Someone here asked about this gun once before, but the question has come up again. This oddball is in the family:
It looks to be a .45 or so revolving rifle.
The barrel is marked "JR Shepherdson Middlesboro on Tees" along the top:
Middlesboro is a town in Great Britain on the river Tees, so there is clearly some British connection.
Also the side is marked "Hills Patent Central Fire":
The barrel has two proof marks. This is the first:
To me that looks a lot like this:
... which is claimed to be "These are the final black powder proof marks. The London mark was in use since 1672 in this or similar form. The Birmingham mark was valid from 1813-1904. Since 1925 the London mark was used on semi-smokeless as final proofs for shotguns with the "NP" mark in conjunction."
... I know nothing about guns, but this didn't seem like a black powder rifle or a shotgun to me...???
The second proof looks like this:
Which to me looks like this fellow:
... which is claimed: "Inspection mark, London - since 1672. Birmingham - since 1812-1904."
That same second proof mark SEEMS to be stamped near each round on the revolver, uh, thing:
The only thing I could find on the web for "Hill's Patent" was an ejector mechanism... but see pic #2, it doesn't look like this has an auto ejector to me. But again, I don't no boo about old guns.
So.
What do I have here??
It looks to be a .45 or so revolving rifle.
The barrel is marked "JR Shepherdson Middlesboro on Tees" along the top:
Middlesboro is a town in Great Britain on the river Tees, so there is clearly some British connection.
Also the side is marked "Hills Patent Central Fire":
The barrel has two proof marks. This is the first:
To me that looks a lot like this:
... which is claimed to be "These are the final black powder proof marks. The London mark was in use since 1672 in this or similar form. The Birmingham mark was valid from 1813-1904. Since 1925 the London mark was used on semi-smokeless as final proofs for shotguns with the "NP" mark in conjunction."
... I know nothing about guns, but this didn't seem like a black powder rifle or a shotgun to me...???
The second proof looks like this:
Which to me looks like this fellow:
... which is claimed: "Inspection mark, London - since 1672. Birmingham - since 1812-1904."
That same second proof mark SEEMS to be stamped near each round on the revolver, uh, thing:
The only thing I could find on the web for "Hill's Patent" was an ejector mechanism... but see pic #2, it doesn't look like this has an auto ejector to me. But again, I don't no boo about old guns.
So.
What do I have here??
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