I love old W. & C. Scotts, especially Premiers. They’re one of the apexes of gunmaking, and in their day, they were one of the finest guns made (and extremely expensive). Scott sold a lot of them to American shooters, and most of the ones you see on the market today are hammerless models like this one, and, occasionally, bar-action hammerguns like this.
But here’s a W & C Scott Premier hammergun unlike any others I’ve ever seen. It’s a 12g Premier hammergun built on a bar-in-wood style action. A few years ago, a dealer called Mid South advertised one of these. I wonder if it’s the same gun? Actually, I hope it’s not.
On this one, some knucklehead F-up the bbls. They’re cut, and the chambers have been lengthened. Other than that, it’s a stunning shotgun, and it looks like it’s in great shape. When I first saw it, I was on the phone right away. I had 1/2 the dealer’s number punched in before I read the part about the barrels. Then I hung up. That kind of shit is a deal killer for me.
BTW: A gunsmith friend of mine told me that a lot of the English bar-in-wood shotguns he has seen came out of the same shop in Birmingham – at least in the early stages. This includes bar-in-woods with famous names like James Purdey on them.
This guns looks like the some of the Purdey bar-in-woods I’ve seen. I wonder if it originated in this same place.
