Local gun show find.

[Dakota Jeff]

Went to a small gun show yesterday and came across this interesting gun.Its a 1889 G grade 12 gauge,with 32 inch barrels.The barrels are in really nice shape,bores nice and shiny.My bore gauge says .760 in right bore and .758 in left with .039 constriction in right and .037 in left.Im thinking this is a brass case gun,as it has a 2 5/8 chamber with a sharp ledge at the end where the case would butt up against.The unstuck barrel weight is 5.4,and the gun weighs 9 lbs,1 oz.Its on a #2 frame.When I first spotted it I thought it was a 10 gauge.Its a hefty gun.As you can see by the photos it needs a little tune up.All the screws are buggered up.It has slight play when locked up but nothing to keep from shooting it.It has had the butt plate replaced,and has a small chip at the toe which I can fix easily.The worst news is it has a different forend from a V grade with a different serial number of course.It seems to fit well though.My plan is to get the screws replaced and possibly get it tightened up a bit.Maybe a new hinge pin would do it,and then just enjoy shooting it and hunting with it.Serial# 58288.

[charlie cleveland]

tjats a nice gun the barrels look a mile long....nice find........charlie

[mobirdhunter]

That's a handsome stock.

[Researcher]

Nice!! Wish my very similar 1889 gun had its last two inches of its original 32-inch barrels. My bores are .757" both sides. My unstruck barrel weight is 58.

56213 17.jpg

Someone at the factory must have thought mine was a 10-gauge as the watertable is stamped 2 above the serial number and E below it.

[Dakota Jeff]

I can see where they could mistake these heavier barrel guns for a 10.Iseriously thought mine was till I opened it up and it had 2 fired 12 gauge hulls in the chambers for snap caps.I couldn't get it apart fast enough to see if it was a 3 frame.I was in disbelief when I saw it stamped 2.Too bad yours was cut.I wonder what became of the original forend for this one also.The gun belonged to an uncle of the guy I bought it from at the show.I asked him to see if there was another Parker that he might have mixed the forends up but he claimed this was the only Parker he had.I need to become friends with a competent gun smith.I have had a good 2 months at local gun shows and have picked up several doubles of which a couple need a little attention.

[B. Dudley]

If you end up opening up the gun, it may be a good choice to put some sort of reinforcement in the wrist as the grain layout is a bit less than desirable and it would be prone to breaking if the gun was ever dropped or fallen on.

[Dakota Jeff]

If you mean opening up the chambers,it would probably be a candidate with the stout barrels,but I wasn't planning on it.If it did end up in your shop and if you thought the stock need reinforcing,an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.It does need new screws,especially on the side plates.One doesn't even have a head on it.

[Dakota Jeff]

I may have misunderstood opening up the gun.I have never had one of these apart.To do any work on it,possibly replacing the hinge pin and replacing screws I'm sure it would all need to be taken apart and the stock removed.

[Mills]

Most GH grades from that era are not in as good a condition as yours. Great find!

[Dakota Jeff]

The barrels on this gun are just pristine.I can't find or feel any dings in it anywhere and the bores are as smooth and shiny as a new gun.When I got this home and ran my bore gauge in it and saw the numbers I first thought oh no these barrels have had the crap honed out of them.I called a friend,Dean Weber who has more knowledge about these older guns than I and conferred with him about the bore diameter.I recently purchased a 1887 hammer gun and those bores are the same within a thousandth or two and then realized this was a brass case gun.I plan on checking barrel wall thickness for good measure though.The buttstock has just a very few tiny marks but may have been redone in the past.It does have a 1/4 inch chip at the toe that isn't in the pictures.Just needs a little tune up and good for a long time again.Im planning on going to The Great Northern shoot in Wis.this July and hope to meet and get acquainted with some of you guys.A lot of you have helped me in giving me confidence to buy some of these guns knowing that it could be repaired and put back into service.This site is a wealth of knowledge.