Historical Turkey Hunt with gear from the 1800s | Muzzleloader Turkey Hunt

This year’s Turkey season had some highs and some lows, but ultimately, I had a wonderful time in the woods with some historic gear and my Scott & Son Side-by-side antique muzzleloading shotgun.

My Gear

Scott & Son 14 Ga Muzzleloading Shotgun. 65 Grains Schuetzen 2F Blackpowder, 97 Grains (Volume) #4 Shot, CCI Percussion Caps.

My clothing for this hunt was loosely based on mid-late 18th century clothing seen in period illustrations and painting. I conducted most of the hunt in 18th century clothing to get a better understanding for how the clothing functioned in the woods and to further understand what my ancestors may have gone through to feed their families so that I could be here today.

The Hunt

Here in Indiana, our Turkey season is pretty long, but when you combine work, a young family, and spring time on the farm, hunting time is few and far between. Through the season, I was able to make it out for 7 mornings, 3-4 hours at a time.

Days 1-3 were very light. Some friends hunting in the area got the same results, a lot of nothing. Day 3 for me was a Sunday, with work looming the next day I was hopeful but went home empty-handed, placing my shotgun back on the porch in its patient parking spot until later in the week when I could hunt again. If you’ve seen the video, this is where I made a mistake, I’ll explain here now to hopefully help you with a successful hunt in the future.

We all know percussion caps are reliable, once standardized, flintlock muzzleloaders were converted for nearly 50 years before being replaced my centerfire arms. I’m coming to you now to remind you, no matter how much you want to save that $.10 cap and the cost of the powder and your lead, if your muzzleloader is going to sit for 3+ days before you hunt again, discharge the muzzleloader and start fresh when you can go hunting again.

I set out on the morning of the 4th day to a new spot, the southeast corner of my family tree-planting. Nestled inside some brush I had a great spot, the air was crisp and the birds were singing, I had a good feeling. Not 10 minutes after picking my spot I heard a series of gobbles straight west about 300 yards. Ideally, it would have been nice for the gobbles to have been 40 yards away from my first spot, but time was ticking on the season so I had to move.

For 30 minutes I stalked my way across the woods, ducking under pine branches, weaving around brush piles as quietly as I could to get closer to the gobbling tom. At this moment, I felt as close to an 18th-century frontiersman as I ever have, it was incredible. Stopping 100 yards from the edge of the woods, I picked my spot behind a fallen pine. The brush created a natural blind to my left and broke up my silhouette from the right. It was as good of a spot as I have had all season and it was time to see if it would pay off.

Above: My Shotgun and my 18th century shoes from South Union Mills.

I pulled my Jerry Rice wingbone turkey call to my lips and let out a series of calls. To my suprise, the Tom answered back. This was the first time I had connected with a tom this season, my heart was in my chest. I called again and he replied immediately, as if he had been searching for a lady all morning and I just walked in.

The downside to this exchange? He was across the highway to my left, I’d have to work to bring him in. To my benefit, the highway was shutdown for some bridgework half a mile west, traffic would be light this morning. I continued calling.

Our back and fourth continued for nearly 20 minutes before he stopped, I spaced out my calls not wanting to lose him, but not wanting to scare him away. Several trucks rolled down the road, I thought to myself, “that’s it, surely he’s turned away now.” I let the moment breath for a few breathes and then suddenly, a gobble roared through the woods! He had crossed the highway and was heading right for me. At this point I’m not sure of his size, but between the gobbles and the scuffle he’s making through the undergrowth, it sounded like he was the size of a bulldozer coming through the woods. My heart promptly retuned to it’s place in my throat.

For 10 more minutes we exchanged calls and he worked his way in until I could see him. I froze with my shotgun up and my call in my lips, my mouth almost too dry to call. He let loose on last gobble and stopped just 5 feet from my open lane through the brush. I’m not sure if it was my calling or the bass drum of my heartbeat that turned him off but his tail went down and he turned west, making a beeline for the treeline and he was gone.

When something like that happens, it’s hard to not think about what you could do better, but to be honest, after I set out my breath, I was on cloud nine. Calling that tom in from across the highway was an incredible experience. Those 45 minutes will go down in history as some of my favorite hunting memories, it sounds cheezy but it was an incredible experience.

I let my heart settle, had some water, and caught my breath before deciding to return home for breakfast. Taking up my gun and my pack, I decided to go to the south and east. If I had any luck, this tom would stick to the tree planting and be here tomorrow. I wanted to take a path with a low chance of chasing him off. I took 3 steps east and stopped in my tracks. A gobble ripped through the woods. I was stunned. At that moment, the only thing I could do was drop right where I was and hide. “A second chance at this gobbler? How? He just saw me”, I said to myself. Another gobble. I’m not one to look a gift horse in the mouth so I jumbled around to get to my call and gave him a holler. He called right back and by the sounds of it he was making his way around me to the north. The only thing between him and me was a row of 8” pine trees running north and south. I wasn’t in a good position, but I had to make the best of it.

Between calls and gobbles, I slowly, and I mean slowly, put my head down and brought my shotgun around to the right side of the tree. With my gun in position, I bring my head up to check the lane. In front of my was the gobbling tom just where I needed him but to my surprise, 3 more birds came out of the trees to the right.

Here I was, ready to go home and I’ve stumbled into 4 birds with nothing between us but a piddly little pine tree to hide behind. In the moment, I took the 4 birds to be toms, but after reviewing my limited video of the event, I believe the group to have been made up of 2 toms and 2 hens.

Pushing my luck, I let out a few more calls to bring them within firing range of my 14 gauge. If my heart was in my throat before, it was thumping along side my brain at this point. I had my pick of 2 beautiful toms, almost glowing as the yellow sun bounced off their feathers in the morning light.

Steadying myself, I inched the shotgun up and drew a bead on the largest tom of the group, he had pulled to the left and was clear of the other three. Sliding my finger back into the guard my pad found the trigger and gave it a gentle nudge to the rear as the front bead found its mark.

“SNAP”

My cap popped, but the gun didn’t go off, I blink and set my second hammer, I’m back on the trigger but the turkeys have turned tail and are moving north, chuckling as they trot.

I should have been crushed, the lord gave me a second chance better than the first and I blew it, but as folks smarter than me say, “It’s okay if the turkey wins”. As I picked myself up and gathered my things, I couldn’t help but chuckle. It was funny, it was amazing, it was everything hunt should be in my mind. Thankfully my family doesn’t have to rely on me to hunt to keep us alive because I can share this story with you and laugh about it.

Since sharing this story, I’ve had a few dozen reasons give to me as to why it happened. From my own incompetence (No argument there), to my cleaning methods, to bad caps, and the weather. My gut tells me I should have emptied the gun and set out that morning with a fresh load and a fresh cap. I’ve not had issues like this before, and frankly, the weather during my “How long can you leave a hawken loaded” video was much worse and the gun did fine, but that was Triple 777 powder, so who knows. In the end, it’s a muzzleloader, and part of the fun is that it’s not perfect. I like to think that someone with this shotgun even had a similar thing happen almost 200 years ago. It’s fun to think about a connection between hunters that isn’t trophies.

For the rest of the season, I was able to call in 2 more Tom’s who subsequently sussed me out and sat in the cold rain for 2 mornings, but I loved every minute of it. To me, any time spent in the woods is about as close to heaven as it gets.

Thanks for following along.