My girlfriend's father showed me this one last week and I'm trying to find out what might be done with it.

It's an outside hammer sidelock, presumably with Damascus barrels, very pitted barrels, other metal work is pretty rough, locks & triggers work, forearm latch works, stock's broken at wrist.

Is this gun candidate for restoration? Any value as parts gun? There's no sentimental value.

Any info on vitage, history, good reference sources, etc., is appreciated. Thanks. -WSJ

Without a lot more information, it's hard to say a lot about it, but probably from the 1880s give or take a decade. Hollis was a well known English gunmaker (I'm assuming that Alfred Hollis is THE Hollis, I don't have my books handy).

It sounds as though it is pretty beat up. It can be resleaved (VERY expensive and difficult to do), restocked (very expensive again, or it might be repairable, but sounds like a major work.

If it's a 16 gauge I might be interested in buying it for parts, but otherwise, you can put a note on http://www.gunbroker.com or http://www.auctionarms.com and see what it will bring (probably only a couple hundred at most).

Brent

Brent:

I'm still trying to round up the appropriate books to sort it out. What references do you have?

I suspect since it's a cartridge gun that Alfred may be one of (the earlier?) Isaac Hollis' sons? I think I found some potentially useful reference titles but so far nothing I can get through the local library system. And I hate to spend too much $$ buying books I never needed before. OK, I did order Flaydermans Guide to Antique Firearms but one should have that anyway, right?

Thanks. -WSJ