doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Canon Delcour & Francotte Barrels

Hello everyone,

I have a shotgun, purchased by my family over 100 years ago, in Egypt, while the Brits were building Suez canal. I do not know was the purchase made via catalog, or in some local shop controlled by treaty of Suez.

My grandfather died when my father was only few years old, and my father lived until 90,( born 1915) hence it was I who now has to figure out aprox dating and info!

the gun has marks DC, on both parts, Serials that match, and the barrel has a stamp AF. I assume, that Jean Batiste, prior of opening canon delcour, made and sold guns but purchased barrels from Francotte?

I looked and looked at the pictures on this forum re: fluid steel, sklep, laminated, ...the more I looked, the more I got confused. The barrel does not have color. It looks like steel,and you can barely see grains of twist/coil, or something?

As the gun was purchased in Suez, could it be some of the English versions of the steel? Or if it was purchased via catalog, who assembled the gun?

Finally, the dates do not match. If Canon Delcour opened business in 1920, it looks we got the gun, posthumunusly..which does not make sense.

There is some engraving, and the gun looks good...

It is not for sale.

If someone can help, would appreciate, thanks

Welcome to the board

the first thing most people will want for answering your question is some clear pictures of the gun, and any markings

http://www.littlegun.be/arme%20belge/artisans%20identifies%20d/a%20delcour%20dupont%20gb.htm

Jean-Baptiste Delcour-Dupont of Nessonvaux was the father of Lucien & Oscar Delcour and had been a manager for Pieper & Cie before opening his own shop specializing in Damascus barrels. He received a patent for SxS barrels in 1910.

Canons Delcour S.A. was registered in 1921, and remained in business until about 1968 when they were acquired by Fabrique National de Herstal. Canons Delcour used a Crown over D, DC, DDN in a crowned oval, ACIER SECURITAS and ACIER MARTELL.

From "L' Armureire Liegeoise". W.J. Jeffery sourced "Herakles Compound Gun Barrel Steel" from Canons Delcour.



If you could post close up full size in focus images of the barrel pattern, and every mark on the rib, barrel flats and action flats we might be of more help.

I am a very bad photographer, I hope this helps, as others 100 are out of fokus.thanks

There is a DC mark on the barrel, after AF, on the top of a hook, upper one. You can see on photo same markings is DC with #4

Well, it's certainly Belgian proof, pre-1924. Can't see the proofmarks all that well, but the AF you see well forward of the other proofmarks is not the Francotte trademark.

Hello bgdlive and
WELCOME to the site on your first postings

You will find this below site interesting

http://www.shotguns.se/html/belgium.html

Mike

p.s. see if you can get a clear picture like this
Best lighting in the house is in the bathroom where
it is lit for the Mrs. of the house to put on makeup

This is the best, I can do tonight. Its 2:00AM in europe, and my wife would kill if I would start making noise in the bathroom. So, I have tried in my basement, but no luck. I will get my son toomorow to improve this work.

Thanks for the info about AF initials. The is also an asterix next to it, it might be inspector's name?

I am wondering why is barrel so shiny, compared to the area where is triger housing. I just hope that my dad did not take the gun to the gunsmith in the 1960-1970, and that he took some top layers of the barrel. This gun was/is in the box most of her life. Perhaps it does not look that way, but it is what it is. Thanks for you input, Peter

I'm sorry Peter, but the gun is of lower quality and tens of thousands were made in Belgium before WWI for export. It is quite unlikely to have any relationship to Delcour-Dupont, and certainly not Francotte. The 'D' may be one of the Dumoulin concerns.
http://www.littlegun.be/arme%20belge/artisans%20identifies%20den/a%20dumoulin%20gb.htm
The barrels are Twist and for some reason the browning was removed, possibly in preparation for refurbishing and re-browning. I've seen the 'AF' before, and it likely is the mark of the (unknown) tube maker.
As a piece of family history it is of course priceless, but under no circumstance should you attempt to use the gun.

It would really suprise me to find out that my grandfather purchased something he could not afford.

I was watching yesterday on youtube, a gunsmith Midway, restoring a twist barrel. And after he created that red rust, and placed barrel in the boiling water, and after removing residue the unfinised gun looked exacetly like this. which promted me to wonder that gunsmith removed browning. Is obvious the my father did not liked what he saw, a for some reason it stayed that way for 50 years.......

I will restore the gun, mostly for the rust protection, and hand it over to my kins....Advising them NOT to fire.

I do have a question, I see an insert, metal insert where shell goes, is that on originals as well? I mean on Twist steel,
if it is, how long does it go, lenght of the shell? Regards.

A forum member posted this sometime ago

Dumoulin
They also maintained an office in London at 9-11 Wilson St around 1897 or so. (Perhaps supplying parts to the trade?

That is connection to suez canal!

and DC initial could be

Dumoulin-Colombier......The dates also fit?

I took the initials DC, and AF from this page

http://damascus-barrels.com/Belgian_Trade_Marks.html