Might be my new Deer Rifle

I am not into old guns, I happen to be in the gun shop where I have purchased most of my guns. A guy came in selling an old Marlin 1881 now this rifle is covered in rust and so dirty can`t tell if the stock is wood but the bore was clean, and it was complete. Luke he runs the gun part got it bought very reasonable. Then he tells me to buy this rifle and I am going no way no how. He said buy it and clean it up it will clean up nicely and I am still staying no. It has the short magazine and he said it is the first one he has ever seen. I am still saying no needless to say I walked out with a dirty rusty 1881 Marlin in 45-70 Government with a short magazine and a 4 digit serial number.

What did I get my self into???????? Got her home went on the Marlin sight found out she was built in 1884 and there was only 194 1881`s made with the short magazine which was good news but I still had a dirty rusty Marlin. Tore it apart do you know there is only about 12 parts in this whole gun. Have to hand it to Luke she cleaned up better then I would of ever dreamed. Put her back together and fired 10 rounds down the tube and was pretty impressed. Never owning or even shooting a 45-70 I did not know what to expect for recoil shooting 405 grain Remington Government loads recoil was less then my 30-06 and a little more then my 243.

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You done good!
Those 45/70’s were a work horse. I’m sure you’ll get your money back on it some day… WTG

Wow.

What you’ve gotten yourself into, is a very nice rifle and I suspect you got an exceptional deal. As you’ve discovered already, you have a pretty rare Marlin there.

Recoil is generally not a problem in rifles from this era. Despite the larger caliber, these chamberings do not have the charges nor do they produce the kinds of pressures that bring out the big recoil.

Rifles from the transitional period show that there are a lot of different ways to get a job done. While the focus today seems to be exclusively on hyper-fast, ultra-flat, and bigger=better, your rifle will, IMO, show the difference between what the trends say we should want versus what we need.

A big caliber, heavy bullet, driven at modest speeds still gets the job done today, just like it did in the last century and the century before that.

An excellent find.

Grouse

Nice looking. When I stumble into guns like that all I can think of is “Cabin decoration”!!!

Very nice!!!!

Looks sweet!

suzuki wrote:

Nice looking. When I stumble into guns like that all I can think of is “Cabin decoration”!!!

When my nephew gets his Bear tag he wants to use this Marlin I have no problem with that I hope she doe not become a safe queen. You can tell by the scars she has on her that she was used as intended probably feeding someones family. If I deer hunt here at home this is the rifle I will probably use since most shots will be 100 yards or less. Hopefully maybe I can carry on the tradition to use the rifle as intended.

Tom P. wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>suzuki wrote:</div>
Nice looking. When I stumble into guns like that all I can think of is “Cabin decoration”!!!

When my nephew gets his Bear tag he wants to use this Marlin I have no problem with that I hope she doe not become a safe queen. You can tell by the scars she has on her that she was used as intended probably feeding someones family. If I deer hunt here at home this is the rifle I will probably use since most shots will be 100 yards or less. Hopefully maybe I can carry on the tradition to use the rifle as intended.

IMO, it’s a shame for any rifle (that is safely capable of being used), to be relegated to the status of wall decoration. Too much can be learned from them.

In order to understand where we are, you have to understand where we’ve been. There was a time when the ability to bag any game you saw at 500 yards depended on your skill–specifically how skilled you were at getting about 350 yards closer.

In other words, hunting skills mattered then and matter still now.

If you read Saxton Pope’s classic book about archery, what he discovered when he encountered and hunted with Ishi, the last Yahi Indian (who was essentially a stone age hunter) was that what Ishi was not a better shot than Pope was with the bow. What separated the two men in the field was simply that Ishi was a vastly better HUNTER than was Pope.

“We shot rabbits, quail and squirrels with the bow. His methods here were not so well defined as in the approach to larger game, but I was struck from the first by his noiseless step, his slow movement, his use of cover.”

I’ll start my sons on iron sights and old guns because I think the importance of hunting skills are more easily to understood when you have to consider the limitations of your weapon in much more stark terms.

Grouse

Can you imagine the stories this gun could tell!!

Breath easy guys. The old 12-guage single shot H&R on the wall is the cabin vermin gun. Crows and such. The old pistol on the wall has ammo and sees use at the range about once a year. I don’t own a gun that isn’t capable of firing and that doesn’t get fired once in a while.

suzuki wrote:

Breath easy guys. The old 12-guage single shot H&R on the wall is the cabin vermin gun. Crows and such. The old pistol on the wall has ammo and sees use at the range about once a year. I don’t own a gun that isn’t capable of firing and that doesn’t get fired once in a while.

Good! I’m going to blast some clays with Great-Grandpa’s 16-gauge this weekend!

I shoot my great grandfather’s Winchester 1897 (purchased in 1903) almost every year. My great grandfather Edward (which was always pronounced “Ed-vard”) paid a stunning sum for the shotgun in 1903, its price rivaled that of much higher grade doubles of the era.

It’s a tremendous shotgun, actually. It takes some time to appreciate what a mechanical marvel this shotgun was considering what came before.

I’ve even carried it for pheasants occasionally and I have to get over the relative weirdness of having to pull back the hammer, of course. The pump action is also a little different, if only because it sounds different with the click-chunk-clunk three-phase action. It’s a very tight full choke, so it absolutely stones pheasants. When I manage to hit them.

My father only retired it when steel shot became mandatory for waterfowl back in the 1970s. Much to my regret, I only met Great Grandpa on one occasion, which I do not remember, but there is a photo of he and I shaking hands, I was 2 years old.

Grouse

I would not think twice about using that Marlin for any game in North America. You found a terrific deal. The 45/70 is a great deer black bear round

Mwal