Model 1897|Page 2|Winchester Shotguns|Forum|Winchester Collector

Roger,

It would appear that your Riot Gun was one of the Texas (Galveston) guns. 

With the PR date and Received in warehouse date being just 1-day apart, it appears that instead of pulling an already assembled gun out of the warehouse and converting it from a Standard (Field) gun to a Riot Gun, Winchester simply used an existing Standard barrel and cut it down before assembling the gun. 

Please send pictures of the gun to me when you get a chance to do so.

Thanks,

Bert 

Redwolf1066 said
My model 1897 S/N 96719 has the same FULL over CYL markings on a 20″ barrel.  I always figured it was cut down at some point, now I’m wondering if it was a factory riot gun.
 
RW
  

Is it a Solid frame gun?  Per the factory records, it was manufactured in late March, 1900.  The odds are very high that it was one of the at least several hundred that were factory converted from a standard (field) grade gun to a Riot gun to fill the large order Winchester needed to fill.

If you can do so, please send pictures of the gun to me at – [email protected]

Bert

Below are pictures of two different verified factory converted Model 1897 Riot Guns;

S/N 100366

S/N 100728