Browning Auto-5 “Light Twelve” (12ga.)
Kim du Toit
November 14, 2003
1:00 AM CDT
Here’s a shotgun which is not only liked, but loved by people who’ve ever owned it. The Browning Auto-5 (sometimes called the “humpback") was the first semi-auto shotgun made, and was designed by the Man Himself, John Moses Browning. Even among his many other designs (eg. the Colt 1911), the Auto-5 is regarded as Browning’s best design. Stories of its reliability and ruggedness are legion: at one point, the Auto-5 was the waterfowl piece, and without which few hunters considered their gun safe complete.
Many shotgunners think, incidentally, that the venerable Auto-5 is still the fastest-cycling semi-auto shotgun, matched only recently by Benelli and the new Brownings.
Production began in 1902, and ended in 1999, which means that the asking price of the Auto-5 has shot up, and no one makes accessories for them anymore.
[pause to allow boos, jeers and catcalls to subside]
Personally, I blame the Democrats. Wasn’t Bill Clinton President in 1999?
To give you an idea of the Auto-5’s popularity, the two-millionth Auto-5 was produced in 1970 at the FN-Herstal factory in Belgium. Other A5s were made under licence by the Japanese company Miroku, but these are not as treasured as the Belgian-made models (although still as expensive).
This one, the “Light Twelve”, is listed at Collector’s Firearms for $1,095—other models sell for less, although not much less.
Other versions are the Magnum (12ga. and 20ga. only), the “Sweet Sixteen” (the “Light” 16ga.), and the “Light Twenty”. All calibers are available in “Standard” weight, which may be preferable from a recoil-management perspective—taming recoil is the only area where the Auto-5 trails the competition (and even then, not by much).
Barrel lengths vary from 24” to 30”. The length of the barrel can sometimes (but not always) be estimated by the “pet” names given to the various types: “Shooters” come with the shorter barrels, “Stalkers” with 26” barrels, and so on. People will often have swapped barrels from the original format, so it’s not always a reliable guide. The “Buck Special”, of course, is a slug gun with a rifled barrel.
So… why should I get an Auto-5 instead of one of the new whizz-bang modern ones painted in a camo pattern?
Well, duh… because it’s an old gun, of course—the same reason to want a Winchester 1894, a Colt 1911 or a Remington Police revolver. All were designed a century or more ago, and all are still outstanding examples of firearms engineering.
The Auto-5 still belongs in every serious shooter’s safe, for its heritage if for no other reason. And some day, a Sweet Sixteen will be in mine.
Update: Here’s a story sent by a Reader about an Auto-5:
A buddy of mine has a Browning Sweet Sixteen. Great gun. And I can honestly say that this is a gun that people do love, not like, but love. My friend’s Browning was discovered in his father-in-law’s basement after his passing. It was lovingly wrapped and stored in soft oiled cloth in a gun case hidden in the basement ceiling. From the state it was in, it was almost new, but looked to have been cleaned and oiled on a regular basis. No one in the family knew that this gun even existed. Apparently there was a gun accident in the mother-in-law’s family early on in the marriage, so he, for the sake of domestic harmony, sold his firearms with the intent of always going back to owning guns after a fews years when the storm died down. He never did, other things kept getting in the way. But still, despite all this, he kept that Browning hidden in the basement, the one gun he could not part with.
Now you know.
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