Said goodbye to an old friend today

Grizzly 45

In 1988 in the bad old days of depression Ireland .
We were broken into and I had my first ever shotgun that I bought when I was 16 stolen.It was a Winchester 1300XTR pump action.Beautiful to point and handle,and FAST as well due to the Winchester mechanisim.I really missed it's passing

Fortuneatly the fools didnt get the my other guns as they had been floor boarded and raftered. For the next 16 years I didnt think much about it,as I thought it was gone for good. Untill appx four years I got a call to come to my local divisional HQ to positively ID a shotgun that the gardai thought might be mine.

Duely did so.And was shown by one of the Gardai.A horribbly mutilated,rusted,chopped with a hacksaw to pistol proportions shotgun.Iasked if I could strip it down to confirm a repair job on the slide. Iwas allowed to do so.But it is funny as I did this,I could "feel" that this was my gun after all these years.I checked the slide repair,and could confirm 110% that this was mine. I was thanked by the Gardai and shown my way out.

Nothing much else happened over the four years.Until Sunday where my local Garda showed up with a notice of destruction for it. Iasked was it possible to view it one more time to see if a salvage job was possible.After all all it would theoretically need was a new stock,forend and barrel.
The Gardai kindly arranged this and today I went in for another look at the mess.During the time I had frantically searched for replacement bits for the gun.
Try getting Winchester parts anymore since they went belly up.:eek:
Anyways.I stripped the gun down again in the station,trying to see anything thru the filthy gunk and muck that was in it was hopeless. I tried dry firing it.A dull clunk told me all.The firing mechanism was too badly damaged,and water had corroded the aluminium reciver.It had been stored badly in motor grease and plastic bags near a river and water had damaged it all over. The grease had reacted with the wood and the water and stained and swollen it to a horrible mess.It was then I knew it had to be let go.

The Sgt was very sympathetic and curious as to why I wanted to rebuild this in the first place,even he said from his limited experiance of firearms,he felt that the gun in it's chopped state handled very well. It would handle 100% better if it was whole I told him.I signed it's paperwork for it's final rest.
Worst of all,as it was found by a tip off,the Gardai were unable to prosecute any scumbags for it's theft or possesion.I have my ideas who stole it,but without a chain of evidence they too will go unpunished.:mad:
Tomrrow it will suffer the executioners cut by con saw,and then end up in our local car scrap yard baler,with numerous others of simmilar and varied histories.It will suffer no more indignities,if an inanimate object can.

Ironically, I belive for some reason it will return to me unbeknownst in another gun I will buy one day.So till then goodbye old friend,we hunted many ducks,geese,crows piegons and pheasents,and Ahem!!! the odd deer..cough.We taught a bunch of my friends how to shoot with you,and
busted many clays as well. So thanks for the good times and the memories.They are inviolate and unstealable.
Another time and another place....

Our man in Havana

RIP. Your story moved me, I am upset after reading your story. That was very sad to read and you have my condolences.
It must have been very difficult to have to let go of a trusted friend. I am sorry for your loss.

bunny shooter

My sympathies. They are more than just iron and timber

meathstevie

It's being put out of it's misery. Bad to see a gun you cherished going that way though...

José Alaninho

That was one of the more eloquent gun related stories i've read.... Sorry for your loss.

chem

Sorry to hear about that:(

Would they not have deactivated it and allow you to keep it? Just for a keep sake.

Grizzly 45

Thanks guys...
Thought about it as a deact...Nah..kind of like getting the taxidermist to stuff:eek: a deceased loved one. If you know what I mean.

cavan shooter

Wow, great write up, I know how you feel,You can get very attached to a firearm. I have a Baikal IJ27E o/u in the gun safe, I got second hand when i was 16 I am now 38 and up until 2000 it was my staple game gun. The stock is a history of my youth, I take it out once a year now allways the 1st Nov. I won't part with it, it's probabally worth €100. I hope to pass it on to one of my lads.