So far the comments have said it all. The gun was presented to its owner as a Dimick (Dimmick), it was presented to a gentleman for an "expert" opinion and declared a Dimick, and was then presented to us.
Without going into minute detail I contacted the owner and questioned the gun immediately. Though I have no proof that the gun is anything other than initially represented, I believe otherwise. This doesn't make the entry spurious nor dishonest as the owner is looking for truth. Otherwise it would have been withdrawn.
It seems that the general consensus is that the gun is most probably not a Dimick. (At least in total.) I have no opinion about the signature as I have no reference to base it upon. The best I can say is... It is what it is. And so we have a gun honestly attributed to Dimick, then the attribution withdrawn, and finally the opinion of a majority here that all is not correct as far as the gun being original and right.
As to Library status I'm of the opinion that the gun should stay. It gives us all the incentive to dig just a bit deeper and to comment honestly. Many here would do well to learn from this little rifle.
I have no doubt that the rifle is totally correct as far as being in period. I see no attempt to embellish nor to hide its history. Perhaps we'll one day find the signature to be of a different hand than presently attributed. Perhaps the rifle is a compilation of older components remounted on a new stock. On these things I can only speculate.
The important thing to me is that this little rifle seems to have survived a century and a half with little overall change. It was obviously valued by its owner(s) and evidence points to a series of repairs and modifications during its working life.
One of my deepest regrets goes back to the beginning of this project where an owner withdrew a nice southern rifle because of the comments received. Many were critical on the basis of originality and attribution to a particular maker. On the whole our comments were correct, but we lost sight of the history and obvious importance of that rifle to the families it served over decades.
Perhaps that little rifle has more value than the pristine highly decorated safe queen we take to a show once or twice a year... At least from a historical standpoint.
