Thanks, guys.  I ran down Jim’s email after posting this morning, and he already responded.  Extremely knowledgable, and most helpful. 

Best, Jeff

First off, I don’t “have” the carbine…yet.   Still eyeballing it, which was the point of the questions. 

According to Jim: 

–Houze estimates 1669 3rd model carbines produced; Jim’s rackup is 1470.  But he points out that the numbers are suspect because ‘they were still making 1st model carbines for China at the same time they were producing 3rds.’   He said “If they were running the serial numbers together, like they were prone to do, the counts could be way off depending on the record descriptions.”  Upshot:  The jury’s still out, but there were likely at least about 1500 3rd model carbines made.  

–My thinking is that Flayderman’s use of the term “very rare” for the 3rd model may reflect their scarcity here in the United States, suggesting a lot of them went overseas.  But…Jim says that he has ‘no knowledge of the 3rd Models going south of the border, although a lot of 2nd Models did.’  Which still leaves a disconnect betweenn known production and Flayderman’s “very rare” notation.  

–Jim said that the military 1st and 2nd model carbines had 24″ barrels, as does the 1st civilian model.  

–A period advertising sheet on the Model 1883 that he sent me shows the barrel length of the 3rd model (Model 1883) at 22.5”  This also conflicts with what Flayderman shows (20″).

That’s pretty much it.  The gun I’m looking at has a 22+/-” barrel, so I’m feeling better about it being right on that point.  It’s not as rare, however, as Flayderman suggests.  Flayderman’s a fantastic source, but this appears to be another of the very rare occasions when he’s off on a rarity estimate for a scarce gun. 

Jeff

Thanks, Mike.  Your comments are really helpful.  On question: Is anyone making modern replicas of the Hotchkiss 3rd model?

On the rarity issue, as I see it there are three basic elements to rarity when it comes to antique American firearms: total production, the survival rate of the model, and the availability of the survivors to the collector’s market.  I have a paper coming out on that topic in the next (Spring 2019) issue of The Texas Gun Collector, along with an article on the survival rates of the three Civil War-era Starr revolvers.  The second article is the first in what I hope to be a series called “The Survival Files,” that I’m co-authoring with British collector and serial number collector (over 85,000 numbers) Phil Boulton.  

Best, 

Jeff

Thanks, Mike.  I’m most definitely not a replica guy–exactly the opposite.  But being suspicious by nature, when it comes to buying antique guns I’m always looking for the possibility that a gun I’m eyeballing is a modern replica that’s been made to look old.  I’m not at all familiar with replicas, which is why I asked if anyone was making a modern knockoff of the Hotchkiss.  Live & learn.  Thanks for the tip.

Jeff