Doc Drew,
I would add...that given the time line, I think it's a good guess that the Armor Steel Smith's were in fact just a variant of Krupp. Perhaps it's a good guess that even those Armor Steel barrels which have no Krupp stamp, in likelihood ARE "Krupp recipe."
I found the book reference I mentioned in a prior post. It is in a thick Harvard text book entitled, "The History of Foreign Investment in the United States to 1914," by Mira Wilkins.
In a chapter discussing German and French FDI just before the turn of the century, she writes, with a dated source notation:
"In 1893 Friedrich Alfred Krupp visited Pittsburgh en route to the Chicago World's Fair, where there was a Krupp exhibit. In 1900 the Krupp company (of Essen, Germany) had an American representative, Captain A.E. Piorkowski. 'Kruppized' armor plate was made by Bethlehem Steel, possibly under license."
So clearly, on the supposition that Bethlehem had a license, and therefore the recipe, it would be no stretch to guess that after the outbreak of WW1, they'd have simply stopped paying Krupp anything and considered such knowledge war time booty. This could be how any number of fluid steel guns actually have 'Krupp quality' barrels which are unattributed as such.
Again, just supposing.
- NDG
