Needless to say, nothing would please me more than to know I have an original barrel on that rifle. So I will assume that it is!
I checked my other no.1s, results were:
-1939 bsa (Egyptian use) - no barrel date at all, fonts match but barrel had obvious grind marks under the number, so I suspect renumber, plus has no letter prefix. Btw, has the bsa commercial (3 stacked rifles) stamp on the knox form.
- 1943 bsa dispersal- barrel dated 42. Fonts exact match.
-RFI .308- no barrel date, fonts match.
-1941 Lithgowicon- very faint stamping, but seems to be 6 42. Obvious rebuilt gun, butt dated 53.
-1918 Lithgow- barrel dated 1918. Matching font.
-1940 BSA dispersal- no barrel date, matching font.
So no apparent pattern that I can discern. Still learning!