Erfurt Gewehr 1871

Warrior1354

ax - hole
Well me and Marc ran into some luck last month with a small auction house. He purchased that wonderful, and lovely 1918 Amberg Gewehr 98. And me this wonderful, and very interesting 1871 Erfurt Gewehr. For year's I kind of wanted one. Mainly to go with my Erfurt rifle collection. But most were in very poor condition, or complete mixmatchers. This one for once was a complete rifle, had decent stock proofs, looked matching from the auction photos, and had the cool steel replacement trigger guard. It was missing a few parts though. The front barrel band screw, extractor, and cleaning rod. But I had a spare 1871 cleaning rod in my parts bin. Thought it would come in handy when I bought it years ago. Now I'm glad I did!

So far the rifle only has a few mismatched parts: the bolt head, bolt head washer, and a few smaller components. But for the most part this 1871 rifle is completely original. Took the bolt apart as well, and found the firing pin clipped. So that tells me this rifle was brought into the country after the great war was over. I'm thinking one of those war bond rifles. Might explain the mismatched bolt head. Most likely that part was tossed when the firing pin was clipped. The steel trigger guard is a neat piece, but it's painted with some type of older black paint. I could remove it, but going to leave it as it is for now. Could have been done in the field, and don't want to altered something without more info. Only bad I would say is the crack in the stock on the left side. Looks like the rifle was hit by something or tossed in pile of weapons. Still I'm quite happy, and how picky can you be with 1871 Erfurt rifles!
 

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Inside of receiver area, barrel markings, and trigger sear.
 

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Stock, stock barrel bands, cleaning rod, and buttplate
 

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Bolt, and bolt components:
 

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Steel trigger guard and rear sight:
 

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Now here's something I wanted to mention. I wonder if anyone else noticed this on their 1871 Mausers? Looks like some of these parts were assembled with marked lot numbers. Check it out.
 

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The steel trigger guard is a neat piece, but it's painted with some type of older black paint. I could remove it, but going to leave it as it is for now. Could have been done in the field, and don't want to altered something without more info.
DONT touch the paint!! It's 100% original it was an expedient/cheap rust protection measure.

I have four of these in my collection with steel trigger guards (Erfurt, Spandau, Danzig and Steyr) and all have the exact same paint; the one in storz also has it. I am 99.9% certain that was the standard operating procedure with these. These triggerguard replacements were done at a depot level and only by the Prussians. I don't believe any evidence has emerged of Bavarian rifles going through this and I have yet to see a legit Amberg with one.

Good snag on this one, it's definitely a nice example.
 
That's what I figured Chris it looked old and it looked original. From me looking at it. I could clearly tell it wasn't done by Bubba. You know me I don't ever alter something without getting more information first. We as collectors know it's only original once.
 
Very nice Erfurt. It’s impressive the number of individual stamps on these rifles. Looks like it still has quite a bit of grease on it.
 
Still waiting on a 71 to pop up at a small local auction house.

Since Covid killed the last few remaining.... that probably won't happen anytime soon. Fewer to attend and keep track of I guess.

Nice find, and interesting information on the painted trigger guard.

I would have thought paints in general would be a uncommon/expensive choice in the 1870's, with most being expensive small batch/local type work? Maybe its more of a tar/sealer type application? Just thinking aloud, I am certainly not an expert on the history of paint!
 
I would have thought paints in general would be a uncommon/expensive choice in the 1870's, with most being expensive small batch/local type work? Maybe its more of a tar/sealer type application? Just thinking aloud, I am certainly not an expert on the history of paint!
So the paint was actually unique to the steel WWI era replacement triggerguards.

The original issue would be brass. The Prussians just thought the brass was too valuable in wartime so a large number were replaced during WWI so the brass guards could be recycled into casings for shells.
 
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So the paint was actually unique to the steel WWI era replacement triggerguards.

The original issue would be brass. The Prussians just thought the brass was too valuable in wartime so a large number were replaced during WWII so the brass guards could be recycled into casings for shells.
Ah! Makes sense.
 
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