My retirement present to myself.
The day I finished, with less than work on my mind I went for a walkaround town visiting a few old friends in various shops and establishments. One of those is a friend of near forty years who runs a military antiques shop. My intention was sometime in the near future to buy a quality japanese sword from him, returning to a collecting I did some years ago. We were chatting when I noticed a really nice Indian Police Martini Henry rifle in excellent condition. Bill said to me "Yes its nice but Ive got something in the office you will really like" (Bill, like me used to be a shooter and knows my likes too well!)
Talking from the back of the shop he went on "I only got this at the weekend and haven't shown it to any of the regulars yet. In forty odd years Ive never had one of these in the shop before and only seen a couple at shows, but none with as clean a barrel ad condition as this. I'm keeping it hidden for a while as its so nice and want to have a good look over it, have a good play !"
He walked back in with what I at first thought was a Spencer carbine but it was this.
A Snider cavalry Carbine, crown stamped EIC (presumably for East India Company- which was pretty much just part of the British army in India by the 1870s) The lock mark date is 1878 which is curious meaning it would have been amongst the last issue as seen after that into 1879 they issued the Martini Henry carbine. That possible suggests why the barrel bore is so good. The pictures don't do it justice , the wood is fresh and oiled and the barrel has that smart brown patina to it. The barrel is almost pristine and in all it is eminentley fireable.
As soon as I saw it I said that once he had finished playing with it, if he had a price i mind, I would buy it. Price agreed and handshake.
I picked it up today and while there was speaking to another long time friend, who before retirement was the catalogueist of the armoury section, particularly Japanese swords, at Liverpool Museum. The museum has a fine collection of antique firearms (I know because I had the priviledge of seeing the entire collect ion their archive quite a number of years ago.) Steve said he had never seen one, certainly there isn't one in the museum's collection (which surprised me) Snider rifles yes but no carbine.
Big boys toys. I am over the moon with this and may be using it soon at a range near here. Worth getting it put onto secton1 firearm licence instead of sec 58 antique curiosity don't you think?
Oh, and Ive just read that Ned Kelly carried one !!
"If you sit still the birds shit on you, even Buddha, life's short so get out there and do something"
"My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I’m happy. I can’t figure it out. What am I doing right?" Snoopy