SEE YOU THERE……………….   

I thought the last two Bisley Shows were good but I had no idea what was in store for Sword & Musket at Birmingham.

As with the two last shows it is the quality items that are moving the quickest.  Which is a great sign as, By Sword and Musket, has been concentrating on this sector of the Classic and Collectible Military Rifle market for some time now.

The wise money seems to be sticking with Quality…. keep it up guys, you wont be dissappointed.

A foot note to all of this, is that the shipment from the USA has arrived, all the weapons have passed proof and are ready to be released to the right persons, its just a matter of time required to get them all listed.

I just wanted to wish all my customers Happy shooting, collecting and when it gets here….Christmas.

The interest in classic and collectible military rifles is definately increasing.  Purchases were strong and it looks like the stock which is about to emerge from the proof house may not be enough to stem the tide of interst on the subject.

This only encourages me to carry on sourcing top quality military spec’ rifles from around the world.  It’s quality, not quantity that counts in this field, as so many of each mark were originally produced for the home forces of each of the countries.  Literally millions of some marks were produced and most of them were not too carefully treated.

It takes time to find the good ones and I just have to ask for your patience.  I would stress however that it is easy to surround your self with a huge collection of not very good stuff, and next year it will still be not very good stuff, which in turn will always be difficult to re-sell.  So discretion being the better part of valour, we all have to wait for the good ones to emerge.  So keep your eyes on the prize and I’ll get it for you.

Thanks again, see you all at the Pheonix next May …………….

Its that wonderful time of year again when all the documentation has come together. All the charges have been paid, the exporters have done their thing, the Airline its’ and the importers have made that magical phone call…. ” all the items have cleared and they are ready for colection….”

I can now announce that 33 differing Military Rifles have arived in the hands of Sword & Musket and as soon as they have passed proof they wll be listed and be available for sale to avid collectors and shooters all over the country.

They cover a wide field of interest and added to the already interesting but, rapidly dwindling list in stock, include some of the following;  There are approximately

6 1903 Springfield US Service Rifles in .30-06

7 Swedish Mausers in 6.5mm

3 No4 Enfields in .303

3 K98 Mausers in 7.92mm

3 P17 in .30-06

2 Springfield Krags in .30-40

A French Berthier Carbine

A .44 mag 1894 Marlin

An 1895  Steyr in 8mm

A Schmidt-Rubin 1896/11 in 7.5mm

A 50.-70 Springfield Trapdoor Musket

If any of these are of interest to you please do not hesitate to get on the blower and I will give any details I can at that moment.  Viewing will not be possible for sometime, and I dont think they will make the Trafalgar Meeting at Bisley as they will probably still be in proof.

Nevertheless, Sword and Musket will be at the Trafalgar, October 22 & 23 with a wide selection of current stock as shown on the website now, and it would be great to see you all and TALK GUNS.

If anybody wants to see anything in particular just make a request before the Friday and I will make sure its on board,

AT The  Motorcycle Museum……………

Sword & Musket was outside in our own tent again, and that’s nothing to do with complaints from my fellow traders about my rich vegetarian dietary intake. One likes it outside, in the fresh air, and there was plenty of that around – passing through the tent at around 35 mph. Luckily I had taken with me some extra tent pegs and was able to keep the tent at least on terra-ferma.  A year or so ago when I took my own “Party-Style” tent I remember nocanantly hanging on the the tent for dear life as I tried to look as unconcerned as possible while discussing the varrious ins and out of the .30-06 Springfield and, wondering at what point, 13.1/2 stone of English/German was going into national air space whilst attached to a flimsy white tent.

Altough I went up there not expect much I was pleasantly surprised and altogether, takings are about the same as last year. Quality sells.

Basecamp

And thats the point really, it is what has been lurking at the back of our skulls for a long time. This stuff does not go down in value, its not like buying a new car, and watching the value decrease just for taking it of the dealers hands and tidying up his forecourt. These items are mostly investments. Ok, so you buy from a dealer and he gets his cut, so that might result in you having to produce a little more of the redies than you had originally planned, but, if you have bought well, concentrated on quality and put some research into your area of interst the item in question is going to increase in value.

Not that I deal in many deacts, but I found myself having to adjust my back up knowledge today when I found out that the humble Bren gun has doubled in price in the past four years. At one point they swamped the market but now that is not the case, rareity pushes value.  Now put the same scinario against one of the many military bolt actions from the last war and multiply by a much higher factor and you start to get the picture.

This was all bourne out by the high level of interest in the rifles on the stand over the weekend. The Springfields that I stock may have been the top end of the Military Rifle collector/shooters budget for a long time, but even they now are getting caught up with by some of the other marques.

Although fun, cheap, slightly battered bolt actions will always eventually sell, there is always going to be a place for the quality pieces at the top end of the scale. I’m not a financial advisor but Classic quality goods always hold their value, and the fewer of them around the steeper the scale of monatary increase.

If you couple that comfortable feeling of rock steady investment, with the fun had trying to master the art of shooting one of these venerable weapons, (and you find out it isn’t as easy as the filmakers would have us beleive) then it makes for a pretty interesting past time.

Looks like I had better stop waffling and find some more goodies to bring into the country………

See you at Birmingham on June 12th

By Sword & Musket will be at the Pheonix again in the same place as last year with all the best military bolt actions I can get my hands on. We are situated in a red and white stripped tent on the front corner between the NRA Museum and the Pavillion.

At the present  I have a strong selection of  US 1903 Service Rifles of all the different types. From the plain World War One issue to the Genuine Remington A4 Snipers of the Second World War.  In-between rest all the other varrients like the interwar years 1903 Springfields with the pistol grip stocks, later chosen by the USMC as their Sniper base for the Second World War, where they established their reputuation as a highly accurate and efficient surgical enemy removal tool.

The regular GI A3 and its big brothers; the A4 Snipers with the M82 and M84 Scopes which saw action as late as Korea help to complete the selection.

Also on display will be the superb Springfield made Krag rifles and Carbines from the Spanish American war years. The finish and attention to detail has not been repeated on US service weapons since.  The accurracy obtainable by these gentle old ladys of warfare is extrodinary. An 1898 version of the same is fast becoming my favourite open sighted weapon for club and competition shooting.

There wil be a mixture of other collectible / shootable weapons from the same period as well as earlier, with a few rather splendid large bore, obsolete Lever Actions by the great rivals Winchester and Marlin.

There wil be parts, accessories and other militaria from the same periods for all to rummage through.

I look forward to seeing you and answering any questions you may have on the subjects

Bring long bags and pleanty of cash.

A Happy Springfield buyer came back with;

“I found doing business with Sword and Musket a pleasure as they were friendly, knowledgeable and gave a great service. The website is very easy to navigate and the information factual, rather than the usual sale pitch. The main issue with the website, is that the items are so nice, you will end up spending money”.

Japanese Rifle collector said;-

“By Sword and Musket have imported a number of antique rifles from the United States for me and I have been very impressed by their efficient and friendly service.”

A Nice early sweed which didn’t even get to the web site!

“Hi Kirk

Just thought you might like to know that I shot the sweed for the first time today at 200yds on the NRA 200 yd target. First shot was an inner at 8 oclock,  and others followed with a group forming between 7 o’clock and nine o’clock. The barrel is clearly a good un. I was using Privi Partisan ammo and I reckon that with home loads it will shoot even better. I have also got an Elit target backsight which I hope to mount soon.  Many thanks again. I hope to have a lot of fun working up a really good load. Best wishes”

A British No4 T .303 Sniper;

Hi Kirk

I thought you might like some picture’s of the no4 mk1 T  I purchased from you a bit back . I’m happy to say it functioned and shot well on the day , I used a mixture of factory ammo & home loads .

I was very pleased with the quality of this classic rifle you sourced from the bore to the rifle’s overall finish it was excellent for something dated 1944 with all the right markings and all the numbers matching fantastic .

Your description was exactly as described , and if you buy anything second hand you’ll know just how important that little statement is , I waited over 20 year’s to own a no4 mk1 T and it take’s pride of place in my collection of classic military rifle’s Kirk.

I have changed one thing and that’s the BOYT .44 leather sling that came with it as you can see I put a modern reproduction sling on it incase I damaged the original .I hope to see you again soon keep well.

Kind Regards

A Swiss Vertelli Rifle in 6.5mm

Hi Kirk,

I thought you might like some pics of the Vetterli on the range!  The round nose rounds have original bullets that I pulled from some 1943 dated Itallian surplus ammo that I found after some detective work (and great expense!)

The 6.5mm Carcano has a bullet that is of a bigger diameter than almost all other 6.5′s
(0.268″ as opposed to 0.264″ – the only other 6.5 that had the same 0.268″ diameter
bullet was the 6.5mm Mannlicher – the problem is that the only 6.5 Carcano loads
available (Prvi Partizan and Norma… use the 0.264″ bullet, and that is 0.004″ undersize,
which is why people think that the 6.5 Carcano rifles are not accurate!)

Having said that, I did also make up some loads using 0.264″ bullets (some Lapua
bullets that I shoot in my Swedish Mauser) and the groups were only a bit larger than
those using the 0.268″ bullets.

Hornady do make a 0.268″ round nose bullet for the 6.5 Carcano but it’s an exposed
lead soft nose…. so it’s classed by Midway UK as a section 5 bullet in the UK even
though the Midway site and even Hornady say ‘Minimal’ expansion!

But, it does shoot, it goes ‘bang’ – it feeds like shit from the chargers though… (there’s
one in the ‘photo) which came all the way from Australia!) – the chargers wobble about
in the ‘magazine’ well – the only other charger loading rifle I have is an M95 8mm
Mannlicher and that works, and it works well.

Regards

A brief idea of what will soon be available (not spoken for so far)  follows;

One Remington 1903 A3 Bolt action US service rifle in its original caliber of 30-06.

One Springfield 1903 Bolt action Service rifle in 30-06.

One Springfield 1903 MkI Bolt action service rifle in 30-06.

One Remington 1903-A4 Sniper Rifle with M82 Scope in 30-06.

Carl Gustaf 1896 full length Sweedish bolt action Service Rifle in 6.5 x 55.

One Enfield No5 Mk1 Jungle Carbine in 303.

One Mosin-Nagant bolt action Sevice Rifle in 7.62 Russian.

One Springfield 1888 Trapdoor Rifle with rod bayonet in 45-70.

One Winchester 1873 Lever action Rifle in .32WCF

One Winchester 1886 Lever action rifle in 40-82. (obsolete caliber)

One Winchester 1894 Lever action rifle in 32-40. (obsolete caliber)

One Marlin 1893 Lever action Rifle in 32-40 (obsolete caliber)

One Winchester 1886 Lever action rifle in 38-56 (obsolete caliber)

They still have to be proofed but will then be available. Full descriptions and prices along with photos will appear once they have arrived. If anyone is interested in any of these, don’t be shy!  They don’t usually hang around for long.

Serial numbers available on request.

Also some fine Antiques on their way;

A good Pair of French Percussion Officers Pistols. Marked “Manufrf Rle de Chatellerault/Couturier”. approx .69 cal.

A Cased Pair of Percussion English Holster Pistols by Collins. .50 cal percussion. With accessories – extremely fine.

An excellent Pair of cased Engraved Edinburgh marked Manstopper Percussion Pistols by Harkom. .58 cal. These are more like Show-stoppers than Man-stoppers.

Smith & Wesson Model number 2 revolver in .32 cal. Condition, Fine to excellent.