A gun or a pistol.
1833. See SHOT-GUN.
1834. “I will show you what it is for a terrier puppy to put a buck at bay. Ay, In spite of your silver mounted shooting-iron,” eying the splendid rifle the young man held in his hand.—H. J. Nott, ‘Novellettes of a Traveller,’ ii. 175 (N.Y.).
1839. I have myself witnessed several of his successful shots with this unpretending shooting-iron, and once saw him knock the feathers from a wild duck at eighty or a hundred yards!—C. F. Hoffman, ‘Wild Scenes,’ i. 85–6 (Lond.).
1846. He said his old shooting iron would go off at a good imitation of a bear’s breathing!—T. B. Thorpe, ‘Bob Herring: ‘A Quarter Race in Kentucky,’ etc., p. 135.
1847. The settlers generally conceded that his “shooting-iron” was particularly certain!—Robb, ‘Streaks of Squatter Life,’ &c., p. 117 (Phila.).
1853. Drop yer shootin’ iron, or ye’ll git more’n ye send; there’s two agin one, my sonny.—S. A. Hammett (‘Philip Paxton’), ‘A Stray Yankee in Texas,’ p. 51.
