doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Charles Daly Italian-made SxS

Awhile back someone told me that in the 70's or 80's CD imported and marketed Beretta boxlock SxS guns under their own margue without any mention of Beretta on the gun. I was in a gun shop recently and found a 20 ga CD fitting this description (made in Italy) with a semi-bvtl fore end.

Does anyone know if that's true and maybe have some additional information on this?

Any info would be very much appreciated.

Granby

The Italian Dalys I have seen (not many) were rough as a cob - pressed checkering, etc. Can't imagine they came out of Beretta, but--- if that's what the Daly folks wanted, maybe so.

I think we may be talking about a couple different Italian Dalys. There was an Italian Daly "Empire Grade", late 60's-early 70's. I think about all the ones I've seen had a non-selective ST, PG, vent rib, and beavertail (or semi-BT) forend. Looked a lot like the GR series sxs Beretta was making at the same time. Pretty decent guns. Those guns (and the Miroku Daly sxs) are undervalued quite often, IMO.

I have one of the Empire grade Dalys Larry is referring to. I bought it new in 1968. As a matter of fact Larry helped me ID it on another forum a few months ago. It looks to me to be virtually identical to the Beretta GR-3.

I'll tell you what I can about the Daly.

Here's the Daly:
[/url]

Here's the Beretta:
[/url]

Nice. Reminds me of how much I like my GR3.

Thanks very much, guys. I'm certain the one I handled was a Daly Beretta because it looked just like your upper photo, Sven, only the blueing on yours is in much better shape.

I appreciate the help very much.

Granby

I've dug a little more regarding the GR-3/Empire connection.

Unsubstantiated internet banter indicates Beretta made the GR-3 starting in 1968. Apparently Roman numeral proofmarks specified the year... XXIV = 1968; XXV = 69; etc. As shown below, my Italian Daly shows the mark XXIII which could be construed to have been struck in 1967. Does this mean my gun is a "pre-production" vanilla GR-3??



As Larry indicated above, the twenty has PG, semi-BT, extractors, non-selectable ST, 28" with 3" chambers. (Thanks again Larry for puting me onto the Beretta connection.)

1967 manufacture is consistent with my September 1968 purchase date. As a young teen I spent the summer of '68 doing any kind of odd jobs available to scrounge up enough money to buy a shotgun and a ND waterfowl license (ND was teeming with waterfowl compared to MN). Amongst others, I started mowing the grass for an elderly gunsmith (H A "Hank" Smith). When he heard of my intended purchase and my desire for a double he smiled and recommended the Daly.

That September, with my $325 cash in-hand, my dad drove me to Ruhr-American in Glenwood, MN, a Herters outlet. They had 4 guns on closeout and let me choose the one with the nicest wood. Apparently they weren't very popular, as I haven't seen another one since.

Through 1972 I put hundreds (maybe thousands)of rounds through the Daly hunting ducks, white geese, sharptails, ruffed grouse and pheasant. Then a 12 gauge 3" Win M12 came along... the Daly was relegated to grouse hunting.

I had some restoration work done 2 years ago as the Daly was a little loose and battered... hinge pin, re-blue, and oiled wood brought it back to near new condition. I opened the chokes to IC/mod and it's a joy to carry and shoot while training/hunting with my first pointing dog.

Bryan

I think if you dig deeper you find out is was made by Sabatti who had a long term relationship with Kasnar/Daly that only just recently ended when they started bringing in Turkish made SXS's.

Ken, I know that the Empire Grades, like the ones illustrated above, were not the only Italian sxs sold under the Daly name. I had one marked "Field III" I believe, many years ago, did not look anything like the Empire Grades from the 60's-70's. I was not into guns to the same degree I am now (and this website didn't yet exist), but I think it quite likely that was a Sabatti-made gun. And going back well before that, something like 25 years ago, I had an Italian-made Kasnar OU, DT/extractors--nice handling gun, but an absolute POS.