes. Word got to Gibson and he blew up. Yeah I know he can be an ahole at times but he really tried his best for the reenanctors on set. He was friend to us all.
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