Rem-Lee M1899 sporter in 7.65: Ever seen one?

[GLMartin]

Greetings, and thank you.

Yes, s/n is in the correct range for a factory sporter:



I *think* this puts the year of manufacture as 1904. The caliber designation is in same the location as you describe on your Rem-Lee:



Do you have a copy of "The Remington-Lee Rifle" by Gene Myszkowski? It was published in 1994, and in it he mentions only five .303 British sporters turning up in his survey (all located in Australia and New Zealand), and "the .35 Winchester and 7.65 Belgian Mauser have not appeared." I have scoured the internet looking for the slightest mention of another 7.65 sporter in existence besides mine, to no avail.

Here's are some photos of my mag, including five rounds of my dad's old ammo:









You may already know this, but there's an exploded view of both the Rem-Lee M1885 and M1899, plus disassembly procedures for each rifle, in the April 1980 edition of American Rifleman. I picked up a mint copy off of eBay a couple weeks ago.



I hope you post up some photos of your sporter.

Best,
Garrison

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[RCEMERalf]

Thanks again for the great photos. That "N.Y.S. S.A. F. " marking is of considerable interest. New York State ........?????. 757 looks like a rack number or issue number for some specific organization. It is impossible to imagine they had 757 1899s in 7.65. Yes, I have the book. I will get some pictures up in the next day or two. My serial no. is 75556. Metal on mine has been reblued and that lovely metal butt plate has been replaced by a rubber Pachmayr pad. 303 is on the underside of the barrel. The forward 3 starts 3 inches forward of the forend.

[GLMartin]

Here's a better look at the top of my receiver:



My s/n is F757XX, and according to Gene M. it's not known the significance of the letter "F" in front of the s/n; about 75% of the observed s/n's above 75650 have it, he says, but there are no discernible differences between a sporter with or without the letter preceding the s/n.

Based on your s/n your sporter *should* be an '03 model, which would mesh nicely with Gene's research that indicates Remington introduced the .303 British caliber to the M1899 sporter lineup in '02.

Best,
Garrison