I recently received a phone call from SureFire inviting me on a writers’ hunt for whitetail deer. In the past several years, I had no access to any hunting land so I was excited to receive this invitation. The location was the beautiful White Oak Plantation less than 50 miles from my front door. I immediately accepted. Then came a very embarrassing moment. A SureFire representative said it was a handgun-only hunt. I quickly had to admit that while I have a vault full of handguns, the majority are suited for hunting two-legged mammals, not whitetail!

I made a call to Bill Booth of Blue Heron Communications, who handles Smith & Wesson’s marketing; he recommended using a S&W 629 Light Hunter, but there was one problem. The Light Hunter is a Performance Center product and none were available in time for the hunt. However, Booth was kind enough to send me his personal 629 that he and the Blue Heron personnel had used on several previous hunts. Three days later, I picked up the polished Performance Center hard case from my dealer.