In a desire to get back from politics a bit, and discuss the subject of self defense with a little bit of fun thrown in, I thought I’d give some thoughts and see what others had for thoughts as well, of what you might pick if you could only have one.
If I could only have, or afford, one single firearm, and had self defense and even carry in mind, what would it be?
Well, for me, it would be a good 6" .357 magnum. with the runner up being a good 10.mm auto.
If I can’t have both a rifle and a side arm, and self defense, carry, and home defense are concerns, yet I also want to hunt, and be able to shoot at some kind of distance, the .357 can do it. All of it. But to get that, you do give up things too, versatility usually means there is a purpose built tool that will do any one job better, and that is true here too. A 6" .357 magnum is not a rifle. But I can shoot it out to 200 yards effectively ( no, not hunting deer, you need to be within 100y for that ) and yet I still have an nicely affective short range defense tool that can fire mild 38.special rounds if I wish, that can be carried like a hand gun, and, even carried concealed with some care. The 10.mm loses out, in my choice, due to accuracy at distance. The accuracy of a good 6" revolver can be quite impressive, something I have yet to find an auto capable of matching, especially so with off the shelf models of reasonable price.
With speed loaders, and a quality trigger from a good manufacturer off the shelf, the .357 revolver makes a fine self defense choice as well. If you can stand full power magnum loads it has one of the best records as a defense round out there, but +P 38’s are nothing to sneeze at out of a 6" barrel either!
So that would be my choice for what I would want if I could have only one firearm that had to cover anything I might need. What would be yours?