Gosh, Jon. You ARE a glutton for punishment. I'd have definitely used the chainsaw. Interesting facts on the Colt .45 and the hat. Didn't know either of those!
Similar to your redneck joke:
You might NOT be a redneck if you've ever turned your pickup around because it says "high water, flooding ahead."
haha! I LIKE that joke, I will use that one sometime too. lol. that's great. Yeah the myth about the guns is especially interesting because I've never seen where anyone has ever stopped and reloaded a cap and ball pistol, it's so painstaking and takes so long.
They had to carry three different containers, one for powder, one for the little firing caps and one for the slugs. That rod under the barrel is the plunger to press down on the slug once the chamber has gun powder in it and the bullet has been seated then you line it up and pull that rod which works the plunger to press the bullet slug into the chamber, then you have to mount each firing cap for the hammer to strike and the gun powder has to be a precise amount so you need something to measure it with! lol. That's why we've never seen that in the movies. with those type of pistols they might run out of bullets but they never show them reloading.
Good point. Only on Civil War and Revolutionary War re-enactments do we get to see them re-charging their muskets...but never pistols.