Remington Rolling Block

They are sturdy rifles that were darnnear soldier proof. They made roughly 1 million of these for about 50 different countries. Back then, almost every country wanted their own chambering, so there were probably 40 different chamberings, all in the .43-.45 caliber range. If you can post some clear pics and list all of the markings you can find, I'll try and narrow down what this one may be.

 

Clear pics showing the rear sight and the front-most portion of the stock & muzzle would be good. Also an overall pic would be good. Also:

Carefully measure the barrel length.
What markings are on the rear sight (western numerals or Arabic)?
Does it have a bayonet bar on the side of the barrel?
If no bayonet bar, measure the outside diameter of the barrel an inch back from the muzzle with a caliper.

I dunno if we can identify it exactly with all of the original markings gone, but we can probably narrow it down some.

 

Your rifle is from the Egyptian contract. Only the Argentine, Danish, Egyptian, and Spanish Civil Guard rolling block rifles are documented to have used a saber bayonet (which required the bayonet bar). The others all used a socket bayonet that engaged with the front sight base. We can rule out Argentine, because they had an octagonal barrel section near the receiver (yours is round). The barrel length on yours is also consistent with the Egyptian contract (Argies and Danes had 34 inch tubes). Spanish Civil Guard RB rifles are pretty scarce, so I feel safe that yours is Egyptian.

There were actually two production runs of the Egyptian contract. The initial batch was produced in 1869-70 (the Egyptian nomenclature designates the rolling block as the M1867). France saw war with the Prussians coming and was desperate for weapons, so arranged for Egypt to default on their contract so Remington could ship the rifles to France in time to serve in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71. Remington subsequently produced another run of Egyptian rifles, for Egypt, which was completed by about 1875. The bayonet used with the Egyptian rifles was a clone of the French M1866 Chassepot design. You can see pics of an Egyptian M1867 bayonet by clicking on this link to the Egypt Page of my bayonet site.

Egyptian rolling block rifles were imported to the USA in large quantities during the 1960s and sold very cheaply into the early 1980s. Most were in appalling condition, having seen a great deal of service. The Egyptian rifles probably saw more combat than any other rolling block, even more than the Spanish rifles.

 

Lemme know what you need Scot. Email anything you want posted to me over at JF and I'll get it up over here for you.

 

The rear sight is also consistent with the Egyptian contract. The rear sights on the Argie and Dane were both drastically different. The chambering should be .43 Egyptian.

It would be a good idea to have it checked out by someone who knows RB rifles, before shooting it. Perhaps someone who knows the mechanics will chime in re how to determine whether the breechblock and action are within spec for shooting. If you don't get a response here, you may also want to post on the gunboards, surplusrifle, or mausercentral forums. They get a bit more traffic and focus more on the old stuff.

Your rifle was probably purchased from Sarco in the 1970s, already modded into a lamp. They had a bunch of beater Egyptian RB's, back then, that weren't selling very well. That said, yours seems salvageable if the bore is OK. The quality of manufacture was quite high on these rifles. The action can likely be repaired if the breechblock is too loose in its present condition.

 

Them are nice socks where did you get them?