Toby,

Actually I was thinking of the .450's black powder cartridges last night and the common misconception that a .450 or .500 calibre BP cartridge was a big bore dangerous game round. Due to the modern smokeless powder view of these rifles as powerful cartridges. They were used a lot on medium sized animals. Same as people use them today, for hunting boar and pigs, deer and the like.

The 10-bore was usually considered a borderline adequate round, with the 8-bore right up there. Especially for elephant.

Even then when you read some of these old accounts, how they blast away at beasts, loosing them, shooting them multiple times.

The old .450 Martini Henry was used for shooting medium game too. Just for my personal education I need to look up what its modern expected velocities are - can anyone advise the ballistics, bullet weights etc for a M-H vintage rifle? I was told the .577/450 is equivalent to a .45/70 ?

No doubt all sorts of cartridges were used for hunting buffalo. Buffalo's Black Death reputation is largely a modern creation. Who created the term? Thousands of them were shot by individuals for hides and meat. Often with medium rounds. The wounded ones seem to be the most ornery, and using inadequate old rounds makes this more likely.

For water buffalo I reckon our Top End guys would be using a few BP Express rifles from time to time.

An Aussie gunwriter Col Allison wrote about his son shooting a water buffalo with a .243/6mm or .240, if I remember rightly.