Some of you may remember the 16 gauge Rigby side lever that sold in Amoskeag's March 2020 auction. I was the one who bought it and a week or so ago I sent Rigby the serial number and description to find out the provenance of the gun. Turns out the gun was sold to the 7th Duke of Newcastle in 1883. His younger brother, the 8th Duke of Newcastle, owned the Hope Diamond until he sold it pay off some of his debts.

well, la tea dah...

Pretty cool indeed. Lots of history out there on these guns and if they could talk there would certainly be some stories.

A repost:
I added a Remington 1882 10 gauge grade 4 gun to my humble collection of Remington SxS's. This gun has a name embossed in the stock under the locks,
D N DARLING is clearly stamped. Doing some internet searching I found out that Mr Darling was a turn of the century Arizona pioneer right here in Cochise County.
The 1916 edition of Arizona, Prehistoric, Aboriginal, Pioneer, Modern lists him as owning a brick manufacturing company and was a very active builder with the growing copper mining industry. In order for Mr Darling to get from the smelter to the mine he would have driven right past my ranch.
What was a blemish on a graded gun became a neat historic story. 1890's border AZ was still wild and dangerous--this 10 might have been handy on trips here and there!

tut, Right your are--if the guns could tell their stories!

Oh gosh a willies- Eddie- are you a Anglophile by chance, as well as a song and dance man for Rasmus accents-- La "tea" dah-- well tea is a Limey beverage- but I believe it is more accurately said as: "La Dee Da (h)" anyway, I'll lift my pinkie and raise a cup of Earl Gray to the thought- RWTF

Are you sure D wasn't for "Ding"? a quite famous name in the history of wildlife management and particularly waterfowling - along with many other things. A Ding Darling gun would be worth some serious cash I think.

This is what came to my mind right away. I like your Arizona story and all, but a Ding Darling gun would be...totally different

Ding's middle initial was also "N" for Norwood, but his first name was Jay. I'm doubtful that he would have his nickname with his middle initial but not his first initial or name in there somewhere.

One rifle I would really like to know the fate of from the same era, more or less is Paul Errington's Model 99 deer rifle. I hope it got into a museum, but I am doubtful.

Still any gun with any known and old history is worthy of special attention.

That's what I was thinking. Better fit.

I would enjoy you gents to have a look at the embossed lettering, but I have not mastered placing photos on this forum.

site owner and manager paramount Dave Weber said that he may change the website after the New Year to allow for easy posting of photos. If it happens, it would make this site even more amazing

I used to have about 4 to 5 hundred photos hosted on Jesse's hunting site...guess what the site got so big it crashed and everything was unretriveable.

Careful what you wish for.

I didn't post pics on this site for a long time, because people made such a big deal about how difficult it was. The instructions that were often posted were confusing and needlessly complex. I've learned that I can easily post a photo here in less than 15 seconds without storing my images on some photo hosting site that may pull the kind of ransom crap that PhotoBucket did. Posting pics directly from my cell phone is a bit more tedious, and might take a full minute if I have to download it to my phone first.

Keith, I am sure glad to hear this. Hopefully posting pictures will be even easier within a couple weeks' time. Merry Christmas to you and yours!