GUN FALL 2017
The live portion of this session begins on Tuesday, October 31, 2017.
FINE LATE WINCHESTER MODEL 1866 LEVER ACTION RIFLE W/ FACTORY LETTER.WINCHESTER186615669744 RF HENRYCal. 44 RF Henry. Standard grade rifle with 24-1/4" rnd bbl, full magazine, half nickel front sight and 1873-style, short, semi-buckhorn rear sight with checkered edges. Receiver and sideplates are gun metal (brass or bronze) and the forend cap & buttplate are steel. Top tang has installed a Model 62A, lollipop tang sight with its orig locator pin. Mounted with uncheckered, straight grain American walnut with straight stock and crescent buttplate that has a trap. Left side of lower tang, under the wood is marked with assembly no. 4624. Top tang channel of buttstock has spurious matching number and inside toe of buttplate is marked 2448. Accompanied by a Winchester factory letter confirming gun as round barreled rifle and shipped with 49 other arms on June 17, 1882 to order 33283. At this juncture, rimfire arms were rapidly waning in demand, although they were still popular in South and Central America. Few of these rifles survive today with high orig finish, usually having been exposed to heavy wear in saddle scabbards and wagon boxes under all sorts of inclement weather, often with little or no maintenance. CONDITION: Fine, numbered as noted above. Bbl and magazine tube retain 95-97% strong orig blue with some minor surface etching. Receiver shows light sharp edge wear with flush fitting sideplates showing no appreciable damage, only a few minor nicks and overall retains a wonderful dark mustard patina. Loading gate retains 30-40% orig fire blue. Hammer retains about 60-70% strong case colors, turned silver on the spur. Lever retains traces of case colors, being mostly a silver/brown patina. Forend cap is a plummy blue patina. Buttplate shows about 70% case colors, strong and bright in sheltered areas with a mottled silver/brown patina elsewhere. Buttstock has a gouge on each side of the comb with light nicks and dings elsewhere and retains most of its original finish. Forearm has a few light nicks and scratches along with some light gouges and also retains most of its finish. Mechanics are crisp. Bright shiny bore shows only light use. Tang sight retains about 88-90% bright orig blue. 52609-5 JRL (11,000-16,000)