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The diary of Colonel Peter Hawker, 1802-1853, with an introduction by Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey, bart. Volume 2 (1893) [Leatherbound]There are various pictures of some of Hawker's guns in books published over the years. For a time some were in the W Keith Neal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Keith_Neal Gentleman punt-gunners brought a bit more sophistication to the guns used. Hawker, active as a shooter during the early to mid-1800s, developed the double punt-gun. Hawker bought a cottage near Lymington and, from there, expanded his interest in wildfowling.

Carman, W. Y. (2004) [1955]. A History of Firearms: From Earliest Times to 1914 (Reprinted.). Mineola, NY: Dover Publications. p.74. ISBN 978-0-486-43390-5. In later life Hawker designed a "military musket" and commissioned the manufacture of several prototypes at his own expense. Hawker's musket was favourably received by the Board of Ordnance, but it was not adopted, being set aside in preference to the Enfield Rifle-Musket, although elements of Hawker's design were incorporated into the final version of the Enfield. [12] Family life [ edit ] Regular encounters on the marshes with other shooters, including what were described variously as 'swarms of gunners' and 'gangs of shore shooters', illustrate just how much pressure the wildlife faced. Indeed, it's a wonder anything at all survived. He also records, though, details of local people following behind the gunners in the hope of retrieving dead or dying birds, presumably for the pot - times then were certainly tough for the poorer members of society. To do that you need a boat. If you shoot a bird from a boat and it falls on land, it belongs to the landowner; if it lands in the sea, it is yours. Journal of a Regimental Officer during the recent Campaign in Portugal and Spain under Lord Viscount Wellington

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Hawker is best known today for his published works on the sports of shooting, wildfowling and fishing. Hawker published his “Advice to Young Sportsmen” in 1814, a popular work having nine imprints in his lifetime with the latest paper edition printed in 1975. Forty years after Hawker's death an Australian book reviewer states that "Probably no book on the subject of sport ever enjoyed so wide or so long sustained a popularity as the "Instructions to Young Sportsmen". [6] Hawker kept a regular diary (published in abridged form) which contains observations of pre and post-Napoleonic Europe, wildfowling, game-bird shooting and details of hunting techniques and conditions prevalent in the late 18th and early 19th Century. His diary, printed in two volumes, was also a popular work with the last paper edition printed in 1988. Holland & Holland first notes the manufacture of a punt-gun in 1872 and thereafter made several, improving on the design each time. A typical Holland & Holland punt-gun of the 1880s was the London, which was a single-barrel breechloading gun, 8½ft long, weighing 100lb and of 1½in bore.

Hawker was married first in 1811 to Julia, only daughter of Major Hooker Barttelot, making the family home in Longparish with a cottage in Keyhaven. After Julia's death in 1844, Hawker married Helen Susan Symonds (née Chatterton), herself a widow. Colonel Hawker had two sons and two daughters by his first wife. Hawker's granddaughter, Mary Elizabeth Hawker, was a noted late Victorian author under the pseudonym "Lanoe Falconer". [13] Hawker's cottage in Keyhaven, Hampshire, still stands as "Hawker's Cottage", immediately north of the Gun Inn public house, which reportedly was named originally to mark Hawker's punt-gunning exploits. [14] Colonel Peter Hawker (24 November 1786 – 7 August 1853) [1] was a celebrated diarist and author, and a shooting sportsman accounted one of the "great shots" of the 19th century. [2] His sporting exploits were widely followed and on occasion considered worth reporting in The Times. [3] Early life [ edit ] The diary of Colonel Peter Hawker, 1802-1853, with an introduction by Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey, bart. Volume 1 (1893) [Leatherbound]The diary of Colonel Peter Hawker, 1802-1853, with an introduction by Sir Ralph Payne-Gallwey, bart. Volume 1 1893 (1893) [Leatherbound] A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Colonial Gentry, vol. II, ed. Ashworth P. Burke, 1895, pp. 776–777. Hawker spent a considerable amount of time at his London residence and at Longparish House in the Test valley, whilst a cottage in Keyhaven served as a base for his wildfowling exploits. Some big guns gained almost cult status. Irish Tom was made as a muzzle-loading punt-gun. It was bought from an Irish market gunner in the early 1930s by Stanley Duncan. He had it converted to a breech-loader by Greener and started using it in 1936. When Duncan had finished with the gun he sold it to actor James Robertson Justice. It was rediscovered and restored in the 1980s and given to BASC to display at its HQ.