Long-Range Power

After my first real shotgun—a 20 gauge SKB—the next truly mind-blowing firearm experience I had came one weekend when someone brought along a .243 Winchester. I remember sitting around the cars after a guineafowl drive when a few birds were spotted far off in a field, maybe 200 to 300 metres away. This bloke calmly raised the rifle, took aim, and took one out. It was like watching a pillow with a stick of dynamite in it explode. I was absolutely gobsmacked.

Looking back now, I feel a little disgusted by how much the sheer power of firearms impressed me back then. I think part of it had to do with agency—I had so little of it in my own life at the time that squeezing a trigger and seeing that decision instantly affect the world around me was intoxicating. But I wasn’t completely without conscience. That same inner voice that would gnaw at me later was already whispering.

The first time I ever went on a proper hunt was with Tim Brownlee, a friend of my mum’s. He had a Czech wife, Vladimíra, who was hot as—but that’s another story. We went away for a weekend to some farm in the northern Transvaal, and I was given a tracker and a .375 Holland & Holland Magnum—an extremely high-powered calibre (the make of rifle would’ve been less noteworthy). I remember the excitement of that day clearly. We came across an impala ewe about 150 metres down the drag. I shot her through the neck—almost decapitating her. I remember the surge of pride, the rush of adrenaline… and then I just felt shit about it. We made it into biltong, which helped justify it a bit, but something inside me didn’t sit right.

Later, I went back to that same farm. I must’ve been 18 or 19 by then, already owning a .22-250 Musgrave—serial number 222500001, which I still can’t believe. The .22-250 is a wild cartridge: a bigger calibre necked down to .22, firing hollow points at nearly 4,000 feet per second. Flat-shooting, devastating, and almost surgical in its precision. I’d been reloading, going to the range as often as I could, putting five shots into one-inch groups at 100 metres with a 40-power scope. It was a proper sniper weapon.

That second time at the farm, I was allowed to hunt on my own. I got up into a tree early in the morning and waited. An impala with stunning 28-inch horns came down below me. I took the shot. Tim insisted we mount the head. I ended up giving it to Pete Becker, who’ll come up again later. But again, I never felt good about it. There was pride, sure—but underneath that, something hollow. I support hunting for meat, for sustenance, if you’re going to fill your freezer and feed your family. But just killing for the sake of killing—God, I could relate to it, but I hated that I could.

Somewhere around 1985 or ’86, Niels had opened a branch of his factory in Lydenburg—near Three Falls but in a different valley. The company had rented a farm called Nooitgedacht, where there was an old Boer War-era cottage and some staff living there permanently. The place had a problem: a big male baboon, kicked out of his troop, aggressive, stealing chickens, terrorising the maid. The farmer—an Afrikaans guy named Pierre—had tried everything, taking shots at him with a .303, but he never managed to bring him down.

One day, Niels mentioned it to me, half-joking: “Maybe you and your mates should go down there for the weekend—see if you can take out the baboon.” Ha ha.

So we did.

By then, I was good friends with Pete Becker. We borrowed Niels’s old Range Rover—he’d already upgraded—and headed down with a bunch of mates from Technicon (where I was studying at the time). Steve Bate was there, his girlfriend Chania, and Nicolette, who was hot as hell. We drank beers the whole way and partied hard that night in the old cottage.

At dawn, running on no sleep, Pete and I decided it was time to go find the baboon. I took the .22-250, loaded it up, and we walked for hours through the vast property—over 2,000 acres. Late morning, coming up a valley past the trout hatchery, we heard a bark. We looked up and saw him—high on a hill near the dirt road from Lydenburg. Just sitting there. Taunting us.

Pete reckoned it was 600 metres. I thought more like 400. Either way, he said, “Go. Take the shot.”

So I sat down right there on the road, got him in my crosshairs through the 20x scope. At that distance, I figured a six-inch drop, so I aimed at his chin. Squeezed the trigger.

With a rifle like that, you lose sight of the target instantly from the recoil.

“YOU MISSED!” Pete yelled.

The baboon started running diagonally across the hill, but after about 30 metres, he just dropped. Collapsed. Then rolled and rolled down the slope into the ravine.

Pete pulled out his .45 in case we were about to walk into a wounded, angry baboon. We went looking. Found him stone dead. A small, neat hole right in the middle of his chest. That hollow point must’ve liquefied every organ on contact. He never knew what hit him.

And the thing is—lying there on his back, dead—he looked so disturbingly human. It was visceral. The pride, the shame, the praise from Pete—he still says it’s the best shot he’s ever seen in his life. He boiled the skull that same day and still has it on his desk. But for me… I don’t know.

Pete and I aren’t close anymore. I think you can see why. Our lives went in very different directions.

I’ve thought about that shot a lot over the years. I know I did it for the wrong reasons—to glorify myself, to impress. But if I were that baboon, maybe that was a good ending. Kicked out of the troop, alone, likely facing a slow and brutal death. Dead before he even heard the bullet.

I don’t regret that shot. But it’s fixed in my mind forever, along with the mixed emotions it brought.

By that time, I’d also bought a stainless steel Taurus .38 Special, likely soon after my 18th birthday—my first legal licence. Firearms were a big part of my life then. I even had a bullet collection—some really rare ones too, like a 14-bore. On one trip to London, I visited the Holland & Holland shop and struck up a conversation with an old gent behind the counter. I told him I was looking for a four-bore cartridge to add to my collection. He chatted with some other customers for a bit, then just palmed one into my hand—live. You’d never see that happen now.

I was in love with the craftsmanship, the geometry, the mythology of firearms. Later I had a Beretta side-by-side 12-bore three-inch Magnum with a gorgeous walnut stock. I used to polish it endlessly. Ritualistically.

But even then—somewhere deep down—I think I knew this was something I had to grow out of.

Guns gave me the illusion of control because I didn’t have any real control. The decision to squeeze the trigger and see its immediate effect—there was nothing else like it. But that’s not real power. Real power is knowing you don’t need to fire.

And thank God I got there eventually.