Shooting DePue

My family had a summer place out in rural Long Island in the middle of potato country a mile off the road and 120 feet up a cliff overlooking the Sound. Pretty busy in the summer around there, but the rest of the year it was pretty isolated. With so few neighbors and miles of farms it was the perfect place to hunt small game and plink.

One Saturday Max, DePue and I decided to drive the 70 miles for a day of shooting our 22s. Max didn't have a rifle, but I had 2 and Depue had several, so we each had one. It was a cold morning as we walked and talked and shot at anything that either moved or didn't. That didn't leave much out of danger. We didn't shoot at birds, though, or fruit still on the trees because the powerful long rifle hollow point bullets we were shooting had a long range. Instead we shot at targets on or near the ground. Things like rocks, rabbits, pheasants, quail, stumps or anything else in range.

Towards noon we were getting pretty cold so we went to the house to warm up. As you hunters and gun fanciers will know, there is a hard and fast rule about guns and houses: always unload before you bring a gun into the house. Period. No exceptions. And we followed that rule religiously. Now the house had been closed up for the winter so there was no heat, but there was an old cook stove in the kitchen that burned coal or wood. We started a fire in that and waited while the room warmed. In the mean time we sat around BSing and eating what ever we had to eat. When we finally got ready to go out and try to kill something we bundled up, picked up the rifles and walked out on the back porch. Max first, DePue next and me last. In a moment of stupidity I aimed my rifle (from 3 feet away) squarely in the middle of DePue's back and was going to snap the trigger and yell (to startle him) BANG, YOU'RE DEAD! As I was squeezing the trigger, I swear I heard my father say "Never point a gun at anyone unless you intend to shoot them". I pulled the barrel down and we walked out. Once outside we reloaded and that was when I discovered a shell chambered and ready to shoot. Had I pulled the trigger on DePue, a high velocity lump of lead would have shattered his spine or maybe hit his heart. I was shook up pretty badly, but never told him how close he had come to being shot or how close I had come to shooting him.

You expect stupid people to do stupid things, but sometimes not-so-stupid people do stupid things unexpectedly. I did something very stupid that day and was saved only by a last minute thought. I have never pointed a gun at anyone since then, and won't unless I mean to kill them.

Photo: 22rifle.blogspot.com/