Jan 9, 2016 3 min read

TUNNLETON, W.Va. – It is said that friends stick with each other through thick and thin, and nowhere is that more evident than in the friendship of Harry Burgoyne and Lorin Bowmar. Burgoyne and Bowmar have been hunting together for many, many years, but the last 17 have cemented the friendship.

Burgoyne is blind, and Bowmar takes his friend deer hunting every year, and each year Burgoyne has come home with a deer.

“To me, Lorin and I have a very special relationship,” Burgoyne said. “People I use to hunt with me before this accident aren’t coming around anymore. It was like being handicapped made me a hindrance.”

Their first hunting experience together was at Snowshoe for a handicapped hunt, and they hunted there twice before going to Dream Mountain a couple of years, and then onto private land.

“It is a simple process, really,” Burgoyne said. “I hold the rifle, Lorin tells me up, down, left, right and squeeze.”

Perhaps not that easy, but the two have practiced together to get their technique perfected over the years.

“There is no formal training for this,” Bowmar said. “I picked him up at his home on day and said, ‘Let’s get your gun and ammo. We are going to practice shooting,’ and off we went.”

“We have practiced a lot,” Bowmar said. “I look over his shoulder and tell him what to do. I may adjust his shoulders at times, but I never touch the gun.”

This year, it took them seven minutes to get a 100-pound doe, and they were done.

“We got into Lorin’s tree house, and he began to build us a little fire,” Burgoyne said. “He stopped trying to build the fire and said ‘There are seven or eight out there now.”‘

“He sighted up the rifle by telling me where to aim, and I squeezed the trigger,” Burgoyne continued. “We were finished.”

To be honest, the local Department of Natural Resource officers were not too excited about Burgoyne hunting in the first place.

“There is one thing about the whole thing,” Burgoyne said. “When we first started doing this, the head DNR men in the county were not too keen about it.”

“Then the state made a ruling that anyone 18 or older with a hunting license can help a handicapped person legally help a person hunt,” Burgoyne said.

Burgoyne had an all-terrain vehicle accident back in 1989 which took away his sight when his ATV flipped and landed on top of him.

“My wife had given me an ATV for Christmas in 1988,” Burgoyne said. “I went riding with my two sons-in-law when we were riding on a strip mine road, and I went up an ash pile.”

“My ATV more or less dug into the ash pile and then flipped on top of me,” Burgoyne continued. “It flipped onto my face, and they really didn’t think I was going to live, but I did.”

Burgoyne said he was in and out of the hospital until April 17, and then spent 12 weeks at the Greater Guild for the Blind in Bridgeville, Pa., trying to learn everything he could.

Neither of the friends would change anything about hunting together.

“Lorin does this because he wants to help me,” Burgoyne said. “And we enjoy our time together.”