doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com What do I have?

It's a wall hanger. I have no plans to shoot it. Each lock has "Richards" engraved. I'm just trying to determine the details of this neat old hammer gun. There are four pictures posted in the link.

http://imgur.com/a/ZvYni

I's a Belgium gun-

many inexpensive Belgium gins were made with some variation of a good makers name on them as a marketing ploy

Back in 1889 the magazine Forest and Stream was doing a series of pattern and penetration tests of various shotguns available to the American shooting public in each issue. For the September 26 issue they decided to take a break from the Greener, Scott, L.C. Smith, Winchester Model 1887, Colt, Remington, etc., and test H & D Folsom's cheapest doubles. Here is a brief quote of what they had to say --

�...but the mean grade gun of no name. "W. Richards," that nonentity in the gun trade, was stamped on the plate, but they were really only those cheap bits of ordnance which come through our custom houses, pay a duty of 40 per cent., and yet may be placed on the counters of the gun shop at $5 a piece. The Forest and Stream has already in past times expressed its opinion about these pestiferous products of the penurious population clustered on Belgian soil.�

Junk back then and still junk today. I keep one around so I can show people just what a actual poorly crafted gun really looks like.
These "guns" sold at Sears for $5.00 to $10.00 with, as indicated, a 40% tariff. Just imagine what the cost to make these in Belgium must have been!
Jim

I had a back actioned, under lever W Richards hammer gun for a while.

I loaded up black powder ammo and shot some skeet with it. It performed quite well.

What you have is same as mine, Belgium low cost trade gun.

Mine was in 16 gauge, and they only major drawback was the lever wanting to poke into my neck when the gun broken open and was on my shoulder

Mike

As the others have said, it wasn't the highest quality originally. But don't despair, if your gun's action is tight it still makes a great shooter! I've owned quite a few Folsom/Crescent made doubles before I couldn't afford a nice double. They shot well and we're fun. So check to make sure yours is safe, then go burn powder

I had a similar gun without any names on the locks. I used to take it shooting sporting clays using Winchester AA Featherlites. So many people asked me who the maker was I finally had JABC engraved in big letters on both locks. I think I paid $1 a letter to have the locks engraved with some type of automatic engraving machine.

Steve

TOO Funny!!
Jim

Sound business; probably doubled the guns value!

Just a word to the OP, that firing pin is way over extended and would almost certainly pierce a cartridge cap ... just another reason not to contemplate firing it.

However it's clearly been around a bit and would have a fine story to tell; cleaned up a tad and hanging over the fireplace it would be an interesting conversation piece.

Eug

It looks almost identical to my old gun. That lefaucheux locking mechanism is an interesting conversation starter all on its own. My old JABC was a 12 bore with 32" fluid steel barrels both with open chokes (perhaps it was an open-choked duck gun). A Houston friend who'd helped me quite a bit with a project of mine liked the old gun, so I gave it to him. I told him what I shot through it but he's just used it as a wall-hanger.

Steve