May 8-10, 2024 Firearms & Militaria
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 5/8/2024
This fluted jacket Portuguese contract Vickers water cooled machine gun’s serial number is recorded in Dolf Goldsmith’s book “The Devil’s Paintbrush”. Even without this authoritative reference, it would be impossible to miss the heraldic Portuguese crest on the feed block cover. This gun has a brass sight bracket on the left side, and includes an original Portuguese Vickers clinometer in its leather case. What is also very remarkable is that this gun is accompanied by its original, serial number matching tripod and original matching stripped lock body. According to the consignor, this gun was brought to numerous shooting events and shot often, always reliably, and always cleans fastidiously afterwards. This accounts not only for the condition of this gun, but also the fact that it has an Australian barrel, feed block, and other parts, which are not of original Portuguese contract origin, such as muzzle booster, fusee cover, top cover, backplate and complete .303 lock in the gun. This is not unexpected when one considers that decades past, before Dolf Goldsmith published his authoritative books, the widespread rise in interest in machine guns as collector’s items, and the meteoric rise in cost relative to the average American citizens income, the community of discerning collectors and machine gun shooting enthusiasts was really quite small. Ammunition was relatively very inexpensive compared with today, and the point is, this gun was used as a shooting platform, and parts were swapped out, and even traded about simply as “Vickers parts". Electronic NFA registry indicates “FORM 2 REGISTRATION” as the manufacturer of this gun. Almost certainly a Richard Wray registered gun, which would mean “VSM” with “3906 Colerain Ave, Cincinnati, OH” in the manufacturer’s block when it comes time to submit a paper transfer application. CONDITION: Overall appearance and finish is fine with much thinning to an even gray patina original blue finish on the water jacket with significantly more finish on the receiver box, and on top cover. Armored muzzle booster a nice unifoirm matte blue finish. Wood handles of backplate extremely fine with light handling marks. Bore is extremely fine, shiny and bright. Lock face also extremely fine. Mechanics are crisp. This is a full-auto only machine gun. Tripod retains its original brass identification plate with matching serial number “2390”. If you have ever thought you might like to own a Vickers, either as a collector’s piece or as a shooting platform, you cannot go wrong with this one. THIS IS A NATIONAL FIREARMS ACT ITEM AND REQUIRES BATF APPROVAL PRIOR TO TRANSFER. THIS ITEM IS FULLY TRANSFERABLE ON AN ATF FORM 3 OR 4. JWK 2024-05-026.
Accessories
Matching tripod, and dial sight in leather case.