u/mholmes1775

Went from an early matching example with lightly sanded stock to an original matching, as-issued example. Only thing better would be an unissued one, but that’s not my style really. Bonus is the original manual and spare firing pin and extractor in the buttstock.

Patiently waited for a nice matching example to pop up and couldn’t say no at the price for this one.

With only about 1500 produced through 1940, this is one of scarcest lebels out there. Surprisingly, she is all matching with the original rust blue finish with serial 495 and chambered in the standard 7.5x54mm (M29). The switch from the earlier 7.5x58mm (M24) was between serial 274 and 278.

You don’t come across these that often, and you especially don’t come across ones that are matching with intact crests on the receiver, stock wrist, and butt stock. This one was made at the tail of production in 1940 before German occupation in 1941. The bolt had been blued, most likely done by the Germans, as this was a common practice seen on German captured rifles.

My Winchester Hotchkiss M1880 served on the USS Galena after repeated attempts by the Ordnance Bureau to either get the wrist crack fixed or issued to ship as is. What this tells me is that the infamous Hotchkiss stock crack on my rifle was done in service and not done after being surpluses out. This documentation is rare in the fact that seldom do we see paperwork like this for these specific rifles. Check out Archival Research Group who took over the SRS and is continuing the extensive search for serials and documentation through the national archives.