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I have not posted anything in quite some time, I find myself very busy with work these days, and everything else it seems. But, I managed to snap a couple photos of 1 of 2 old Winchesters I picked up recently. They are not the best photos given they were taken in the dying hours of the day, but it is a very nice rifle, sctually better than these photos show.
I am very proud of this one, it is fairly scarce and special. It is a Winchester 1894 Deluxe Extra Lightweight Takedown rifle with 22" barrel. It has H style checkered PG stocks with 3X wood and oil finish, a hard rubber shotgun buttplate, 1/2 magazine, Lyman front and rear, and platinum lined 3 leaf Express rear sight. It also has the shorter 8 3/8" forearm. The s/n was applied to this gun on November 15, 1904. The special thing about the gun is it was shipped to Britain and has several British proof marks on the rear top of the barrel, upper receiver, etc. Like to know some of the history on this one. Maybe it went Red deer hunting in Scotland, or took a Stag or two, who knows. Too bad the old guns can’t talk. Here are a couple photos. It is hard to tell, but the gun even has lots of nitre blue color left on the loading gate, and a fair bit of case coloring.
http://s158.photobucket.com/user/MBCAPELL/media/IMG_2534_zps7a86c740.jpg.html
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I forgot to mention that one of the neat things about this gun – and this goes back to it’s life in Britain – is that it also came with two partially full, and when I say partially full I mean 4 cartridges, lol, of Kynoch ammo. Over here we know it as the old 30-30 or 30WCF, but over there it was 7.62x51R. Here is a photo of the boxes. A nice piece of history to have with the gun. I would like to know what game was taken with the cartridges missing from the boxes.
Matt
http://s158.photobucket.com/user/MBCAPELL/media/IMG_2542_zps281b28e6.jpg.html
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Matt
Matt,
Very nice indeed 8)
I noticed that it has Winchester proof marks on it… what is the serial number? When was it received in the warehouse?
Bert
WACA Historian & Board of Director Member #6571L
That’s a real beauty,Matt.Will you give it a try out at the range?
I have some old Kynoch ammo as well.Somewhere I have a box or two of it in .405.
Very nice. Beautiful piece.
Rapid taper, standard taper, extra heavy. All 45 caliber.
Bert: Yes, it has the WP Winchester proofs on both the barrel and receiver. And as you can see, lots of British proofs, even the upper rear of the bolt has one, but I forgot to take a photo of that. The serial number of the rifle is 244,967.
According to Cody, the s/n was applied on November 15,1904. It was received in the warehouse on December 7, 1904 and shipped on December 8, four days later to Order number T115639. There is also a Repair and Return on November 11, 1905, Order number 3992. Seems a bit early to be proofed eh? If I recall, your survey work shows about June ’05, a few months before the Repair and Return, which the letter does not give any more detail on. I have no idea what the R&R could have been for, as nothing it out of whack in the letter, it letters exactly as it is.
28 Gauge: Yes, I would like to shoot it next time I get out to do some shooting. Lord knows when that will be, but I have a few I need to shoot, and this one will be towards the top of the list.
Thanks all for compliments.
Matt
Further to my last post above, I had some time to take apart – carefully I may add – the rifle this morning. As above, I made reference to the early WP proofing on the barrel and receiver, as the s/n was applied to this rifle in November 1904 and we generally don’t start seeing these proofs until mid 1905. Anyway, I’m pretty sure I solved the riddle.
The rifle shows a Repair and Return a year later in November 1905, work order # 3992. A careful inspection of the rifle shows this same R&R work order number penciled in underneath the forearm, and underneath the barrel it is stamped with the same R&R number "3992" followed by REFINISH and JPP. From what I have read, JPP are the initials of James P Parker, a former Winchester employee. According to what I have read from Bert and G Madis online, JPP was a Winchester employee back in the day, who according to something Bert posted on another website specialized in barrel rework. According to Madis, "Parker was one of Winchesters best workers in the special order shops and in the mail order store. The marking "J.P.P." has been observed on a number of guns which were either very special guns or which had been returned to Winchester."
That said, the gun came back to Winchester a year after it was shipped, it had a refinish of some sort – as documented on the gun with the matching work order number, REFINISH, and JPP’s initials (which I forgot to mention are also stamped on the upper tang), and I’m guessing Winchester added the WPs at that time.
Though though R&R is not explained in the letter – just the date as is often the case- it is nice to see it partially documented on the rifle, though I’m still not 100% sure what the actual R&R entailed, given the gun letters out perfectly and nothing is awry. Hard to imagine a complete refinish only 1 year after the gun was shipped. I will take a picture of the letter and ledger copy and post it later today. Pretty cool rifle I am happy to have it.
Matt
Matt:
That is a great find! Nice special features gun in unusually fine condition. The "Inventory of The Winchester Firearms Reference Collection" book states that – "Winchester began placing proof marks on guns commencing July 17, 1905"*. So while your rifle was R&Rd in November of 1905 that is consistent with the proofing start date.
* see inventory #2077 shown on page 307.
BTW, Georgia has 6 copies of the book remaining out of the 24 we bought from the original printing and once they are gone there will be no more. Price is $50 delivered to US destinations and $45 plus cost of postage delivered to Canada and other foreign destinations.
Contact the Exec. Secretary at [email protected] if you want a copy
WACA Life Benefactor Member
NRA Life Member
Thanks Rick. Yes, the gun is in really exceptional condition, it has been well taken care of over the years. I intend to do the same.
Thanks for that info too and I think I will touch base with Georgia for a copy of that book. I’ll send her an email right now:)
Matt
Rick,
Sent an email to Georgia. I am on the third go round of Bob Renneberg’s book, I really need something else to read! I wish there was more work out there on the Model 1894/94. I ran out of good literate to read a long time ago.
Thanks,
Matt
Matt:
It doesn’t read like a novel and you have to "mine" it to pick up the little tidbits that make collecting so fascinating but there are several gems in the book…………
WACA Life Benefactor Member
NRA Life Member
Rick Hill said
Matt:It doesn’t read like a novel and you have to "mine" it to pick up the little tidbits that make collecting so fascinating but there are several gems in the book…………
Sounds good to me. It’ll cost me $30 just to get it up here, but I’m sure it will be worthwhile.
I mentioned the Cody letter and ledger info for the rifle. Hard to read the ledger info, but here are both if anyone is interested.
http://s158.photobucket.com/user/MBCAPELL/media/IMG_2604_zpscc158c58.jpg.html
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Matt
WoW Matt what a beauty.Thanks for sharing . What is the other one ?
Phil
Matt74 said
28 Gauge: Yes, I would like to shoot it next time I get out to do some shooting. Lord knows when that will be, but I have a few I need to shoot, and this one will be towards the top of the list.
Thanks all for compliments.
Matt
Good for you Matt.My opinion on a firearm is,if I can’t afford to shoot it ,I can’t afford to own it. 🙂
Nice gun Matt and it is one of the few guns that is talking to you as you further examine it. 
"Road King" said
Nice gun Matt and it is one of the few guns that is talking to you as you further examine it.
Thanks Brian. Yes, the gun does talk to me. In fact, I go downstairs to my cave to admire her pretty much every evening, and we have a little chat. Seriously though, yes, I really enjoy going over all the little markings on these old Winchesters. And it is especially more gratifying when they start to talk to me and help me piece together some of their history. I will have to do some looking into the proof marks to see if I can determine when the gun went overseas. I was thinking Winchester shipped it there directly, but I suppose someone in the US could have maybe bought it first, then maybe they could have taken it to the UK in later years. Not sure if someone bringing in a gun would have had to have it proofed – I can’t really see that – or more likely they just got proofed when they were exported to another country where they were to be sold on that market. Anyway, more research to do. Lots of different proof marks on there, and I understand there are different ones depending on during what time frame the Proofing House (i.e. Birmingham) stamped the gun.
Matt
From what I can see the proof marks are consistent to what was used after 1904. It also looks like it has the London Proof mark not the Brimingham mark. The V or the crown is the final inspector’s mark after the gun has been proofed. Rifled barrels are marked Nitro Proved where as smooth bores are marked Nitro Proof.. The nitro proved mark was used between 1916 and 1925 on semi smokeless barrels.
"Road King" said
From what I can see the proof marks are consistent to what was used after 1904. It also looks like it has the London Proof mark not the Brimingham mark. The V or the crown is the final inspector’s mark after the gun has been proofed. Rifled barrels are marked Nitro Proved where as smooth bores are marked Nitro Proof.. The nitro proved mark was used between 1916 and 1925 on semi smokeless barrels.
Well, you kinda beat me to the punch Brian! I found an online document showing all the various Proof House markings, just did not have time to take a look until tonight.
Yes, according to this they are all London Proofs, and consistent to what was used post 1904. It has 4 different proof marks on it. It has the "provisional proof for barrels" which they started using in 1856 and has a lion standing over top of some squigly looking lines; it has the "definitive nitro proof for all guns – parabellum pistols" which is an NP with some symbol over top I cannot make out; it has the "London View Mark" which is the Crown over the V, there are a few of those including one on the top rear of the bolt (which I understand you don’t often see the markings on the bolt; and it has a fourth mark which – as odd as it seems as this is the only mark I can find in the document that is even close – appears to be the "definitive black powder proof for shotguns, muzzle loader barrels" which has been in use since 1637. Not sure why they one would be on a nickel steel barrel, but it is the only mark in this document that looks like it, and I’m pretty certain that is what it is. I got my info from this:
http://www.nramuseum.org/media/940944/proofmarks.pdf
Fun stuff playing Sherlock Holmes with these old rifles.
Matt
Here is another photo of the rifle to share with all you folks!
http://s158.photobucket.com/user/MBCAPELL/media/WZU102-G-F1-L_zpsf038c08a.jpg.html
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Matt
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