A gunner remains motionless as a large pack of grouse crests the hill and approaches the butt on set wings. Catlike, he drops a bird well back, pulls forward for a double, and then moves to a third, which falls like a stone out front. Deftly, the loader hands off, and the shooter’s luck holds as he grasses three grouse going away. Hmm . . . . Autoloaders and pumps are forbidden on the moor, yet six birds fell. Obviously, our shooter was using a pair of triples!
Many makers, from John Manton on down, have produced tri-tube game guns. In Germania, three-barreled Drillings are not un-common, although usually one of the barrels is rifled. For those shotgunners eager to go for a triple without resorting to an autoloader or pump, a modern maker from Ferlach, Austria, offers a svelte three-barreled gun with game gun panache. First and foremost, the Karl Hauptmann triple handles. In 28 bore, the gun’s 28½" chopper-lump barrels balance the 7.2-pound package perfectly. The sidelever offers easy loading access, and the single trigger fires the center, left and then right barrel without fault.
The gun is not hard to look at either. The action has lovely cove sculpting around the bar as well as the graceful sidelever and top strap. And the stock ears are robust—not always the case with triggerplate actions. Looking inside, the quality is self-evident from the screws to the mainsprings.
None of this is surprising. Hauptmanns have been making guns since 1902 and making tri-barrels for the past 35 years. Heading the firm since 2005, Gerd Hauptmann has patented his innovative selective ejectors for his triple shotguns and rifles and modernized their manufacture. The three-barreled gun is available in 28 gauge or .410 with a sidelever or toplever.
For more information, contact US agent Francis Lombardi, francislombardi@me.com.
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