Awfully poor workmanship on an H&H,,and that's looking beyond the poor condition of it.
It's supposed to be an H&H,,whatever grade, it's supposed to be a Best workmanship if it's from H&H.
It doesn't have to be fancy, but it should have been made right when built.
I'm just looking at the fit of parts like the lock plates to the frame and the trigger plate to the frame.
Both are far from anything precise. Wide gaps in the fitting, I would not expect that. There are coarse file marks on the bottom of the frame where the deep carve out recesses were filed in for the lockplate outline. They look like they were there since 'final finishing'. Not a top shelf job expected on an H&H or similar.
The bbl lug showing through the bottom of the frame doesn't fit closely at all.
The hand engraved lettering is far from anything of quality. Uneven height, slips, incomplete cuts, crooked letters, etc.
Screw heads don't fit snug in their counter bores.
Both sides of the bbl flats have been struck with a 'CHOKE' marking.
The spec sheet says : Chokes- Both Slight Choke
So OK,,both sides are stamped 'Choke'
...But why is only the LH tube marked 'choke' in smaller letters ahead of the flats. Why not both tubes if they are both Slight Choked.
Or why is one marked at all ahead of the flats? (Do the English Proof regs of the time require that?)
Looking at the Proof marks on the bbls and the action flats ,,the Ser#'s on the action flats, Bbls and FE,,,and all the other stuff above,,I am wondering if the
gun might be a foreign made SxS other than a Brit gun (Spanish maybe) that has been reser#'d and maker marked .
The 'Make a gun to match the Factory Letter' .
Gee, no one has ever done that before.
Either that, or I'm all wrong (Could BE!),,or H&H was making, or having made with their name on it, some very poor quality stuff back then.
The obvious poor stock work,,the heavily layered (looks like) poly spray stock finish is obvious. Peeling off in many areas, I wonder what it may hide underneath.
The wood has been sanded below the metal in some areas like the edges of the top tang. Maybe the thick Poly was an attempt the build the surface up to meet the metal again.
Don't laugh, it's been done.
Some recutting of the checkering was done, or at least attempts to. Click on the pics of the checkering especially the top and bottom of the grip patterns. Some
pretty crud work there. I almost thought there had been attempts to hide a butt stock transplant,,may still do.
Then someone else would have come along and done the nice job on the butt pad. ( A butt pad from a company in Kingston, Jamaca ??).
The initial shield shows those tiny circular sanding marks from an orbital sander on the metal if you enlarge that pic. Quicker to get it done I guess.
Just too much wrong from all directions. I didn't even mention that fence post forend,,
I guess I just did.
