I was just cleaning up my computer drive and found some pictures of a gun I used to own.
...used to own??? I'd have a very hard time parting with something like that, even if I couldn't shoot it.
I'm curious about the line we see on both sides of the frame, just behind the breech balls from the point of the scalloped frame, that extends upward to the top of the frame to where a rib extension might be.
The shop of an old German gunsmith who lived not far from my parents, when I was a kid, had piles of guns that looked similar to this Collath, with extensive deep relief engraving, inlays, carved horn and wood. He had incredible stuff that rivaled anything I've ever seen in any firearms museum or collection. He told me that he had been an armorer in the German army during WWII, and part of his job was to remove and burn the wood stocks from guns that were confiscated by the Nazi's. Then he was supposed to crush the breech section so they could not be recaptured and used. Then the crushed guns were sent back to Germany where they were melted as scrap for the war effort. In broken English, he told me, "Oh I crush a lot of very nice guns... but really nice ones, I stash. And after the war, I come to United States, and my brother smuggle them here to me." I wish he was still alive, so I could see them again, and so I could ask how he managed to hide and save them until after the war, and how he was able to smuggle such a huge quantity of guns into the U.S.
I'll probably get called a Nazi again for repeating this here, but somehow, I'll manage to survive. The DGS Cancel Culture hasn't cancelled me yet.