I've never touched a gun, but as far as a know hunting weapons are not optimal for self defense.
When you hunt a deer you try to hit from far away and if you miss, well, you'll find another.
When someone is trying to harm you (even with a knife), you want to shoot multiple times and as fast as possible. If you shoot once and miss, by the time you manually reload, the attacker can get to you. If you do hit, but with a small caliber, that doesn't have stopping power. You might seriously injure the attacker, but he'll also injure/kill you.
Between the two, I might go with the knife in most situations. I can't carry my hunting rifle around with me all day. Mine also has a huge scope on it that makes it useless at the distances you would typically encounter a hostile human attacker. The rifle is also overpowered for the job, and introduces concern for damage to unintended targets.
Have you ever heard the saying "in a knife fight, the difference between the loser and the winner is that the winner gets to go to the hospital"? Doesn't seem like a fun situation to be in. Especially for people who hunt with weaker calibers or lower powered scopes, it seems ideal to stay out of arm's reach from any potential bad guy
But if the choice comes down to a hunting rifle, a knife, and a Glock 19, I'm going to choose the option that will put the threat down quickly and humanely.
Your comment seems to be a bit of a non sequitur. GP said they were not combat-worthy due to being collectibles/antiques, not due to... whatever it is you're talking about.
Among my collection is a 100-year-old 16ga. H&R single-barrel shotgun passed down through four generations. It hasn't been fired in decades, and hasn't seen an armorer in longer than that. Not only is there no semi-auto, there is no magazine at all, and even if you'd be willing to go to war with something that needed to be manually reloaded after every shot, I am not altogether convinced the breach wouldn't explode upon firing.
This is correct. My current collectables (C&R and antique) are all capable of being fired, but I almost never do due to their value and risk of damaging them. Many are over 100 years old and there's a decent enough chance some irreplaceable part will break during use. I can also easily reduce their value by 1000s of dollars by doing something like this. I keep them because I enjoy their historical significance and the interesting mechanical solutions they embody, not for their ability to launch projectiles. When I'm ready to go to the nursing home, I'll sell them and get my money back or more.
A good percentage of the firearms out there are like this, which was my point for those not aware. Another good percentage are specialized for sporting use. Some are so inappropriate for combat that you'd be better off with a spear (e.g., if given the choice between a 50lb benchrest rifle and a spear, I'll take the spear).
Some old collectables are not safely operable against any target. Some simply aren't operable. Even if they're not worn out from use or disrepair, the chemistry of ammunition has changed over the years and it may not be safe to use with modern ammunition. For others, commercially made ammunition might not be available at all.
Yes, people have been killed by old antique guns. But most of them in this category them are rotting away in attics or forgotten in safes. They're certainly not what is predominantly being used in street crime.
Would they be standard issue arms for a modern army? Irrelevant.