doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Francisque Darne

It's been a while since I've posted anything bu in researching information on my latest Darne (?) acquisition, I read that Ted (don't know how to spell his last name), mentioned back in 2017, that he had heard of Francisque Darne straying a bit and coming upon with variants of his fathers original design. One Ted mentioned was a small sidelock version of the classic Darne. Ted said he'd never seen one. Well, I am the proud owner of one. She's a beaut, and just thought you should know they were made, when and how many I don't know.
Carl

And you DON'T post an extensive collections of photos?

How cruel can you get? I'm not sure you can be forgiven for a post like this.

Congrats on your catch. I have my first Darne in the last month. Was only able to take it out once.

Carl,
If you can email the pics to me, I�ll put them up for you. On the road this weekend, so, no hurry.
I�ll see if I can find the catalog with that gun design in it.

Best,
Ted

Hi All but specifically you Ted. This gun is not new to you. Several years ago I sent you some pictures (yes, emailed to you Ted) because I wanted to find out more about it. There are several unique features to the gun, one, it is a slightly different shape to accommodate the side locks, and it has removable discs on breach face to access firing pins.
I bought the gun at a very reasonable price because it had a whopping 1 3/16" cast off.
I will send pics to Ted shortly, but where do I find the email address?
My apologies to you Brent...I am a very selfish person, but going to rectify that now.Carl

Forgot to mention Ted, you thought, based on the pictures I sent before that this gun was a "Fixe" model of some kind.
Carl

BrentD, do YOU have pictures of your new Darne ?

Brent, You just got your first Darne? What model and how'd it shoot?

Guys,
I do have pics but don't know how to post them or where to send them to have them posted?

Yes, this is my first Darne. I got it a couple weeks ago, before everything went downhill here. I got to shoot one round of trap and one round of wobble trap with it. I was stunned, that as light as it was, I wasn't oversteering like I expected. Maybe because I was watching for that - it is a classic problem of mine with a new and very light gun. At wobble trap, I missed a few first shots and was really surprised how fast I was on the second shot on the same bird, which I never missed. Might have been a fluke, but I was pleased with how well I shot it the first time out.

This one is an R10, so nothing fancy. 6.04# and excellent condition. 12 gauge, choked a pretty tight modified (I forget what Mark measured it) and a quite tight full (0.040" as I recall).

you can see it here
https://auctions.morphyauctions.com/_C__DARNE_R10_SIDE_BY_SIDE_SHOTGUN_-LOT478354.aspx

But you have all, already seen this gun right here
https://www.doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=439660&page=1

Ted was coaching me a little on french guns that I have suddenly seemed to swoon over. I was originally looking for some higher grades of Darnes and more conventional brake action guns, but the tragedy of my Greener and its resurrection tapped out all the money I was looking to spend on a new French double, so I had to start scaling down. When I sent him the URL for this one, he surprised the heck of me when he said he had owned it.

Anyway, this is just about the perfect Darne for what I want to do and the budget I had left to work with. If I really get to liking it, I'll find a fancier one someday when funds allow.

Many thanks to Ted for patiently answering all the screwball questions I had (and I imagine I'm not done asking).

Very nice, thank you

also

Carl, click on Ted's Name on the left of his post
Click on View Profile
See email address

Mike

Please don�t take offense if I don�t remember a specific gun, or, who contacted me about it. I get a lot of emails and phone calls in a month. I try my best to answer questions.

Best,
Ted

Some pictures:



Sliding breech gun with actual side locks.




Sliding breech gun with disc set strikers.


Bizarre amount of cast on original stock:




Carl and his stocker have been busy:




Safety side of gun:




Top of gun. Says Francisque Darne, differentiating from the typical Regis Darne product. Francisque was Regis Darne�s eldest son, and opened up his own shop in 1910. He died in 1917, but, his company soldiered on into the mid 1950s with different owners.




Carl, a good, clear photo of the barrel flats would be most helpful in nailing down some more details about a very unusual sliding breech gun.


See what you can do. I�ll look through my catalogs to see what I come up with.




Best,
Ted

Hi Ted,
Just sent them to you and thanks very much for posting the pics.
Just a couple of points. This gun took four years to get straight. As you can see above, the stock was replaced to eliminate the 1 3/16" cast off. That was an engineering nightmare for my stocker. Then, there was a broken hammer spring that had to be replaced. You can imagine the problems of finding a F. Darne hammer spring. After looking on and off for 2 years, I had one made by my gunsmith. Now it looks great, shoots great and I am one happy gun owner.
Carl

AWESOME
Great pictures
Ted, thank you for posting these !

Enjoy the shooting



Mike

Back in the day, when I wrote the Darne, Charlin, and Francisque Darne sections of the Gun Blue Book, I noted that most of the Francisque Darne guns were tinkered with versions of the 1894 Regis Darne patent.

Nothing has changed from that, in my opinion. Further, I�d guess he got his unfinished but barreled and proofed actions from his Father�s companies back door.

Best,
Ted

What a fantastic gun! I'm amazed that it could be stocked with a through bolt and that much cast off. Does it have a nut on the end of the bolt or is it a normal slotted head?

Is the safety in the fire position? If not, where is the fire relative to what it shows in the photo?

A few more:






A lot of information to digest. This gun was built during the Jallas e Cie era, after the First World War and prior to the second. There is a catalog available from Abbey books from this era. The gun was originally a 2 1/2� chamber gun that featured longitudinally polished bores, which, was a big deal. It is a double proofed 12 gauge, with, what appears to be Jean Breuil chopper-lump tubes. It was proofed with French powder T in St. Etienne. They were still pointing out they won a gold medal at exposition in 1904.

Neat gun. Do the side locks and disc set strikers add much to the 1894 Darne patent that this was hewn from? I�m not so sure about that.

You guys that study barrel makers marks recognize those marks?



Best,
Ted

Difficult to read all the inscriptions and Ted knows more: Outside of the normal advertising stuff and .65 chambering:
-- F. Darne on top of the barrel flats.
--" E.Jallus & Co.successeurs" - owners of the Darne firm in the 1930s. (Gold medal...Lyon? 1879?)
-- Barrels were made by Claude Brueil

Need better photos.

Owners of FRANCISQUE DARNE. Totally different company than Establishments Darne.

Best,
Ted

Sorry Ted...I did mean F.Darne...left it out..typing too rapidly. Wonder what the Gold Medal was about....I'lll take a look.

Everyone is a student, including me. I�m not good with independent barrel suppliers of the era, the Darne company went to producing their own tubes early in the game.

The gold medal was awarded in 1904 for the guns they were building.

Best,
Ted

CMR: canon champaley meillier et riou (CMR)

Thought I'd seen that before:
https://doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=518976

The safety is in the fire position, look closely above the switch and you can see (F) and (S) in gold lettering.
The through bolt was a nightmare for my stocker. It does have a nut on the end of the through bolt and with the wood twisting as it did, it was a real problem to remove it. When all was said and done, the cast off was reduced from 1 3/16" to 3/8"
Tell me what you want photographed and I will do it.
Also, on the trigger guard on the bottom, it reads " Favereaux Vitre" in gold. What does that mean? The recessed leather strap is spring loaded and fully functional.
One other note, the barrels both have a stylized "F Darne" done in such a way as to imitate his signature.
By the way, this is not a pitch, this is a statement of fact. My stocker is suburb. He has stocked another Darne for me and since I was born and raised in Hawaii...before it became a state, I chose to have it stocked in Koa. So Nice. Thanks for all your comments and statements and a huge thanks to Ted.

"Favereaux" is a surname in France. Vitre is a village near Brittany. Obviously marketed by a hardware dealer in Vitre. Amouriers getting guns in the white from Saint Etienne put their own (retailer) names on the guns.

Useful to recal some retail prices from 1970, when Darne shotguns first came to Britain.

A new R10 was 110 pounds
A Webley and Scott 156
A baikal IZ27 78
A Remington 1100 90.
All the above new at Whaley's Gun Shop in Hornsey road (not far from Diggory Hadoakes later residence)

At the same time at Praed Street Paddington there was a used Dickson Round Action at 150 pounds.

Did not buy any of the above. I opted for a used Franchi Al48 at 75 opunds, which I hunted twice, it jammed solid after few shots. I sold it at the Praed St shop but the Dickson was long gone by then.

Ah, yes, I see the F and S for the safety. That seems much more ergonomic than the standard R10 safety.

I wonder what the story was behind the original stock. I suppose a dominant left eye, but it wouldn't seem to be quite enough for that either, relative to the rifles I've seen stocked that way.

Did you try to shoot it before you restocked?

What a cool gun.

A couple more:



Look at the rails that breech slides on.

Inside view of side lock, with a broken spring:



Carl, I have to apologize for the random order these appeared in the post. My electronic communication is slow and disorderly due to my entire family going to work or school on the information superhighway, and messages are no longer sorted, newest to oldest in my email. I stumble over a picture from you and post it.
Sorry. Very cool gun.


Best,
Ted

A Francisque Darne catalog, from the Jallas e Cie era:



The art deco era was in full swing.

First page:




I do not believe this version is Carl�s gun. Some of the features are similar, note the rails and the safety, but the front wood appears to be different in shape where it mounts to the action:



I have two F. Darne catalogs, this one and a post WWII version, when the company was part of SIFARM. Neither has anything that looks exactly like Carl�s gun.



Best,
Ted

A ridiculously unique and interesting gun. It�s like F. Darne was trying to figure out how to take the virtues that make a Darne a Darne and do away with them. Like swapping out the coil springs for v-Springs.
The stock work looks really nice, btw. Who might your stocker be?

Anyone got a picture of the sliding breech repeater? The one with the internal magazine that held 2 additional rounds?

I have a photocopy of that article, from �The Rifleman� written in 1977 by Roger Barlow. I have tried to put a photo from the article up, but, the photocopy is too poor to get a good picture of.
The Levi 4 shot sliding breech gun appears pregnant, in the same way a small bore Parker does. You nailed it, take the virtues out, light, quick handling, well balanced, and make it something else.

Best,
Ted

I did not shoot it before the stock was converted. since I am right handed and right eye dominant, it felt really strange. There is, on closer inspection, the name Lyon and the date 1914 just below the gold medal remarks?
My stocker is Kirt Kimsey and resides in Georgia. If interested, I took some closeup pictures of the Regis Darne that he stocked in Koa, emphasizing the fit and his checkering.

Pretty sure it is 1904, Carl. There was a large exposition that year, and the gold metal notation appears on all F. Darne guns built prior to the second war.

1914 was when the first war started. Different exposition.

Best,
Ted

Ted, not sure there was an exposition in Lyon in 1904. There was one in 1914...obviously cut short in August by the outbreak of WWI. But could you check your Darnes to verify they say "1904?"

It is for sure 1914, I checked with my wife and my super duper magnifying glass.

Cool. I stand corrected.

Best,
Ted

If there can be a sidelock Darne and a 4-shot Darne, can there also be a hammergun Darne? I would think not, but so far, I haven't guessed much of anything right on these guns.

I think this one is as beautiful as it is unique.

What is the weight and the barrel length? If you said, I missed it.

The barrels are 27" and the gun weighs 7 pounds on the nose. I think the gun would be an ounce or two less if it didn't have the self retracting shoulder strap in the stock.
Since you are the one who groused at me for not including pictures on my first post (and rightly so), are there any other pictures you think I've missed? Here's your chance???

Carl

I would love to see the details of the self retracting sling. Is this like a Manufrance?

Is it a more or less normal rib or a sunken top rib?

Thanks for all the pics and descriptions. That is a gun, the likes of which I'll almost certainly never see.

I have a Manufrance Ideal and I don't recall it having a sling. Mine pulls out of a slot in the base of the stock and attaches to a nicely fashioned hook affair on the upper portion of the barrels. As mentioned, when disengaged it retracts into the stock very neatly. The rib is much like the normal Darne(sunken) but more subdued. I will send you pictures if you want me to email or text them?
Carl

Carl, a lot of French guns from the period had the self-retracting slings.

Carl, if you send pics to brent@iastate.edu, I'll post them for you.

I think this is an example of a Manufrance with a retractable sling. The website doesn't mention it however. I've never actually seen one of these in real life.

https://www.gunsinternational.com/guns-f...=101385284#lg-2

Here is another
https://www.gunsinternational.com/guns-f...un_id=101333709

We�ve been over the retractable sling here, quite a few times. When I was importing Darne guns, that sling was an option. I sold few of them, they were expensive, and while they are a bit �gee wiz�, they aren�t really a very good sling. The width of the strap is narrow, supporting a 7 lb. gun on a 1/2� strap isn�t that comfortable. The mechanism in the butt adds weight and mechanics right where you don�t want them. The sling was not a Manufrance product, and they appear on all makes of French guns.
To the guys who wanted a sling, and, that wasn�t very many, I always told them to go with the bretelle Darne. I use a sling on a shotgun, and there really isn�t anything that compares. The front loop is free to move up and down the tubes, eliminating most of the complaints about the sling getting hung up in brush. The sling is easily removed when you don�t need it, and easily put back on when you do. I just leave it in place, on my own guns, usually.
Given a choice between sling swivels and a regular sling, or a retractable sling, I�d take the former. It is just a better sling, all the way around. If you are going to have a sling, have a good sling.
The retractable sling is really only for very intermittent use. I guess if I was restocking an old gun that had a functional retractable sling in place, I�d at least consider putting it in the new wood.

Best,
Ted

Ted is absolutely right on the usefulness of the sling on my gun. I had it put back in the new stock to preserve its originality. The sling Ted mentions is a vastly better solution. But there could be moments that you might appreciate having the built in sling handy on a long trek back out of the fields and woods.
Mostly I did it to keep it true to the gun. However my stocker was not happy. Sorry Kirt!

if you'll look closely the sling cartridge on the first example you link (the kirby hoyt 2r gun), it has been reinstalled backwards. the "D ring" has a decided angle that allows it to retract quite flush into the receiving metal housing.

generally i agree with ted & carl, the slings are better in theory than in practice...they are simply too narrow to comfortably use for long, and the auto retraction pulls them tight as soon as you release your grip on the sling. i have them on three MF guns.

There are pictures in the works on mine. As stated I like that in an emergency, I could use the strap, but not as a general rule. Mine was installed correctly and looks nice all tucked in the stock.
Carl

When it comes to shotguns, I often need a sling for short periods of time when duck or turkey hunting. The narrowness would not bother me at all on a 6-7 lb gun for that purpose. I use a couple of the double slip loop slings but then I have to stuff them somewhere when I've gotten to where I'm going and not forget them. They do make VERY handy turkey carriers however, if not being used on the gun. anyway, I like the idea of retractable sling in theory. But practice could be different.

My Darne is my first shotgun with sling loops of any kind. We shall see if I put them to use.

I have 2 Ideals with the retractable sling and a Darne that does not.
I like the sling as a (it's just neat) thing and also for the ability to dig around in a bag or eat an apple without putting the gun in the mud.
I like slings on shotguns but I also like Belgian guns that usually have swivels
For duck hunting in saltwater a sling is mandatory as I don't want the gun in the mud ever.

I like a sling as well. But, I�ll tell you right now, we are a minority in that regard. A lot of my hunting spots are walk straight in, turn around and walk straight out, and a sling works perfect.
The retractable is neat, can be handsome, but, mostly fails as an actual sling. That, is actually good enough, most of the time, on a shotgun.

Best,
Ted

In rereading the posts, I notice that it was mentioned that a small bore Parker looked pregnant. Got to thinking about the Charlin O/U I have. I'm sure many of you may have seen it on GI for quite awhile. I talked to the owner and eventually made him an offer, but hoped he sold for more. He eventually accepted my offer. The gun is very smooth, but looks pregnant too. I've shot it and it works well...but oh the looks!!! And again, like Ted said about the Darne's(Charlin's too), light and well balanced it isn't.
Carl

Some of those are marked �Super Charlin�. The action is fun to cycle back and forth, but, I never deluded myself into believing I needed one.
Hope you like yours. A Darne is tough enough to sell.

Best,
Ted

My eyes were wide open when I made the offer but honestly I did reflect on whether I'd just created a nightmare for myself. Once I received the gun though, I was pleased. It is well built and very pleasing to the eye...mostly. It's for me and I'm glad I own it, so there you go.

Here are three more photos for Carl highlighting the sling aperatus.

Thank you Brent!!!