What Is This Airman's Gun?

[Charlie Flick]

I ran across this image on Ebay. (That's the seller's watermark across the image.)

 

I was puzzled by the 4-barreled weapon that this airman is aiming. The image only says "4-barreled shotgun" on the back.

 

Does any member here know what this weapon is?

 

 

Regards,

Charlie

[americankraut]

Winchester Liberator, experimental 4 barrel "survival" shotgun in 16 gauge.

[doyler]

Maybe the Colt Defender?

 

 

 

[aznation]

The Winchester Liberator,

Created in the 1960's the Winchester Liberator was designed by Robert Hillberg for the use in guerrilla warfare. Basically it was a four barreled 20 and 16 gauge break open shotgun with a pistol grip, forward grip, and collapsible wire stock. One might ask, "why not just build a pump action shotgun?" A fair question. The Liberator was made to be simple and easy to use, even for uneducated peasants who have no firearms experience and little access to tools and parts. Nothing is easier to use and maintain than a break open shotgun. The Liberator also weighed only four pounds, making it an ideal weapon for close quarter jungle warfare. In fact the weapon was intended to be supplied to anti-communist guerrillas in Southeast Asia, but the project never came to fruition. Neither was the firearms popular with American sportsmen or law enforcement, who could get along with a pump action shotgun. Very few were made.

 

 

 

[doyler]

Defender has eight barrel and one in picture has 4

[doyler]

Agree its the Winchester

[Charlie Flick]

Nice work on the ID of this weapon, guys. Thanks!

 

The Winchester Liberator must have been evaluated by the Air Force if this airman is handling it.

 

Charlie

[The Meatcan]

Wow! I bet that thing could throw a pellet shower.

Terry

[aznation]

https://www.forgottenweapons.com/winchesters-liberator-shotguns-video/

 

 

In the early 1960s, an influential but little-known (today) firearms designer by the name of Robert Hillberg came up with an idea for a cheap-but-effective armament for the masses. With encouragement from DARPA, the Winchester company took up manufacture and development of the design, under the name “Liberator”.

 

The guns were initially planned to be made almost entirely as magnesium castings, with steel liners in the barrels, with a total cost of about $20 per gun. They would use prepackaged 4-round ammunition packets as well, rather than standard individual shotgun shells. By the time production was actually begun, however, the design had been altered to a break-action system using regular shells – the prepackaged quad-cartridges proved too difficult to perfect. So the production Mark II guns used conventional shells with a break-open action.

 

As it turned out, casting the frames over the steel barrel inserts was a quite difficult process, and Winchester soon moved to a MkIII design which replace the barrel casting with 4 independent all-steel barrels fixed at the muzzles by a stamped plate. By this time, however, military interest in the guns had fallen away and Winchester was left to try to market them commercially. They attempted to interest both police and civilian markets (although with 13 inch barrels, the guns were regulated by the NFA). None of these marketing attempts succeeded, and major production never began. The design was too impractical and guerrilla-oriented to really appeal to anyone with a more ordinary use (like recreational shooting, sport shooting, or security/law enforcement) in mind.

[Garandomatic]

I THOUGHT I recognized it from Forgotten Weapons!