Probable Service information about a Savage No 4 MK 1*

G'Day to all the No 4 tragics in Milsurps space...

It would be interesting to hear your knowledge and speculation (based on knowledge) of the Service Life of this rifle...

Attachment 105367 Attachment 105369Attachment 105368

Rather than rely on the variable dimensions and screen quality you're using, I'll point out the bleeding obvious: there's no "US Property" stamped on the top of the LHS receiver wall. Add to that, a 'flaming bomb' US Ordnance acceptance mark on the front of the LHS receiver.

Now this is a very late, high numbered No 4, that would have been made in the last 4-5 months of manufacture (my guess, based on number).

Now what do you know, or surmise, about this rifle's history?

Not having the 'US Property' means it never was sent to the UK nor NZ, where many ended up as part of the US supply contracts for the Allied forces. It does have later life BNP markings, but that's not pertinent to the initial story, and more on that later...

I've not found much detail on these non Lend-Lease rifles in references, so am keen to hear some more to help my research.

What can you add to the story? ;)

Since all Savage No.4’s were marked with the “US Property”, my uneducated guess would be that it’s been removed and refinished. I’ve seen it before but could be wrong. Is it still Dulite blue, phosphate, or phosphate and paint finish?

It's been refinished. Obviously after the US Property marking was removed.

The proof is the purple on the side of the receiver from the induction hardening for the bolt locking recess.

Again, only my tuppence worth, but I'm inclined to agree with Brian & Lee Enfield. I have never seen nor heard of an authentic Savage rifle without the US Property mark. The few I've seen or heard of had had it removed. I must say, if this is the case, someone has done it very neatly & the refinishing has been done quite competently, but as LE mentioned, when refinished the discolouration in the steel where it was induction hardened tends to show through. We might be imagining it, but it does rather look like a subtle but distinct colour variation on the body side wall at this point.

Even if the mark has been removed for some reason, it is a very nice looking rifle.

Now we've all put our foot in it are you going to spring a surprise on us?!?;)

Roger and all,

Very good comments and direction, thank you.

I believe all the views are converging, somewhat. And your views seem to support the hypothesis I had to begin with.

Here's some more photos of the said rifle. I believe they might assist in determining the likely history.

Attachment 105372Attachment 105373Attachment 105374Attachment 105375Attachment 105376Attachment 105377

One of the photos might be familiar to some of you, as I posted it last week, seeking some views on what the mark on the receiver ring were.

What we have here is a Savage No 4 Mk 1* rifle, which most likely was sent to the UK during WWII as a Lend Lease rifle. At some stage, sold out of service and bought by a Civilian Small Arms Club or individual shooter.

The rifle was then modified. And fairly extensively, too. I believe the US Property stamping was neatly ground and polished off prior to the refitting of a .22LR barrel. The bolt was modified like the Parker Hale No 9 rifle design. The muzzle of the rifle tends to suggest that PH did not do the lining of the barrel, as there is no PH or Parkerifling stamp to the muzzle and it is not crowned at all. Not PH-like at all, a keen observer would say. The furniture shows British manufacturer marking JC N22, for John Curtis. Not a Savage item.

The Parkerising and painting were likely to have been refinished to a light Parkerised coating all over.

The rifle was not in Service as a No 9, as there is no indication of marking by stamping or electro-pencil (engraving) that is the hallmark of PH converted No 9s.

That the rifle was reconfigured in England is suggested by the BNP marking on the LHS of the receiver ring.

Attachment 105378

But...

We're really none the wiser about the stamping on the crown of the receiver ring. Some think it might be 'Israeli,' while others think it's a mis-struck Canadian Land Service C-Arrow. I don't buy either suggestion.

My guess is that the mark is of a now defunct British gunsmith, and in particular, the one who carried out the conversion to .22LR.

The other stamping (not engraving) that no one's addressed convincingly (actually, at all!) is the 'flaming bomb' US Ordnance marking on the LHS of the receiver wall.

I'm in two minds about that one, and one plausible suggestion was it is a fake that was included at the time of conversion.

Happy to also consider the possibility that this rifle was not stamped US Property and was accepted by the US Ordnance inspector for US ownership.

I mean no disrespect to any more senior and widely versed members, but I don't accept the possibility being ruled out on the basis of "...I've never seen one..." I'll make the well understood quote once again for clarity of my open mindedness on this possibility: On matters Lee Enfield, one must remove two words from their vocabulary - 'always' and 'never.' I'm sure Ian Skennerton would be most sympathetic to that comment.

So... There we have the situation as best we know it.

I have no intention of commencing an argument, upsetting anyone, or creating discomfort by advancing an idea or view. I'm just trying to explore probable history of this rifle, based on reasonable and rational logic and deduction.

Please chime in with your knowledge to help build a better picture.

Would really love to know if some one has chanced upon that receiver ring stamping before!

What you have is, effectively then, a N/No9 rifle, but probably converted by a civvy gunsmith here in the UK to that spec. Interestingly, back in the 90's I bought from a school five such converted No4's. Barrels were just as yours, & they bore no official N/No9 nomenclature. Neither were the muzzles crowned & Parker-Rifled stamped. Very much like yours indeed, apart from the fact that the butt sockets on mine had been scrubbed, & they had all been renumbered, presumably when converted. No odd hieroglyphics on the receiver rings either though, I'm afraid, so if your hypothesis is correct, probably not the same gunsmith!

Re the US flaming bomb stamping; are you making the point that it is unusual by being stamped on the rifle at all, or just where exactly on the rifle it is located? I have always thought it was, broadly speaking, a US equivalent to the Enfield examiner's mark, indicating acceptance/ownership by said government. The Savage No4's were owned by the US but then provided to Britain & Commonwealth forces, but IIRC the US retained title to them. I just went into the gun room & checked three Savage No4 T's. All of them bear the flaming bomb, though all are marked on the butt socket, not on the body side wall. So, what I'm saying, I suppose, is that I don't think bearing the flaming bomb is anything unusual, unless you feel it may be because of where on the rifle it is marked. I could well be wrong on this as I don't see a lot of non-sniper No4's, so shoot me down in flames if I am.

I don't know if this helps any, but it's nice way of spending a Sunday afternoon! And don't worry, I agree totally with your comments of 'never say always & never say never' with Lee Enfields. I simply meant that I've not seen heard of or owned a Savage rifle that left the factory without the US Property stamp.....to date.

ATB

Looks to me like a double strike on the flaming bomb striker must have indeed had a heavy night!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Roger Payne

Re the US flaming bomb stamping; are you making the point that it is unusual by being stamped on the rifle at all, or just where exactly on the rifle it is located? I have always thought it was, broadly speaking, a US equivalent to the Enfield examiner's mark, indicating acceptance/ownership by said government. The Savage No4's were owned by the US but then provided to Britain & Commonwealth forces, but IIRC the US retained title to them. I just went into the gun room & checked three Savage No4 T's. All of them bear the flaming bomb, though all are marked on the butt socket, not on the body side wall. So, what I'm saying, I suppose, is that I don't think bearing the flaming bomb is anything unusual, unless you feel it may be because of where on the rifle it is marked. I could well be wrong on this as I don't see a lot of non-sniper No4's, so shoot me down in flames if I am.


ATB

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Flaming Bomb on the sidewall is not unusual I have seen several and this is one I owned (some years ago)

"...It does have later life BNP markings..." That means it was sold through England/Britain at some time.
"...believe the US Property stamping was neatly ground and polished off..." I don't think so. Just a WHAG, but the U.S. Property stamp is fairly deeply stamped. Removing it would show. If you have or have access to another No. 4, you could measure the thickness of the receiver.
There any more Savage stamps on it? There are usually all over the rifles.
"...the one who carried out the conversion to .22LR..." You think it's cobbled it together out of parts?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Roger Payne

What you have is, effectively then, a N/No9 rifle, but probably converted by a civvy gunsmith here in the UK to that spec. Interestingly, back in the 90's I bought from a school five such converted No4's. Barrels were just as yours, & they bore no official N/No9 nomenclature. Neither were the muzzles crowned & Parker-Rifled stamped. Very much like yours indeed, apart from the fact that the butt sockets on mine had been scrubbed, & they had all been renumbered, presumably when converted. No odd hieroglyphics on the receiver rings either though, I'm afraid, so if your hypothesis is correct, probably not the same gunsmith!

Re the US flaming bomb stamping; are you making the point that it is unusual by being stamped on the rifle at all, or just where exactly on the rifle it is located? I have always thought it was, broadly speaking, a US equivalent to the Enfield examiner's mark, indicating acceptance/ownership by said government. The Savage No4's were owned by the US but then provided to Britain & Commonwealth forces, but IIRC the US retained title to them. I just went into the gun room & checked three Savage No4 T's. All of them bear the flaming bomb, though all are marked on the butt socket, not on the body side wall. So, what I'm saying, I suppose, is that I don't think bearing the flaming bomb is anything unusual, unless you feel it may be because of where on the rifle it is marked. I could well be wrong on this as I don't see a lot of non-sniper No4's, so shoot me down in flames if I am.

I don't know if this helps any, but it's nice way of spending a Sunday afternoon! And don't worry, I agree totally with your comments of 'never say always & never say never' with Lee Enfields. I simply meant that I've not seen heard of or owned a Savage rifle that left the factory without the US Property stamp.....to date.

ATB

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I would concur with Roger,the flaming bomb inspection marks were applied at the factory, as the rifles were paid for and contracted by the US Government, so they required the same legally defined and specified inspection and acceptance process at the factory as the Thompsons they also produced.

I'll happily chime in and say that I stick to my observation that the US Property stamp has been removed. The US ordnance bomb acceptance stamp was also standard. I've seen a few in 30 years from new in the carton to shagged out junk. They were all marked starting at 0C1. It's just a bog standard Savage that's been neatly reworked IMHO. The original Dulite blue was not too durable so almost all that saw service with the UK and Commonwealth got refinished post WWII providing they saw substantial usage. I have one here now that was a "lunch box" variant with no serial numbers and in minty condition that also sports the US Property stamp. I'd guess that the bodies were marked before they were breeched up and finished. An interesting observation is that the bodies were sandblasted first so many think they are Parkerized as the Dulite takes on a greyish color when applied on a sandblasted surface. The finish on the original .303 Savage barrels has a very light polish and if you take a look at the barreled body of an original rifle there is a distinct contrast in the colors between the body and barrel but it's the same Dulite blue finish. Having examined hundreds, I'm also looking for the walnut stocked variants which we've been told many times do exist but they don't! All of the Savage woodwork I've examined over many years is good old birch.

Excellent, we're getting somewhere!

Thanks for the comparison Roger, that's very helpful. I do feel that this rifle was reconfigured in the UK post War at some stage, certainly for civilian purposes. Might be an individual, might be a club, might be a school, no idea.

I'll accept the flaming bomb, was not contentious, and AdE's comment is bang on the mark, thanks Alan.

The confusing things still is the absence of the US Property stamp. Was this ground off, was it such a good and careful job, was the stamping so light or crude in the first place that it made it easy for the smith to do some touch up work to make the rifle gleam? Who knows?

Great input, thanks folks, appreciate the effort. Let's hope some one will wander by and recognise the receiver ring stamp mark.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 22SqnRAE

Was this ground off, was it such a good and careful job, was the stamping so light or crude in the first place that it made it easy for the smith to do some touch up work to make the rifle gleam? Who knows?

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Well, you can see the file marks at the front of the receiver on that top flat...so it's just a job not a "Good and careful" job... It was just filed off.

There’s nothing confusing about it. It’s a simple task to file it off and refinish. I doubt it was done by a military Armourer as it wasn’t allowed because the rifles weren’t UK property. That being said, I’ve seen a few with it filed off over the years. Whoever converted it and refinished it is most likely the culprit.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by browningautorifle

Well, you can see the file marks at the front of the receiver on that top flat...so it's just a job not a "Good and careful" job... It was just filed off.

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Jim,

Not being the owner of the rifle, I currently don't have better photos of the portion of the receiver. Of my 3 Savages, each has pretty rough striations perpendicular to the side face of the receiver, whereas this one doesn't.

I'm not following your pointed response to my choice of words. What was your intention that I missed? :surrender: I don't get my message absolutely spot on 100% of the time, does anyone? I'll agree there's file marks, so it's not a perfect finish. We're in agreement. :thup:

I'd concede, after several views of this photo against one of my Savages, that the stamp has been ground off. (With, or without care, so as not to offend anyone's expectation of workmanship. ;))

Attachment 105401

In the photo above, the angled top surface intersecting the radiused vertical face clearly has a distinct misalignment at the intended tangent. So, on that basis, all those who have suggested the mark has been ground off, I reckon you have evidence right there.

Brian's information about the lighter grey colouration of the grit blasted surface seems to be supported by the finish we see now. That's really good insightful stuff, thank Brian.

Funny how with some reflection and some better information, the very strongly held opinions of some folks can be realistically challenged. I'll not delve into that back story, suffice to say I believe the view that people have presented in this discussion are quite well evidenced and reach a very similar conclusion as to the actions leading to the rifle in its current form.

The missing bit is: 'by whom?'

There is a proofmark on top of the Chamber that I believe is the same as one seen on a supposedly ex-Israeli BHP being discussed on another forum. I suspect that the lend lease stamp would have been removed by the Israelis since they would have received/purchased the rifle from another source obviously.

I agree with 22SqnRAE - I think the history of this rifle has been reasonably pieced together from careful observation of it. As mentioned, the only outstanding question being who effected the .22 conversion. I know quite a lot of both SMLE's & No4's were converted by PH & Alfred J Parker, as well as by (for the want of a better expression) 'jobbing gunsmiths' so it may be that we will never know for sure. The mark on the top of the receiver ring may be a clue, or may not; again we may never know, but hat's off for the effort in trying!

As an aside Brian, I agree with you about the US Property marking not being removed in military service (or at least, not in Commonwealth military service) as the Savage rifles legally didn't belong to the UK. However, I have often wondered about how the Savage 4T conversions got through. If the same rationale applies, they weren't ours to convert/bugger about with, but we did, all the same. Perhaps it just didn't occur to anyone that we shouldn't be 'tampering' with US government property......

Paul has it in one. I had a brainstorm, (a rare occurrence here!), this morning and went to my storage area to check a box of surplus of chamber sticks I have. Low and behold, they are Israeli and all marked with the same marking that's stamped on the breech of the OP's rifle. That answers that question.

I think the same answer applies that I use for many unanswered questions Roger. There was a war on and many formalities were overlooked in the name of expediency, practicality and probably experimentation. The strange thing is that I've seen more "less telescope" Savage No.4T conversions than ones that were legitimately scoped and issued so maybe they were leery about putting them out in the hands of the troops in quantity. It appears most were sat in a rack someplace for the duration and they certainly aren't that rare. Their use or lack of may be for the reasons you state. It's hard to say. Peter Laidler told me that he'd never seen a Savage No.4Mk.1*T while working them in service. His book relays that and he admitted it needed to be rewritten with all of the new information gleaned in the past 20+ years. I think H&H were probably happy to receive rifles from everyone initially and as we know, the ROF Maltby, ROF Fazakerley and Savages more or less fell by the wayside because they wanted bodies that were consistently the same. BSA were the only ones accepted after the early years of diverse conversions, ('41-'42). It must have been quite a learning experience when they found that jigging up all of the different bodies with their respective machining differences became a production nightmare. It had to be simplified to meet the high quantities of rifles needed for the war effort and that's why BSA ruled the roost! Just my personal observation but I think it makes sense.

So, it would appear to be an Israeli mark, you reckon? An acceptance mark perhaps?

Yes, Bri, re the 4T's we're on the same page. Lots of the Savage conversions are indeed less Telescope rifles as you say, & I suspect more Mk1* rifles than Mk1's. However some Mk1*'s were definitely scoped up - there were several in the big batch we bought twenty years ago - I still own one of them. Peter often said that you stick your neck out when writing a book or a magazine article because there's always someone who has that extra snippet of information that you didn't know. I did tell him when he was preparing the book that I thought there were a few Savage Mk1*'s converted, but I think he thought I'd been taken in by fakes. I don't mind about that - they were not well known then, but once the book appeared more collectors provided him with similar observations, & so these rifles became accepted. Just shows why popular books run to more than one edition!

BAyonet Collection Presentation

I am sure that is an Israeli property marking.

https://www.milsurps.com/attachment....7&d=1581250776

I think between allies that working on kit like the 4T there would be certain leeways as it would seem stupid and counter productive to put the troops at risk by not getting the weapons to them to do the business because of a US Property stamping they were in the fight together for a common cause to defeat Germany AGAIN! Sort the rest out later still this has been a real interesting thread. 22Sqdn good luck with finding out "Who dunnit" maybe they left a clue in the butt trap!!!!!!!!:lol::madsmile:

Definitely Israel.

Just my 2 cents but Savage would not have been paid if the rifle was not accepted for US service. The mark was removed in an FTR over the last roughly 75 plus years time....

As already discussed, it's more likely it was removed by the Israelis or a civilian gunsmith, not during FTR in British/Commonwealth service.

What about the 0C1 Savage sniper? Il has the "US Property" filed. (See post # 17):

https://www.milsurps.com/showthread.php?t=24683&page=2

0C1 was converted to a No.4Mk.1T and has the US Property stamp. It hasn’t been filed out but is mostly obscured under the front telescope pad.

If Lend Lease came in in February 1941 you might reasonably expect all Savage rifles should bear the US Property stamp, as No4 production didn't get under way until later in 1941. Granted there is always the possibility of the odd 'lunch box' receiver escaping the factory unmarked, but I am totally with Brian in doubting that there were ever any batches of rifles purposely left unstamped.

I did not explain myself: I didn't mean to say that the "US Property" dodn't exist on the 0C1 Savage, but that the "US Property" was scrubbed down.

Breakeyp (post # 17) says: "Even though the former owner (butcher) went happy with a hand grinder, there are traces of the PROPERTY "Y" still visible next to the front mount base."

Then the "US Property" was scrubbed down before installing the front pad (in my opinion).

Where was the "US Property" scrubbed down? Outside the Commonwealth? I am doubtful.

The US Property mark, (what is still exposed), on Savage No.4's converted to No.4T by Holland and Holland is not ground off or even dressed up. I just looked at two I have here, one a Mk.1 and the other a Mk.1*. Both are legit H&H sniper conversions and both have very legible US Property stamps with only the exposed bit to see because the rest is under the front telescope pad. If the US Property stamp is gone from a Savage No.4, be it early or late production. It WAS removed outside of British and Commonwealth service. It's just a fact. I'm at a loss as to why folks are convinced it isn't so. All that being said, I think this horse is beaten to death and starting to decay!

It's my fault Brian. This is 22SqnRAE's thread. I just mentioned the Savage 4T conversions 'en passant' to illustrate a point, but it's become like the proverbial snowball rolling down hill!

This has been a very interesting thread, slap me in the side of the head if I throw another curve at it. Could this rifle been put together from unfinished parts shipped up to Longbranch after Savage ceased building the rifles. Parts that may not have been finished, but slapped together into rifles and then sold off after the war to Israel, and possibly converted over there. Just a thought, you chaps are more expert than I.

No it ain't Rog. It was just another observation on these fascinating old rifles. It's endless.

---------- Post added at 11:17 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:11 PM ----------

The big question is who converted the service rifle to a .22? I don't know that it was done in Israel although I've seen other Israeli military .22 conversions done on Mauser 98k rifles so anything's possible. It looks like a very nice job of it. I hope he gets it out and enjoys it.