Southeast Alaska—due west of northern British Columbia—is a hell of a place to hunt anything. Autumn means anything from frigid blizzards to balmy days full of Boone & Crockett mosquitoes. Spring is the symmetrically opposite ditto. One thing remains constant though, and that is the saltwater. It gets into everything—binoculars, cameras, guns and even your underwear. Saltwater migrates through your clothing and coats your skin. Whatever it comes in contact with, it seeks to destroy. Within the universal solvent of the seawater exists a sticky, gritty concoction of salts, acids and sea life residue that can render a gun and its optics useless, and make you cry out loud for your mamma in search of relief from its chaffing.
On the other hand, Southeast Alaska is arguably one of the richest areas on the planet for fish and game. Sitka deer are nearly everywhere. There are enough large brown bears to interest a diehard bear hunter. On the lofty peaks not too far inland are goats and sheep that will make the most obtuse wilderness hunter sit up and take notice. Its rivers, streams, channels, sounds and open sea play host to salmon the size of your leg; halibut the size of your front door; whales the size of a school bus; and enough “lesser” species of game and fish to keep an amateur naturalist busy for decades. Southeast Alaska is also home to a gang of black bears fully capable of standing toe to toe with any big-game hunter.
These bears are not foolish enough to come in night after night to a 55-gallon drum stuffed with stale donuts and honey. No, these babies like fresh meat—salmon, crabs, even tidal pool mollusks and deer fawns. Their propensity toward a high-protein diet contributes significantly to their great size. The environment in which they live is what makes their glossy, luxurious hides so desirable.
So I had a fair amount on my mind as Marlin Benedict motioned to me to hurry up and finish my intimate outdoor business and get my sorry butt back down to where he was and address—with 19th century rifle technology—one of those outsized black bears that had suddenly appeared as I squatted in the bushes. But I am getting ahead of myself…
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Messrs. Hepburn and Marlin
John Marlin had been making single-shot rifles and even some revolvers since around 1870. For seven years prior to that, he focused on making single-shot pocket pistols. As the popularity of the lever action blossomed, it was only natural that the independent, Yankee gunmaker wanted in on the repeating rifle action. By 1881 Marlin garnered portions of patents from Andrew Burgess, E.A.F. Topperwein and H.F. Wheeler, and developed a side-loading, top-ejecting, lever-action rifle. The octagon barrel was 28 inches long, and the tubular magazine held as many as 10 .45-70 or .40-60 cartridges.
In 1889 Marlin had struck up a professional association with Lewis Lobdell Hepburn, a gunmaker who worked for Remington until it went into receivership and a marksman who competed at Creedmoor in 1874 with a rifle he made himself. Hepburn had secured a patent on a side-ejecting, lever-action rifle, and Marlin had immediately recognized the superior engineering and strength of a solid-top receiver. The Model 1889 was a smaller carbine chambered for revolver cartridges like the .32-20, .38-40 and .44-40.
Hepburn further refined his lever-action rifle, and in 1893 was awarded another patent for improvements in the locking-bolt system and a two-piece firing pin. These improvements were incorporated into all Marlin lever actions from this point forward. The Model 1893 was chambered for cartridges longer than the Model 1889—the .32-40 and the .38-55.
In 1895 the rifle was again revamped and made larger to accommodate even larger cartridges including the .38-56, .40-65, .40-82, .45-70 and .45-90. Barrel configurations went from octagon to half-octagon, half-round and round, and ranged from 15 to 30 inches long. Too, it could be ordered with a straight or curved grip, and a takedown version was also available. When 1912 rolled around a lightweight version of the Model 1895 came out featuring a 24-inch round barrel; a half magazine and a 7 3/4-pound weight in .33 High Power caliber. The first version of the Model 1895 ceased production in 1914.
New Age
Some 46 years after the Model 1893 Marlin—which by now was run by John Marlin’s sons, Mahlon and John Howard Marlin—decided its flagship rifle needed a little face lift. The stock and fore-end were put on a diet, and new sights were put on the Model 1936 in an effort to better compete with the popular Winchester lever rifles in a Depression-ravaged economy. With a 24-inch barrel the rifle version weighed some 63ž4 pounds and was chambered for calibers like the .30-30 and .32 Special.
 The long-eye-relief “Lever Scout” scope mount from XS Sight Systems allows the user a great deal of latitude when mounting the an optic. |
Four years after World War II ended Marlin made another major engineering change on the Model 36. The square bolt of the Hepburn-based designs was replaced with a round bolt made of alloy steel. This allowed the receiver to have only a relatively small hole in the side for ejection and strengthened the rear portion since the steel did not have a slot milled into it. Christened the Model 336, with a “C” suffix for the carbine or an “A” suffix for the rifle, the new Marlin also sported a beefed-up locking system. Riflescopes were becoming popular at this time, so the receiver was drilled and tapped to accept scope bases, and the hammer spur was reshaped into a lower profile to accommodate the newfangled sight.
Marlin added the .35 Remington to the Model 336 line in 1953 and in 1956 began touting its proprietary Micro-Groove rifling. Over the years the Model 336 has undergone a number of largely cosmetic changes, yet remained a solid, reliable rifle for the cartridges of the .30-30 class. One change instituted in 1984—to the lament of many lever-action aficionados—was the inclusion of a manual cross-bolt safety. Like the automatic safety on some double-barrel shotguns, it is a futile attempt to engineer brains into an inanimate object to replace a lack of brains on the part of someone handling that object. But like an ill-conceived government program that continues under its own inertia without producing a justifiable benefit, we’ll likely have to live with the safety indefinitely.
Throughout its history the Marlin 336 has been made in a gaggle of variations, commemoratives and calibers. During the late ’50s it was chambered in the then-popular .219 Zipper in an effort to tap the burgeoning varmint market. Other caliber variations included the .44 Magnum, .356 Winchester, .375 Winchester and .444 Marlin.
 When topped with a long-eye-relief scope, a set of back-up irons and stoked with full-power .45-70 ammo, the Marlin Guide Gun is a rifle that can handle any Alaskan surprise, bears and weather included. |
Full Circle
In the early 1970s a resurgence of interest in some of the older, large-bore, blackpowder cartridges gained enough steam to prompt Marlin to chamber the .45-70 in its 336 series. The new big-bore rifle resurrected the Model 1895 moniker, since that model designation fit the cartridge. As interest grew in the new big-bore lever gun Marlin began making sporter versions with a gently curving pistol grip, designated as the Model 1895S. Initially barrels were 22 inches long and featured eight-groove rifling. After the first year Marlin chose to promote its Micro-Groove rifling in the 1895.
With all that heat-treated steel in the receiver and the bolt, and a beefy 5/16-inch locking bolt, it wasn’t long before the power crowd began handloading the .45-70 well beyond its 19th century levels. Some less robust rifles let go with some of the wilder loads, but the Marlin hung in there, and in so doing developed quite a reputation for reliability with backwoodsmen who eke their living from the wilderness side-by-side with un-neighborly critters like bears and jumbo-sized rutting herbivores like elk and moose.
Hunters can afford to have a full-size gun. Their purpose in the woods is to shoot something, and the performance in terms of accuracy, power and recoil can best be delivered by a standard rifle configuration. But the backwoodsmen and guides who live out there are often doing several things simultaneously, and the rifle is actually a reactive tool—much as the concealed handgun is in more settled environs. For these hardy folk the rifle needs to be trim and fast handling, because a reactive tool can only help one to deal with an unexpected turn of events when it’s available at the time. A minute—or even several seconds—to go fetch a big rifle from its parking spot can be very dangerous.
So in 1998 Marlin responded with the Guide Gun, an 18 1/2-inch barreled, Ballard-style rifled, four-shot Model 1895 with a ventilated recoil pad. No pretences here—this is a business gun. An abbreviated barrel is less likely to snag; the Ballard-style rifling grips heavy, hard-cast bullets better; a four-shot magazine gives you five rounds to deal with the problem at hand; and a ventilated recoil pad subverts the worst of the sting of the heavy loads. The first Guide Guns also were ported to help deal with recoil, but since 2002 they are sans the Swiss-cheesing—to the applause of those of us trying to preserve what hearing we have left. All that was lacking was a corrosion-resistant finish.
 If the scope should fail, this bear rifle wears a set of super-quick, back-up iron sights made by XS Sight Systems. The large ghost ring and post is extremely easy to use in a wide variety of hunting situations, especially in low light when bears are close. |
19th Century Design,21st Century Technology
The always-progressive Marlin Company made the decision to produce the Guide Gun in stainless steel in 2001 and dubbed it the Model 1895GS. Every major metal part, save the sling swivel studs and sights, is made from the nearly rustless material. The parts that are not stainless are satin-nickel plated, except the sights, which remain blued. In 2000 Marlin introduced a new caliber—the .450 Marlin—to the Guide Gun platform in an effort to dissuade those with vintage .45-70s along with the modern ones to make a mistake and load one of the newer hot loads into the old gun.
Most big-game hunters are shooting bolt-action rifles today. And even the most modern, high-tech, titanium super-duper magnum is founded on a design developed before man could fly or roll down a road on a contraption powered by an internal combustion engine. So why is it a stretch to think one would be handicapped with a lever-action rifle in .45-70? I certainly did not, but I confess that because so much of my hunting is done on a turn-bolt platform, I did need to think it through.
Despite my bolt-action leanings, I am truly enamored with the lever-action rifle because of its inextricable ties to the Old West. It truly is an icon of the American West, and my oh-too-modest collection of lever actions pays tribute to my love of that era. So I felt a combination of emotions as I unwrapped the stainless steel Guide Gun. Here was a true American classic with lines as timeless as Mt. Rushmore but of a shiny, new material I hoped would not spook a bear.
My preparation included replacing the factory sights with a Ghost Ring setup from XS Sight Systems and one of its Lever Scout Mounts for a Leupold long eye relief scope I had on hand. Choosing ammo was a no brainer. These are big, tough bears, and they live in thick coastal forest. I wanted something that would slap it down for keeps, so I chose Randy Garrett’s 540-grain Super-Hard-Cast Hammerhead loaded to 1,550 feet per second in most .45-70 rifle barrel lengths. Yes, this is one helluva +P load.
Pants Down
When I boarded the Bear Necessity, the mother ship of Mark Galla’s Alaska Peaks & Sea’s outfitting business, there were a couple of hairy eyes cast on the stubby lever-action carbine. Galla and his crew are all Alaskan sourdoughs, veterans who know their way around the woods, and they know what works. To a man they pack a .375 H&H as a backup rifle for when the pudding hits the fan. Surely they thought the big cheechako in the cowboy hat with a shiny lever-action carbine would need a close eye kept on him this trip.
We spent a week probing the coves and passages around Prince of Wales Island morning and night. The weather—always the wild card on any hunt—was balmy. I managed to anoint myself with a doozy of a facial sunburn, and my lucky cowboy hat damn near became part of the flotsam of the inside passage on one blustery day. Every morning and evening we’d dive off into one of the skiffs and post ourselves in a likely spot looking for beachcombing black bears. A few Boo Boos—immature bears with “long” legs and pointy ears—showed up on the beaches often enough to keep our tails wagging. All in all, it was a tough hunt in terms of bears seen. But on the next-to-last day my luck turned, albeit sardonically.
The morning hunt had been totally unproductive, something we had started to count on because of the uncharacteristic warmth and lack of rain for early June. We were in cruise mode, taking turns at glassing the shoreline looking for interesting, mobile jet-black dots to initiate a rush to a skiff for further investigation.
A black bear drill goes like this: Spot a bear on the beach. Make a mad dash to put on waders and jump into a skiff—hopefully with your gun, pack and any necessities. Use the skiff to arrive at a point downwind of the bear where you can beach the boat and make your way closer to the bear for evaluation and a shot. Nearly all of these ventures end in disappointment. Most often the bear will either fade away into the woods or get spooked. Then you start all over again. By the sixth day of a seven-day hunt you have the drill burned into your memory—along with the outcome and resignation to your fate.
So when the moving black dot on the shoreline about 1-1/2 miles away prompted the wrote exercise of waders, pack, gun and skiff, I knew the outcome. As we had a half dozen times before, Marlin and I did everything right. We came in downwind and beached the skiff perhaps a quarter-mile from where we had last seen the bear. Carefully and quietly we worked up the beach, and when we got to the beach where we had seen the bear—like every time before—it had vanished.
We had been running like this for a week. It was hot, and because of the pressures of time this particular morning, I had no opportunity to satisfy one of nature’s fundamental bodily functions. We retired to a fallen log next to a trail, passing a day-old fawn that had been bedded there by its mother. Marlin occupied himself as I retired some 40 to 50 yards into the bush for some nature time, leaving my rifle with Marlin.
As I stepped out from my “privacy bush” repairing my wardrobe, I saw Marlin with my Marlin, frantically waving me to join him. “There’s a real good bear on the trail just around from this tree,” he said. I handed him my toilet paper and ventured forth.
I cautiously stepped from around the spruce to the edge of the trail and saw the largest black bear I had ever seen coming straight on. It was about 80 yards away and spotted me as I raised the rifle. Through the 2-1/2X scope it was still nothing more than a large mass of black fur—almost no legs or ears, just a huge body and swaggering head. This was the Prince of Wales Island stud bear, and the only thing standing between it and a day-old Sitka deer fawn snack was me. I settled the crosshair just inside its right shoulder, hoping to clip the bottom of the heart and left lung.
The bear swapped ends at the shot, and headed back up the trail. I lead him a bit and shot again. The bear dove off into the brush. When I reached the point where the bear took off into the brush, there was the sudden realization that I had but two rounds—one in the chamber and another in the magazine—and it was like hitting a brick wall. I simply could not step off the trail into the bush after the bear. My spare ammo was in my pack 100 yards down the trail on the resting log. I retrieved it, and with a bit more calm, followed Marlin in after the bear.
We found it less than 30 yards off the trail piled up in thick brush. Both of the Garrett SHC Hammerheads had passed completely through it. The Sitka blacktail fawn never moved from its spot, and its mother looked at us nervously while it munched browse as we packed the bear hide back to the skiff, never saying “thank you” for saving its baby.