"The Journey Begins" In December 1984 I was a 27 year old Captain stationed at Pease AFB NH awaiting transfer to a small radar station in Iceland. It was my turn for a "remote" assignment. (There was some great goose hunting there but that is another story.) I was young and knew very little about Parkers, but they had a mystique about them; this was before the PGCA existed. The most respected gunsmith in the area had a pair of Trojans for sale, a 12ga 28” barrels bored modified and full, and 20ga 28”. Being a duck hunter I was drawn to the 12ga. The day before leaving for Iceland I broke down and purchased the 12ga, 163332, a 1913 gun with a dolls head rib extension. It was in very good condition with about 60% case colors. Duck season was still open so on the morning I was to depart I woke up early and went to an old dairy farm in my home town of Dover that bordered the Bellamy river. It was a cold December 10th and there was a little snow on the ground, the tide was low and as legal shooting time approached I spied a small group of ducks in a narrow brackish channel. The bend in the channel and tall banking would cover my sneak and allowed me to get within 25 yards before they flushed. I brought the Trojan to my shoulder and fired the right barrel, a big Black duck tumbled out of the sky when the 1 ¼ of lead 4’s hit home. I swung to another duck but the gun would not fire. I had never used a gun with two triggers before. It was too late to recover. I walked over and picked up my trophy. While standing there admiring my duck a small group of mallards came into the cove. They were 90 degrees to my position, going left to right at 50 yards or so. There was no time to think, only time to react. I raised the gun to my shoulder still holding the black duck in my left hand. I rested the barrels/forend on my left arm and pulled the back trigger. A big green head dropped out of the sky stone dead. There may have been some luck involved but I walked over to pick up the drake believing everything I had heard about a Parker, it was at that moment a magic shooting wand, and it was mine, I actually owned a Parker. While walking back to my Jeep my thoughts turned to who had used this gun before me, I had a “feeling” it was another duck hunter but had no story or evidence to back it up. I picked up my second duck and went home, leaving the ducks and the gun with my father. While in Iceland I purchased and read Peter Johnson’s and Larry Baer’s books on Parkers, but I still wondered about my Trojan and where it had been. When I came back from Iceland the Trojan was my go to gun for waterfowling until lead was banned. It sat idle for a few years until Bismuth shells came out. Starting in 2000 other Parkers joined it in the gun cabinet but it remained my principle sideby fowler and I enjoyed many a memorable hunt. In 2001 I discovered via internet the PGCA and found I could get a Research letter on my guns. I immediately ordered a letter on my Trojan. When the letter finally arrived I found some basis for my “inkling” the gun had belonged to another duck hunter. My Trojan was ordered in January 1913, it was completed and shipped to the Parker warehouse in June 1913 and then shipped as part of a 25 gun order, all Trojans, to the Walters and Martin Company of Norfolk VA. It sold for $19.00, (a dollar went a long way back then.) I believe the gun most likely started its life shooting fowl on Chesapeake Bay. December 10th seems to be a special day for this gun, in 2001 I was hunting alone on the salt water Cocheco river in Dover, it was a bright sunny day and the action was slow. Suddenly I heard some honking and a lot of it. A big group of Canadas was coming down river and they were hugging my side of the shoreline. The range was about 45 yards and the old Trojan barked twice (I knew how to use two triggers this time) two Canada geese splashed into the river. I had doubled on geese on the 16th anniversary of my first day with this gun. Coincidence, maybe, but I started to wonder if this gun went on it's first hunt on December 10, 1913. Over the course of 23 years use on the brackish waters around Great Bay NH the gun was really showing its age from the wear and tear of salt water hunting. On my 50th birthday in 2007 Scott Kittredge and I went on a “great adventure” and drove 8 hours each way to meet Lawrence and Babe DelGrego. I treated myself to a partial restoration, having the wood and barrels redone but leaving the original case colors alone. A few months later I drove back to Ilion to pick it up. I could not believe it was my gun when Lawrence led me to the vault where my Trojan was laying on the bench. It was proud again and so was I. I am blessed to have several more Parker’s including a couple of “neat” ones but I learned again just recently on a crow shoot that it remains the magic wand I once thought it to be. I knocked down a real tall one, killing it stone dead and watching an incredible long dead fall straight down, with a single shot from the left barrel. There are nicer Parkers in many regards but there is not a better Parker in either performance or the memories it has given me. It was my first Parker and suspect no matter what it will be one of if not my last Parker because there is nothing quite like ones first love is there?
