winchester a5?
winchester a5?
Looks to be either a Winchester A5 or a Lyman 5A .
Chris
It is a modified Winchester A5 from WWI.
jt
Very cool.
They were made from 1909-ish ( IIRC ) to 1928-ish , so , yes , a WW1 re-run like most of the 1903s the marines hit the beach on the canal with.
Chris
The scope is from a set modified by Winchester in 1917 for sniper use by the USMC in WWI. They are quite unique, and only about 1,000 were made and issued to Marines of the 13th Regiment with approximately 125 of them issued to the 5th and 6th Regiments before they went to France. They were mothballed after the war except for a few that continued in use in the Banana Wars. Although the scopes still exist, the original sales rifles to which they were attached are as rare as hen's teeth. The original 125 represent the rarest of all the 1903's. Although faked on a grand scale, the fakers (and the buyers) seem to have no knowledge of what an original looked like (distinct identifying marks).
jt
There was an old Marine who stated he was told to strip the rifles down to their barreled receivers. He had difficulty removing the bases, and crushed those receivers. I cannot attest to the accuracy of his story, but I suspect most were decommissioned in some way. Of the original 1200 rifles, very few have surfaced to date. Currently, the fakes seem to significantly outnumber the remaining originals.
jt
great information on a subj soon to go with our WWII veterans, thank you to all that contributed to this
thought it was a cool photo, and looks like it was not staged