Real Manton?

[Cody Tetachuk]

Definately english, maybe a "real" Manton, hard to tell. "Real Mantons" tend to be fairly high end, the lower end guns many times made in Birmingham with Mantons name engraved and sold out of Manton's shop.

    I think you need to separate the original John and James Manton from the later John Manton which tended to be economy guns (better than belgian) which were a continuation of the family name under John's widow and the shop foreman.  Unless I am mistaken they carried on into the cartridge era.

     Also re W Richards; keep in mind there was also a William Richards who made economy grade guns and was english.  Final note is that an unproven gun shipped to and sold in England would have been given an english proof before sale.  The english proof mark was therefore not necessarily a forgery done in Belgium

cheers Doug

You meant to say "the original John and Joseph Manton".

[heelerau]

Mate, that is an old story, as a kid I knew the odd old farmer with a muzzle loading shotgun, or some other old black powder firearm, in a back she. \I would get a look at it, offer to clean it,  offer to buy it, no, the old bloke would scatch his backside and pretend to consider the offer, and then say no it might come in handy one day.   It would stay rusting in the back shed, he would die, and the son/daughter would toss the lot for scrap, or hand it in to the police to have it disposed of.  Seen the same with old vintage cars and the like, ver frustrating.  Yep, it is the same down under !!!!

Cheers

Gordon
Old guns that used obsolete cartridges or ignition were just junk to many people. There were many guns in remote areas that a gun collector would never see, much less buy. I bought a rifle in 1981 from a man in Southwest Missouri that had found it years earlier at a house in the mountains. A kid was dragging it by the barrel across the rocky yard beside the house. He gave $5 for it. Amazingly, only a few slivers of wood, the hammer, and one inlay were missing. With a little restoration, that rifle is still hanging on my wall. My father knew a junk dealer that traveled the countryside in a horse-drawn wagon in the 1920's buying up old "stuff". He kept all the guns, and 50 years later, his grandson showed me a few - a factory engraved Henry, Colt dragoons (two 1st Models and one 3rd Model), several Colt percussion Armys and Navys, and some early Winchesters. After the grandson's death 10 years ago, I asked his widow about old muzzleloaders. She said she had maybe 20, or more, old "Kentucky" (her term) rifles locked in a shed behind the house, and would show them to me one day. Well, that never happened, and now she's dead and her daughter owns them. Now, it's the same thing. The daughter says she'll call me some day when she gets a chance to go through things, and let me look at the guns. I'm still waiting.