Hello,

Recently i enherited a pistol from my grandfather. sadly i have no idea about it and would like to find out more.

I have seached the markings on the internet and nothing has come up so any suggestions are welcome

The gun is a flint lock pistol with a brass finger guard and base and is made of a dark wood.

On the section with the flint lock either 'LOWES' or 'IOWES' is engraved and there is also a royal arms with GR engraved underneath.

there is a brass plate on the top of the handel which i think has the leters 'JR' engraved on it.

I will attatch a picture with all the different angles sorry for the bad graphics!! (i took them with a webcam)

Hope you can help, Thanks

---

 Attachment: 20.64 KB

sorry about the blur

 Attachment: 21.62 KB

sorry about the blur

 Attachment: 19.28 KB

sorry about the blur

 Attachment: 19.01 KB

sorry about the blur

 Attachment: 19.46 KB

sorry about the blur

 Attachment: 22.15 KB

sorry about the blur this is the Royal arms and GR

 Attachment: 24.8 KB

sorry about the blur this is the lower / iower

I don't know much about firearms, but I would guess that it says "TOWER", as in the Tower of London. GR is for Georgius Rex--King George (the Third in this case).

Jonathan

If the engraving on the lock was "Tower" it should be pretty obvious. I am not aware of any contractor named Lowe who made British dragoon pistols in the 18th c. although there were many of them and I could certainly be wrong. The elimination of dates and contractor's names on lock plates began about the mid 1760s which would place this pistol later than that, if the lock is engraved with "Tower" and undated. If it is a contractor's name it predates that period.

That it is British there is no doubt, since it does have the Crown and GR engraved on the lock plate. It appears to be a dragoon pistol. The jaw screw looks a little strange, more Spanish than English, but the photos are too blurry to be able to tell much.

Also, and again clearer photos would help, that is one bright, shiny pistol for a 200 + year old firearm! So, either it has been cleaned, and possibly had much of its collector's value removed in the process, or it is not antique. If you can, please post some better photos.

Recommendations of a gun buff: take these pictures, and put them up over on http://www.thehighroad.org under the Blackpowder and Firearms Research forums. Someone there will probably be able to tell you exactly what it is.

Edit to add: It may well have come from Spain, if it is a replica. Spain took a huge role in the early blackpowder resurgence of the 70's; many of the replicas we have even today are made in Spain.