Parker Internal Hammer Sidelock Gun

[Bruce Day]

Something interesting for the experts.

[Kensal Rise]

A particularly fascinating mechanism. And perhaps one of a kind ! I'm most piqued by these aspects:

It appears to have been made up on a hammergun frame.
The tumbler axle is "split" in its mounting between the frame and lockplate.
The sear essentially "floats" separately as a part of the lockplate.
The firing pins are not integral with the tumblers per the boxlock design
The gun has a fishtail top lever for no apparent reason... other than one may have been handy?
What was the reasoning behind this? A higher-end "sidelock" Parker?
And... what time frame was it made???

Altogether, a VERY rare Parker indeed !!

[Bruce Day]

All those are unknowns. We know only what we see.

However, if past posts are any indication, there is a member here who will have another like it at home, knows all about them and dozens more will have passed through his hands.

[Wild Skies]

Did we see this gun at the 2014 Antique Arms Show in Las Vegas? If not, there was another one shown there.

[Bill Murphy]

We saw one at an early Gold Medal Concours, which could be the same gun. Who knows?

[Brian H]

A gun exactly like this was on a table at Vegas last week. A picture was posted here someplace I can't remember the price.

[Dean Romig]

Thanks very much Bruce. That's an excellent pictorial essay.

When looking at pictures 1 and 5 and enlarging it so I can read that patent date it looks like March 26, 1873 or 1875. In any case, I find no such patent date in The Parker Story listing of all known patent dates. This might indicate that whoever did this work patented it. Of course, I may be wrong about the date I read.

[Mills]

Very cool. Great material for a Parker Pages article

[David Noble]

The serial number is in the S&I book as a grade 3 damascus top lever gun with no extras.
I would guess a very early and ingenious conversion to hammerless. Too bad the smith that did the work didn't sign it somewhere.

[B. Dudley]

Must have been a gunsmith that was doing hammerless conversions on Parker hammer guns. I wonder who it was.

Very interesting indeed.

Similar in some ways to a cocking rod Lefever.