Winchester 1866 grabado por L.R. Nimschke|Winchester Rifles|Forum|Winchester Collector

I agree with the advice CJS57 gave you, please do not clean it and do not polish the brass, señor. That is a beautiful, original old ’66. The dark patina on the brass parts is important, do not polish it. Be extremely careful of the screw slots as you assemble it. I would recommend using special hollow ground screwdriver blades that are the proper width and thickness for the screw slots. Once it is reassembled, I would suggest purchasing a small can of Conservator’s wax (or Renaissance Wax). Do not use any other kind of wax but one of these two. Apply a thin coat to your rifle, the wood and the metal. Wait about five minutes and then wipe off the extra wax with a very soft cloth. The first time you do this, the cloth that you apply the wax with may get dirty with dust and oil residue from the rifle. Keep changing the cloth for a clean one as you apply the special wax. A few days later, apply a second coat of Conservator’s Wax with clean soft cloths.

What you have there is a $15,000 gun as it sits but if you do any cleaning it will detract from its value.

Bob

You can wipe the outside down with a oil rag and the insides can be cleaned out a little more aggressively since it does look like it is caked up with rust and crud.

Bob

Gonna throw out a couple of thoughts:
The lower L.D.N looks like it was stamped not engraved, you see doubling of the letters especially the L. Very common when stamping by hand, you get a bounce if the stamp is not firmly fixtured or held.

If the rifle was sent back for a touch-up or additional engraving was added at a later date, would the engraver again add his initials?

I agree with Mike. I have seen engravers initials double stamped before.

I have seen engravers stamped signatures, from J Ulrich to N.K. doubled. For anyone who has ever tried to use a stamp they would know that it is not that easy. Single letter stamps are easier to get correct than multiple letter stamps. I have been using Metal stamps for years and still manage to double them myself once in a while. The only guy I ever knew who could use a stamp in his sleep and not double it was Nick Colomonico, a barrel man in the Custom Shop. He restamped inscriptions day in and day out on bbls., receivers and frames. The engravers were required to be able to make stamps but did not do a whole lot of actual stamping. I have had access to Nick and John Kusmit’s collection of smoke prints. I have seen engravers signatures stamped over engraving lines and also on top of grass, stumps, rocks and scrollwork. Are the Nimschke initials on this gun legit? Why would someone take a gun that is obviously engraved by Nimschke and put his initials on it? If they did so it must have been an awful long time ago as the metal has the same age to it. Maybe Nimschke had a few pops and then whacked his name on it. Maybe he liked it so much he did it twice. Who knows? To say engravers never doubled stamps or went over the lines is just not true.