I've got this old Remington rolling block that I bought a real long time ago from, as I recall, Sarco, to use as a wall hanger. It's worked well in that capacity until last week when a friend gave me a couple of coffee cans full of ammo. Being the careful kind of shooter that I am (well, when dealing with green ammo and 140 years old guns anyway), I tried to verify what I had here. The gun has been polished so many times that the markings are all but gone, the front sight is down to a nubbin, the forearm iscracked and split and at least an eigth of inch has been sanded off. These are all normal, from what I can gather. But--- the bore is bright and shiny, the extractor is there, and everything seems to work.
The ammo, however, ranges from looks pretty good to green to corroded. That's the good news. The bad news is that it's not 43 Egyptian but measures out to be 43 Spanish, a different cartridge entirely, so that's the end of that plan. Or so I thought, which brings me to the point. Just out of curiousity, i tried one in the chamber to seewhat it would take to resize a couple. Lo an behold, it slid right in with no slop at all. So I rammed a bullet down the barrel and it took the rifling nicely.
So-- is anyone aware of these guns being rechambered at some time in the past? What's going on here? Are the books wrong on actual caliber or what?
If all works out, then I'll seeabout restoring it and trying some reduced loads and go from there- should be fun!
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