A long way back in time

BUTNER -- It might be problematic as a spectator sport, but all the commotion coming from Range No. 4 at Camp Butner recently was certainly worth a look.

With 150-year-old British rifles, gunners from 10 countries were hitting targets as far away as 1,000 yards.

The Muzzle Loaders Associations International Committee held its Long Range World Championships from Sept. 20-26 at the N.C. National Guard's Butner training site. It was a gathering of muzzle-loading aficionados, who fashion these guns for the challenge and nostalgia.

"The achievement of shooting accurately at this distance with an old muzzle-loader is really top stuff," said Kim Atkinson, captain of Australia's team.

When the shooting begins, the 45-caliber bullets rip down the range with the serenity of military jets.

The sulphuric smell of spent gunpowder wafts through the air as a smoky haze rolls with the wind.

The shooters fire methodically but at will.

They load gunpowder into the muzzle. Jam it down. Load a bullet into the muzzle. Jam it down. They carefully lay face down onto their shooting mats, then aim, fire and start the process over again.

The only thing that breaks up this routine is cleaning out the barrel or peering through a scope to check the accuracy of their shots.

There are high-powered scopes around, but none is mounted to any rifle. Rather, the scopes are used to scout out distances and to see, afterward, how shooters fared with distant targets.

Not for spectators

The shooters banter with each other, congratulating each other about targets sitting more than a half-mile way.

"It's not really a spectator sport," Atkinson said. "But you make friends all around the world and you see some phenomenal shooting."

At distances of 1,000 yards, the guns are aimed as much as 125 feet above the target with expensive sights that allow for adjustment for wind and other factors based on a variety of equations. These sights are primitive but accurate metal instruments akin to a protractor or compass used in geometry class.

The first long-range world competition took place in 1999, and now occurs somewhere in the world every two years.

A gun with history

Though many shooters fired replicas, the rifles were all modeled after British muzzle-loaders from the 1860s, which was an era of advancement and popularity for this type of arm. Some shooters did fire "originals," as they're called, rifles made by gunmakers such as Rigby, Whitworth and Metford.

"It was the start of truly accurate long-range shooting," said Ohio's Joe Hepsworth, the captain of the U.S. team, who also organized the event.

Confederate sharpshooters used the military version of Whitworth rifle in the Civil War, Hepsworth said.

Technology surpassed these guns with advancements in breech-loaded rifles, with their cartridge loads, which were easier and quicker to load. These, while now obsolete, are the predecessors of the modern rifle.

But then, muzzle-loaders were on their way out, and this became apparent at a famous competitive target match in 1874 in Creedmoor, N.Y., between Ireland, which had just won all the matches in the British Empire, and an amateur team from New York, representing the U.S.

The Irish team challenged the U.S. contingent to use U.S.-made weaponry. The Americans used Sharps and Remington rifles loaded with cartridges at the breach, or butt end, of the barrel. The U.S. won the match by a single point when a member of the Irish team cross-fired, hitting another target, and lost four points.

Cherished old guns

Al Roberts of Huntsville, Ala., showed up at the Camp Butner competition with a few of these guns. His father got him interested in these old rifles, and he cherishes them and the historical aspect.

"They're essentially works of art," he said. "The wood is beautiful. It's the finest watch or piece of furniture."

He takes special care of the guns and won't take them out on a day with precipitation.

"They're 150 years old," he said. "We'll probably get another 150 years out them."

Howard Markam, who lives in San Diego but is from England, has a South African-made original believed to be from the same period.

"Believe it or not," he said. "I could have paid off my mortgage for what I paid."

For others, a replica will do just fine.

"Mine is worth $2,000, and I think the bloke next to me said he paid $16,000," said Graham Salisbury of the Australian team.

Salisbury said he was drawn into the sport 26 years ago when an American opened a gun shop in his town in Australia.

"He fired a shot and I smelled the powder and I was gone," he said.

Interest has driven up the price. About 10 years ago, originals could be had for a fraction of the price, Roberts said.

"Nobody wanted them," Hepsworth said.

Adjusting for conditions

The week of the championships were challenging, and the contestants saw a mix of weather conditions.

On one day, Germany's Petra Leonhardt took second place in the 600-yard competition, but the following day he was stymied by the wind at 900 yards.

"Today, the wind took me," she said.

Art Fleener of Iowa had similar difficulty..

"Your margin for error is small," said Fleener, who fires a replica.

Markham was happy, though.

"I missed that last shot, but I did pretty well," he said. "14 shots in a row."

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