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I've just read a couple of books about two English hunters who went on two "shoots," one in Somaliland and one in Alaska in the 1905-1907 time period.

For the African hunt the author listed their battery as:
Three 12-bore rifles,
Two double barrelled [sic] hammerless ejecting .500 expresses,
One .35 Winchester,
Two small .22 Winchesters,
One single barrel .350,
One .410 collector's gun,
And "a good shikar pistol apiece, 12-bore."

For the Alaska hunt they took "... '375 and a '256 Mannlicher ... our old 12-bores, a '35 Winchester, a '22 Winchester, and a '410-bore collector's gun."

I'm curious about the 12-bore rifles and, in search of information, I ended up at this site -- and it's been great fun lurking the past week or so. Anyway, were the 12-bore rifles like the shotguns of the day, but with rifled barrels? Were the cartridges similar to our slugs? The English hunters I was reading about used their 12-bores for lions, rhinoceros and brown bear. Thanks in advance for any comments or insights.

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Welcome onboard

OK...you like reading books.

Unless stated otherwise in the "books??"..it could be litteratly any gunmaker from London to Birmingham who has done 12 bore rifles.
We have subsection here on the Nitro Express that has some borerifles on program..perhaps this could solve something for you.
http://forums.nitroexpress.com/postlist.php?Cat=0&Board=paradox

Here is a link too.
http://www.acant.org.au/Articles/HowdahRifle.html