Recommended Loads

[Researcher]

This is the page from the 1914 "Fox Gets the Game" catalogue that gives chambering information and recommends loads for the Ansley H. Fox gun --



A.H. Fox Gun Co. was only recommending 1 1/8 ounce loads in 12-gauge, 1 ounce loads in 16-gauge and 7/8 ounce loads in 20-gauge. On the other hand, from even before the A.H. Fox Gun Co. was founded in 1905, the ammunition factories were pumping out 12-gauge 2 3/4 inch shells with up to 3 1/2 drams of bulk smokeless powder (DuPont, E.C. or Schultze) pushing 1 1/4 ounces of shot or 28 grains of Ballistite or Infallible dense smokeless powder pushing 1 1/4 ounces of shot. Their recommended 16- and 20-gauge loadings are about what the ammunition companies were putting out in 2 9/16 inch 16-gauge shells and 2 1/2 inch 20-gauge shells, but those 12-gauge recommendations are way on the light side.

[Silvers]

Aaahhhh, for those simpler days. No digital chronographs, no pressure transducers, no restrictions on lead shot .... you went to the hardware, got a box of X brand shells they kept in stock..... you made two decisions: high or low brass, and shot size. Drams or dram equivalents were a vague, insignificant concept to most. Then you had at it for rabbits, ducks, woodcock, whatever. Hunting for small game here in the east? 6's would do for everything.

Now if I were shooting a 12 gauge Fox back in the day, and read somewhere that they were normally chambered 2-5/8", here's what I'd be getting at the hardware store. Take note of the shell length, also the store's date and cost basis code on the box. There must have been a decent demand for these shorter shells, for Peters to have put them up into the 40's. By 1952 (Stoeger's catalog) the 2-5/8" 12 gauge seems to have been phased out. 2-3/4" in standard 12 gauge were the only ones listed in that issue. But by then 2-3/4" had been standardized for 12 gauge by US arms manufacturers for about 20 years. Silvers

[Researcher]

All the U.S. ammunition companies offered the 2 5/8 inch 12-gauge, and 2 1/2 inch 20- and 28-gauge shells until just after WW-II. By 1948 they were disappearing from all the listings. The 2 9/16 inch 16-gauge shells hung on into the early 1960s.