Speaking of S&W .44 Magnums, a Norwegian scientist had to use his to kill a polar bear that went for him. Letters in,
National Geographic assailed him! Some people just do not have their heads screwed on right!
If I'd learned of that case sooner, I'd probably have tried to write to him, certainly to the magazine, offering congratulations on his marksmanship, and on his survival.
Sporting Classics had an article by a doctor in Alaska who used a Ruger Super Blackhawk to kill a charging grizzly. He and another doc had killed a caribou or a moose (I forget which) and the bear may have wanted to kill them and take their meat.
I was especially impressed by the man who knifed a coastal brown bear in the neck with a Buck Model 110 lockblade folder. He survived and sent the still bloody knife to Chuck Buck, then President of Buck Knives. (He died recently.) Buck kept it in a frame on his wall for some years. This man was featured on that Discovery show about the gun shop in Alaska. Wild West Guns? The show that has Phred (good) and those guys who remind me of a New Jersey pawn shop (bad).
I also know of a man who used a Schrade Model LB-7 (much like the Buck Model 110) to kill a cougar that attacked him from behind as he was walking a road in the woods near his home on Vancouver Island.
And there's the case of Harry Wolhuter, who used a knife with a six-inch blade to kill a lion that was dragging him off to eat. Happened in Kruger Natl. Park in 1903. Wolhuter's rifle was on his horse, which bolted, throwing him when the lion charged. Wolhuter was pretty messed up, but his Africans (who had run) found him and got him to a doctor. The knife and the lion's hide were on display at Kruger for years and may still be. There is also a monument where the attack happened. Search on the Net and you can find photos. He wrote a book in the late 1940's about his experiences as a game ranger. I want to read it, and think there have been reprints. All I've seen listed are too expensive for me, but maybe there'll be a new printing someday. Wolhuter managed to stick the lion in the heart.
