[stumpstalker]

A young man with an old soul. Welcome aboard, Tyler.

You appreciate that there is intrinsic value in knowing who previously owned or hunted with a gun now in your posession. That's something we are not likely to get with an auction purchase.

I too bought a 20-gauge (a Lefever, DS) from a widower, which was the gun his wife had hunted with. The butt-plate is a non-original styled replacement. The gentleman said that the original plastic plate broke when his wife dropped the gun, butt down, on a rock during a hunt.

I have been told, "you can get an original-styled replacement for that gun". I may do that at some point, but for now I will keep the gun with that storied detail intact.

Do follow the example of Burton Lowell Spiller and William Harden Foster and add a Parker double with all prudential speed. You have come to the right place for valuable and gratuitous advice.