Hunting and history have always been parallel interests for me but until recently the two never really crossed paths. Ironically it was working on a history degree that round about ended up with me starting my current guiding career nearly seven years ago. Even through the career path change, merging the two never really crossed my mind and I was perfectly happy keeping them separate. A couple years before working on the history degree and then establishing my guiding career I started collecting military surplus rifles from the first and second world wars. The first one in this collection is a Finnish M39 Mosin Nagant rifle manufactured in 1943. A magnificently beat up piece that no doubt saw much fighting in the cold and snow of Russia and Finland. The M39 was followed closely by its Russian counterpart a magnificently restored M91/30 Mosin Nagant manufactured in 1937 at the Tula arsenal.
Mosin Nagants are common starting points for military surplus collections as there were millions produced in a litany of variants from 1891 through the 1950s and 60s. Unfortunately for my pocket book these two rifles would start a mild (my wife would say severe) addiction to filling out what I’ve come to refer as the world wars collection. Following the Mosin Nagants came what I consider one of the prides of my collection. A No1 Mk3 Lee Enfield manufactured at the Lithgow factory in Australia in 1916. History of the world wars as is probably evident is my main historical interest and as I’m also a New Zealand citizen (this becomes very important later on) the roles the New Zealanders play in those conflicts is deeply entwined with the Australians.
Finding the Lithgow at a gun show for what I thought was a reasonable price I jumped on it. Its a purely Australian rifle but as in a military capacity the Aussies and Kiwis operated together it represents an amazing piece of history. After procuring the Lithgow it was a couple of years before another surplus rifle would join the collection but I did get back to some proper big game hunting. The fall of 2018 found me with a buck tag in hand and after a week of hunting a few hours after work each day my friend and local guide Seth helped me shoot a nice buck. It was this hunt that I picked up on a few things particular to the area I was hunting. Firstly getting another tag would only take four years which for some is an eternity but as I was busy guiding big game those years I wasn’t concerned. Secondly it was easy to find deer, particularly reasonable bucks. Third I could get relatively close, the buck I killed was at 70 yards which is an easy shot especially with my Remington 700 .270 and its Leupold scope. All this information rattled around my mind until February of 2020 when I went to New Zealand for a cousins wedding. Sitting in my aunt and uncles living room was an album from my grandfather who had passed six years earlier. One picture in particular caught my attention.
My grandfather Harry Hancock on the right during his days culling red deer for the New Zealand government. The rifle on his shoulder is a No1 Mk3 Lee Enfield. I think it was the flight home that I came to the conclusion I was going to hunt like my grandfather. A plan began forming in my mind…..
Hunt with History 