doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com E.M. Reilly; History; Chronology; Serial Numbers

No ramrod pipes on the barrels. Those barrels would be too early for a live pigeon/competition gun?

Great observation. Live pigeon shooting didn't really take off until mid-late 1860's I believe (as you well know - How's the Reilly shooting these days?). Can't explain the lack of ramrod supports. Reilly did advertise both breech loading and muzzle loading pigeon guns in 1869. Maybe if and when the barrels were cut by 2", these were removed. Would like to see detailed photos. Thanks for the comment.

The Field, 17 July 1869:

A couple of posters wanted to see the lumps and barrel flats of 10456 (number December 1857) pictured above. Holts had kindly provided them.

Gene,

Do you have EM Reilly 15120 in your list? It’s a pinfire gun.

Ken

I don't Ken. If you have the details would like to add the gun. The master list is on p.57. It'll have to be moved by early next year otherwise it couldn't be updated. Here are the known extant guns from that neighborhood; 15120 would date to winter-early spring 1868 according to the chart:

15021 - E.M. Reilly & Co., New Oxford Street, London. .577 Snider Enfield Volunteer 3 band rifle. German silver rearsight cover stamped "Snider"
15047 - E.M. Reilly & Co., New Oxford Street, London. .577 Rifle. Single barrel, breech-loader rifle. Green Bros Patent - Pat use #325
15126 - E.M. Reilly & Co., New Oxford Street, London. 12 bore. SxS Shotgun, center-break, C-F, U-L. Rebounding back-action locks. 6lbs 12oz First (original) rebounding hammers.
15127 - E.M. Reilly & Co., New Oxford Street, London. 14 bore, SxS shotgun; Shotgun SxS; pin-fire, U-L, hammer gun.
15129 - E.M. Reilly & Co., 502 New Oxford Street, London. 12 bore. Shotgun SxS; pin-fire, U-L, hammer gun.
15143 - E.M. Reilly & Co., Oxford Street, London, 12 ga. Shotgun SxS; U-L, hammer gun.
15227 - E.M. Reilly & Co., (address not mentioned). .577. Enfield Rifle, Snider conversion.

The reilly is shooting great! I've got a good rounball load figured for it. I plan to take a deer with it this season.

I sent you an email with pictures of the gun.

Ken

A questions was asked about the action of 10456. It appears to have a rising stud on the water table. (I don't know what that is for; if someone can explain - much appreciated). Holts responded in 24 hours - a record and very admirable:



The gun was unsold. They raised the estimated minimum from £150 to £400. It'll probably be reauctioned and at some point go into the silent bid group.


edit: Stephen Nash offered an erudite and elegant explanation for the rising stud, identifying it with a Beringer patent of 1837, widely adopted in UK gun making.
https://www.doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=662816#Post662816

This sub-chapter has been added to the history. It is entirely Steve Nash's research and mostly his prose. I will delete it as he wishes and will certainly footnote it when his book comes out.


*24A 1852-1860: Break Action, Pin-Fire Guns in UK; Beringer Patent

Stephen Nash, per above has postulated that UK gunmakers adopted elements of Beringer's center break concepts in their guns, vice those of Lefaucheux; here are his thoughts which are truly ground-breaking:

. . .—Casimir Lefaucheux’s gun had a forward facing lever under the fore-end and the barrels had two bites. Lefaucheux used a fixed pin protruding from the barrel flats which cammed against the locking lug upon the closure of the barrels assisting in helping the lever to close.

. . .—At virtually the same time, howevever, in 1837 Beatus Beringer took out a patent on a similar center-break style gun. He used a single bite and it included a stud protruding from the water table attached to the under-lever. This stud acted as an assisted opening/closing mechanism and was used on all of Beringer’s guns.


. . .— Beringer's action improvements and design choices (such as the single bite) were far more common in British pin-fires than Lefaucheux's, despite all British pin-fires being called 'Lefaucheux' at the time. Joseph Lang copied Beringer's single bite, but did not include the rising stud. Blanch, Reilly, and others, including Birmingham action makers such as Samuel Breeden and Joseph Brazier, did.


. . .-- While the pin-fire system of Lefaucheux, based on the cartridge, was adopted and correctly credited, Beatus Beringer had a greater impact on British designs, something which has not received the attention it deserves. As noted above in Chapter 24 Blanch bought a Beringer gun to study. It is not known if other gunmakers subsequently copied Blanch's gun, or whether they obtained Beringer guns to dismantle and reverse engineer on their own. What is sure is that so far no British built copies of Lefaucheux’s original double-bite design have been found.

This site is seeking pairs. It has lists of hundreds of SxS’s in the UK.
https://matchedpairs.co.uk/matching-pairs/

It advertises itself as a “pairs” and “trios” registry with the following comment: “We are actively seeking the singles, pairs and trios listed below. All of the following were once part of a pair or trio, should you have a matching gun please contact us to register it within our database”:

It does not identify the pair number of the gun they are looking for. The guns which led to the request must be extant, someone had to register them and make the request – however, unless details on these requester guns are available, they are not included in the master Reilly SN list (now up to 725 known guns).

The site is looking for the following Reilly serial numbers; the site has two entries for “Reilly” and “Riley” which are no doubt the same gunmaker: - guns in red have information available in our Reilly database:

Reilly: 27785, 27786, 27787, 33859, 231559 (possibly 31559?) 33915, 535521 (possibly 35521 or 33521)

Riley: 1832, 24956, 25723, 27854, 30364, 30486, 32941, 33240, 33265, 33889, 35134, 35156, 35350, 35572, 35631, 73378 (sic not a Reilly SN).

Seeking 24956
. . . . .24955 - #1 - requester
. . . . .24956 - #2
https://www.holtsauctioneers.com/as...++6580+&refno=++209274&saletype=
E.M. REILLY & CO. 16-BORE BOXLOCK NON-EJECTOR, serial no. 24956,


Seeking 25723 (unknown if #1 or #2)
. . . . .25724 sold by Hallowell & Co. Livingston, MT: E.M. Reilly, boxlock, 25724, 12 ga, 26” barrels choked impr cyl/impr mod, 14 1/8” all from DT to leather covered pad, 1 3/4” drop, str/spl, fine scroll engraved, AE, sleeved, 99% blue, faint traces cc. Cased. (No picture – no mention of this being a pair so the twin might be 25722)

Seeking 27854
. . . . .27853 - #1: Requester; Owned by Gene Williams
http://gavingardiner.com/BidCat/Sea...Submit+now.y=0&Submit+now=Submit+now
. . . . .27854 - #2; This is the pair to my own 16 gauge 27583 - #1; It was previously owned by Terry Buffum and is now in Massachuettes, discussed here:
https://www.doublegunshop.com/forum...rd=1&Number=595489&what=showflat


Seeking 30364
. . . . .30363 - #1: Requester
https://www.theexplora.com/who-made...chards-by-miles-gilbert-and-ian-jackson/
. . . . .30364 - -#2 – located in Norway
https://indiansforguns.com/viewtopic.php?t=15506


Seeking 30486
. . . . .30486 - #1 - ?
. . . . .30487 - #2 - Requester
https://www.southamsauction.co.uk/a...alse&sd=0&pp=48&pn=1&g=1


Seeking 32941 (unknown if #1 or #2)
. . . . .Reilly 32941 but without a pair number indicating either the site or auction house made a mistake:


Seeking 33240
. . . . .33240 - #1 - ?
. . . . .33241 - #2 - Requester
http://www.hillrodandgun.com/archivepicture.php?id=12774
Bosely, Montana


Seeking 33858
. . . . .33858 - #1
http://auctions.holtsauctioneers.co...++1445+&refno=+++83052&saletype=

. . . . .33859 - #2 - Requester

Seeking 33889
. . . . .33889 - #1
. . . . .33890 - #2 - Requester
https://www.guntrader.uk/guns/shotg...2-gauge/sidelock-ejector-190412143825007


Seeking 1832
. . . . .1832 - #1 - (This is a 1907 gun labeled as if it were 1840)
. . . . .1833 - #2 - Requester
https://auctions.morphyauctions.com...CO__SCALLOPED_ACTION_BOXL-LOT493536.aspx

It's a sad day to see you still have O'Reilly on the brain.