http://www.africanhuntinggazette.com 41Many Hunts
and a Mercy
Mission
It was 1996 when I was with hunting buddy Jim Gefroh.
Being novices, we had booked our first tuskless hunt in
Zimbabwe in November.The weather was hot and beyond
humid. The jesse was thick - in places like a rainforest.
We encountered elephants from the beginning of day one,
until the last day of the hunt. We were charged, and held
our ground. We aborted a shot when, at the last second, a
newborn calf was spotted lying under its mother’s belly.We
crawledinto a herdofbuffalo, and realizedalmost too late
thatwewere alsoina herd ofelephant.Wegot lost,ranout
of water, got caught in the rain, lost weight and suffered
from the tropical heat. We were essentially thrown into a
mosh pit of elephant hunting and... we were hooked!
By Kim Stuart
O
ver the following years we
experienced other challenges. An
enraged matriarch charged us
withoutprovocation.OurPH,withhisback
literallyagainsta tree,steadfastlystoppedthe
charge. Hishead-shottothe angrycowwas
taken atfourmeters!What hadstartedas a
relativelysimplequest,toshoota tusklesscow
elephant with a period muzzleloading rifle,
essentiallytookona lifeofitsown.
First,weneededthecorrectblack powder
rifle. A big-bore percussion rifle capable of
knockingdownanelephantwasnotoneyou
couldorderonline.Theivoryhuntersofthe
past useda minimum ofan8 bore, or .80
caliber.Theirrifleoflastresort,or“Stopping
rifle”wasa monstroussixteen-pound4 bore,
(4 balls per pound, so each of the round ball
projectilesweighedonequarterpound).Jim’s
mission was to build custom black powder
rifles.Afterconsiderableresearchanduntold
hours of work, he built both rifles, the 8
boreand4 bore,bothintheclassicGerman
Jaegerstyle- fullstockrifles- withpercussion
actions.Healsobuiltan8 boreflintlockrifle
forhimself.
Moist conditions necessitated keeping
powder dry and the rifle barrels moisture
free.Withthehelpofa “cow’sknee”overthe
breachofthemuzzleloadersforprotectionand
a fingercotoverthebarrel,weweresuccessful.
Field repairs, what we called, “MacGyver”
fixes,raisedJim’screativegun-buildingability
to another level. Without specialized black
powderrifle-buildingtoolshewaslimited,but
nonetheless he always kept us in the game. AZimbabwe: 1996 - 2018