doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Poulin's August Auction

I was the one who bid on and won the Boss S x S. I'm almost afraid to ask why there so little interest in the gun. Did I miss something in the description that made other bidders not interested or was just everybody out of play money?

I picked the gun up yesterday and it certainly appears to be in very good shape. Poulin mention the gun being slightly off face and it was, I could get a .0025 feeler gauge in the gap, but not a .0030. There is some very minor oxidation on the 28" barrels that is covered by the hand guard. Did I get really lucky?

I'll note that Poulin packed the hell out of the gun, took almost 10 minutes to get the gun out of the multiple layers of bubble wrap.

Thanks

On edit: Bid + buyer's premium + CT sales tax and gun cost a bit over $6300, not counting S&H and the transfer fee.
And a link to another auction site that shows the gun. For some reason the Poulin website seems to 'archive' past auctions so you can't see what the lot number was.
https://www.invaluable.com/auction-...queryID=defd00dec84df6049707b3c5c701c92f

Always curious about Brit SxS's from the late 19th, early 20th century. But unable to identify which gun you bought. Poulin's site is not easy to use for historical purposes as is Holt's. Might it be this one? Thanks.

https://www.poulinauctions.com/2026...dey-self-opening-action-extra-barrels-2/

That's the gun

There was an article a number of years ago about a Boss built on a Purdey action in the "Shooting Gazette". I believe the year was about 1909 and a Boss customer asked for a self opener. So Boss just walked down the street to Purdey and picked up the action.
Gunmakers in that day simply tried to please their customers

I’ve owned Purdey guns that lettered as having Boss single triggers. The three pull design. Both pre WW1 iirc.

In reading the Purdey records many guns were ordered and finished in just a few weeks. I ask how this could be and the answer I was told is that in the high sales eras lots of single and pairs were built to relatively standard specs as time permitted. Example 28” double trigger game guns. Stocks were headed up and guns in the white. Customer was measured, stocker finished stocks to measured dimensions. Guns were hand carried to Kell’s shop and the engraving of a pair took only a few days. This was done by several people. One guy did trigger guards, one forend irons etc. A Kell engraved gun might have had 4-6 engravers. The records bear this out. Less than a week in Kell’s shop.

Guns finished in 45-60 days at times. Many buyers were not as sophisticated as today. The ones that knew what they wanted got it I suspect.

I’ve also been told that Purdey no longer has the jigs or blueprints to build the large framed 12 ga pigeon guns. Orders for them dried up long ago apparently. As I thought about that I don’t even recall seeing a post WW11 large frame gun. Probably a few out there but I may have forgotten them. Post war “pigeon” guns I have owned or recall seeing come in at 7# 4 oz to 7# 8 oz. I sold my last light framed pigeon gun this week. My pre war big framed guns are all at or over 8# with 30 or 32” barrels.

So yes, if a buyer wanted a Purdey actioned Boss it could be done in that era. Incidentally, Boss recently refused to build a Beesley actioned SXS I’m told on very good authority.

I can't see what it sold for but, I would be happy to have a set of unnumbered 28" spare barrels that you can shoot as much as you want without the concerns I would have with damaging the matching barrels. Looks like a nice gun to me.

EDIT: For $6300, I would be very happy with that gun.

As a pigeon gun fan, I've spent a little time on this.

Live bird pigeon shoots became illegal in the United Kingdom in 1921.The British Parliament passed the Captive Birds Shooting Prohibition Act 1921, which made it illegal to release and shoot captive birds from traps.

...so most guns that we think of as "pigeon guns" from the UK made after 1921 are either fowlers, or destined for somewhere outside the UK, like the US.

Looking at the Invaluable website, most of the comparable guns went at the middle to the low end of the estimate

I'd say a steal at that price

Pigeon shooting may have been outlawed in the UK in 1921 but the shooting continued on the Continent so they just traveled there.
I own a 1906 Purdey pigeon gun and a 1911 Purdey hammer pigeon gun.
I shoot Helice with both as much as I am possible to.