New-Old Point Shooting

David Codrea linked to an interesting article about a point shooting that went away with the advent of revolvers and was finally sunsetted by the introduction of modern automatics with Browning model 1911

The gist of the technique is, pull the trigger with your second finger, and point at the target with your first finger. Because you naturally point at things with your finger pretty accurately you can get off shots faster when you point and use another finger for the trigger work, as your don’t need to line up sights. And this is very helpful when you are under great stress and/or the threat is at close range. Like times when you are in a gunfight with a pistol.

This works well with single shot dueling pistols, but you run the risk of a serious burn from escaping gases from a revolver, and your finger gets in the way of the cylinder movement on double action shots. And the nail in the coffin was instruction in the original operators manual for the 1911 expressly recommended against it, mainly because the extended forefinger would interfere with the slide’s action, jamming it, maybe injuring the finger.

This warning in 1911 did indicate that some people were still aware of the method despite the absence of appropriate hardware being produced for half a century (not many dueling pistols around once the revolver became widespread more that 50 years prior.)

This goes against everything in Cooper’s Modern Technique, but Jeff Cooper was pretty adaptable. If pistols were designed to allow for this type of REAL point shooting, he may have ended up being a strong supporter.

Cooper even shared a story of an improvisation he had to adopt in a specialized circumstance in one of his books or writings. In college he was challenged to a wager to ice some varmint in the yard of his frat house (a different thing in the 1930 from what we think of today.) The .22 rifle available was proving too cantankerous at getting the job done for any of the other Brothers. The problem was a bad trigger that needed WAY too much pull to get the job done. I think Cooper estimated it at a 10 pound pull. For a .22. MADNESS. Anyway, the challenge was made and Jeff Cooper was not one to back down from a gauntlet fairly thrown. His solution was the go prone and instead of grasping the stock with his trigger hand, he pinched the trigger between finger and thumb, with that thumb in back of the trigger guard. This did the trick, but he freely admitted such a thing had only limited utility for most guns and situation. But a proper point-shooting system like the modified grip I’m discussing here would have almost universal utility. Then again, Cooper DID study more modern point-shooting, and found them lacking despite their speed. He was more of “get your head screwed on straight before you are anywhere near a gunfight, and deliberately aim and hit the target while the point-shooter under the same stresses misses you a few times, as your chances are better” if I understand him right. I’d even bet the Colonel was aware of the point-and-pull system and tried it out.

Modern point-shooting advocates are very practiced with their weapon and very good at what they do and have the ammo budget to prove it, but the “Point with one, squeeze trigger with the other” is something novices can ostensibly master very quickly.

IF the gun allowed for it.

You’d have to produce a pistol with changed geometry, both to the place where the pointing finger goes so it won’t interfere with any of the workings or get injured, and where the trigger is placed on the frame so that second finger has better access to it. It would probably have to be a single action trigger, too, as that second finger isn’t a very good squeezer on mushy long-travel triggers or strong DA pulls, I’d imagine. And a manufacturer would need quick acceptance in order to make the investment in a new model worth their while, so the technique would have to overcome decades of entrenched conservative preferences in an entrenched conservative customer base, and that doesn’t happen that quickly, even if the new method is seen as clearly superior from the get go.

And they’d have to make it ambidextrous to affect me, and the geometry might not be easily adaptable so that an ENTIRELY different model with left-specialized geometry might be necessary for us southpaws.

The changed frame shape might not allow a shooter to shift between point shooting with a different trigger finger and the ‘conventional’ way, either.

There are gadgets available, aftermarket, to retrofit regular pistols to accommodate this P&S stuff. So some part of the market is addressing the need, cheaply. They just help the pointing finger, they don’t reposition the trigger.

I’d never try it, since my weapons are all conventional, with the inherent issues already extrapolated on, and to change my technique at this point of the game would be like Tiger Woods radically changing his driver swing. Tiger DID do this to perfect his game, but it took over a year to iron out the bugs and he performed poorly (for him) in the meantime. And I am no Tiger Woods of pistol shooting. Let me get good at Modern Technique before even DREAMING of changing to another horse mid-stream.


Besides, if it was a superior technique John Moses Browning would have designed the 1911 to shoot that way. He didn’t ergo it is not superior. That’s logic! Ok, maybe not ‘logic.’

It’s an interesting thought experiment, though.