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1869 Sharps Long Range Rifle

Currency:USD Category:Antiques / Firearms & Armory Start Price:3,750.00 USD Estimated At:7,500.00 - 9,500.00 USD
1869 Sharps Long Range Rifle
SHIPPING & HANDLING: Shipping and Handling cannot be estimated prior to invoicing, based on the size and weight of your purchase. All shipping is subject to a minimum charge of $19.00. If additional shipping and handling costs are required, the buyer will be reinvoiced for the balance due. Items are not shipped until the invoice is completely paid. Many buyers purchase a number of lots. Every effort will be made to include all lots in a single shipping charge calculated to cover the weight and size of the package(s). NOTE: Some shipments (of unusual size, dimension, or weight) may require sp...
A J.P.LOWER marked Sharps 45-110 Caliber black powder cartridge classic sharps rifle. A military/civilian 3 barrel band long range Sharps rifle that was found by Mike Star, the original owner in 1900. Star was born in 1833 and Star is the grandfather of the current owner. A complete history of the gun comes with the gun. This beautiful piece is marked; Old Reliable” in script and “Sharps Rifle Co. Bridgeport, Conn.” In block letters on the barrel forward of the ‘R.S. Lawrence’ ladder sight calibrated to 800 yards. Forward of the sight, between the receiver and the sight on the barrel is; J.P. LOWER CAL.45”. Above that is stamped; “2 7/16” denoting “45-110” Caliber. On the left receiver below the hammer is stamped “SHARPS RIFLE CO PAT APR 6 1869” in a two line address. John Pray Lower was a gunsmith born in 1833 Philadelphia. He apprenticed with gun dealer /trader J.C. Grubb. He worked with him abroad and throughout the U.S. He owned a gun shop where he sold guns and ammunition as well as fishing and camping supplies. He primarily was a gunsmith from Denver Colorado and he had a contract with the Sharps Company, among others, to handle, repair and sell Sharps rifles. He died in 1917 This rifle was most likely a 45-70 Government caliber as to the configuration of the stock and was custom enhanced by J.P.Lower to be re chambered for the Sharps Buffalo round of 45-110 caliber black powder cartridge, most likely a paper patch round. This gun also has an improved J.P.Lower blade front sight. This gun has excellent bore, nice furniture, and excellent working action. The rear military lanyard has been professionally removed, conducive of a civilian arm. The right side stock has the steel patch box used on earlier percussion sharps and carried over to the “74” model’ an excellent working piece of classic American history that is reminiscence of fine American large caliber and long range rifle history.Mike Starr the owner of this 45/70 Sharps rifle who stamped his name onto the stock, became a part of my family’s history when his real mother (name unknown)
died in the black Cholera plague in 1837 Richmond, Indiana. The infant grew up with the Quaker community and subsequently was employed with Charles Starr’s Tremont House and Starr house (both documented hostelries that catered to the many travelers making their way West). Following Charles’ death in 1855 he made his way out West. Final communications with the family placed him in Washington state. Torn by his pacifist and abolitionist beliefs during and after the civil war
he led a solitary obscure life until his death sometime around 1900 ( no record of his time of death or of his final resting place could be found). Only oral family history gave an indication of the location of his frontier home. In the 1930s my father while working on Grand Coulee dam, followed the information that existed at that time and found a crumbling homestead ruin. In that decaying dilapidated antique ruin, in an old outbuilding Dad miraculously found Mike’s “old reliable”. No one knows how the rifle came to be in Mike’s possession; he probably obtained it from one of the buffalo hunters employed by the Canadian Cascade Railway that wiped out the great Northern herd. What little was known about Mike existed only in oral hearsay and passed with the death of my father and his family into history’s foggy oblivion. My father tried several times to retrace his steps years later but never again found the lonely ruin where he found the rifle.
State: City: Date: ID# 45759