July/August 1978 - American Handgunner

Above: Combat Master Leonard Knightfiring in the first IPSC U.S. National PracticalPistol Championships, June, 1977.When the smoke had cleared, Leonardhad taken second. Center: Here's BillNorth running the wild Surprise AssaultCourse. Notice his thumb on safety andhis trigger finger outside of the triggerguard. Pistolcraft can be exciting. Right:Jeff Cooper, IPSC President, bustingturning targets at a fast, 2 seconds each.various Marks, gave excellent servicethrough innumerable campaigns all overthe world. Right up through 1957, whenthe British finally switched to the BrowningP-35 self-loading pistol, they werenot about to give up their DA servicerevolvers.In similar fashion, it took the selfloadingpistol quite a while to catch on inthis country. One cannot help but beamazed at the endless condemnation ofthe autoloading pistol, both aloud and inprint, from 1900 right up to the presenttime. The situation is now improving, buta large segment of the American shootingfraternity still views any self-loading pistolwith dark suspicion.In the early days of the autoloader, sayfrom 1892 till 1900, this criticism is understandable.The early autopistols andtheir ammunition left a lot to be desired inthe way of reliability. But from 1900on, a continuing list of excellent weaponsand improved smokeless ammunitionrendered the ridicule of the revolver manpointless and outdated.In 1920 Captain Hugh B. C. Pollard, anEnglishman, in his excellent little booktitled "Automatic Pistols," made a very20good case for the superiority of the autoloadingpistol over the revolver as acombat arm. From a practical viewpoint,Pollard heavily stressed the idea that"quick work with a swift pistol" shouldbe the accepted goal. Again, he makesthe point several times, that the essentialnature of all pistols is that of "weaponsfor quick use at close quarters."Captain H. -W. McBride said much thesame thing in 1935 in his entertainingbook "A Rifleman Went to War." In thechapter "The Pistol in War," he outlinedsome advanced ideas on how the handgunshould be handled in a combat situation.McBridge emphasized the handiness ofthe pistol as a defensive tool, and its usefulnessin close-in, hand-to-hand fighting.The quick reloading capabilities of theautopistol were pointed out, as were theexcellent qualities of the Colt 1911, .45Auto. McBride also suggests that theproper way to recharge an autoloadingpistol in combat is to keep a live roundchambered while making the magazineswitch! That last point was very innovativefor 1935, and is quite familiar to allfreestyle practical shooters of today.Texts dealing with practical shooting,or at least partially dealing with it, seemto have been quite popular during the1930's. Ed McGivern's book, "Fast andFancy Revolver Shooting," was publishedin this period, as was J. H. Fitzgerald'sbook "Shooting." Both of theseworks dealt quite extensively with thesubject of double action revolver shootingas it related to the defensive use of theweapon.the 1930's, reaching its peak during theyears of World War 11, and fading again inthe late 40's. The next burst of progressdidn't occur until the early 1960's, butthat's getting ahead of the story.In 1942, the first classic text of themodern era on practical pistol shootingappeared on the scene. It was authoredjointly by Captain William E. Fairbairnand Captain Eric A. Sykes, both formerlyof the Shanghai Municipal Police, andwas titled "Shooting to Live." This littlegem of a book, only 96 pages from front toback, first set forth many of the principleswe now think of as "modern" in origin.Among other things, Fairbairn andSykes advocated use of the Colt 1911self-loader in .45 ACP for general policeand military service. They also taught twohand eye level shooting, firing two-shotbursts at all man targets, and emphasizedthe importance of stressing close rangespeed shooting on surprise targets. Manyof these concepts were so far ahead oftheir time that they have only been generallyaccepted comparatively recently.Both Fairbairn and Sykes were eminentlyqualified to write such a book onpistolcraft. During a 12% year periodwhen their training techniques were inuse,'the Shanghai Police engaged in 666armed encounters with criminals. That's4.4 shootings per month, with a net resultof 260 killed and 193 wounded crooks. Atthe same time, there were 42 killedand 100 wounded officers, quite a favorableratio.One verv innovative idea that has beenInterest in practical handgun shooting . revived today is the indoor surprise reacseemsto have gained momentum during tion range devised by Fairbairn andAMERICAN HANDGUNNER JULYIAUGUST 1978