Hi prairie ghost

Yes, lots to ponder.

I've started cleaning the rifle and the wood looks to me like American walnut of about the grade you might see on a Winchester 54 or an NRA sporter. It is fairly straight grained with good color but not a lot of figure. However, Griffin did build stocks with ordinary American walnut during his 'Bretton Hall' period from about 1910-23 before the founding of G&H. (He also built stocks of Circassian walnut during that period and was known for his supply of good wood.) G&H too built rifles with ordinary wood, especially during the Depression years. They built Springfields with cross bolts as well.

It's hard to tell much about the checkering because the stock has way too much finish on it and it has blistered or melted down into the checkering. It’s so dark that it looks almost like black paint. The checkering pattern though is identical to the photo of Griffin's 'early' style on page 96 of Petrov's book (vol 2) except that it is not as fine lined - possibly owing to the American walnut v Circassian. The checkering on the pistol grip extends almost to the inletting – another Griffin feature mentioned by Petrov.

The thing that I find most convincing though is the shape of the stock. I have a few of the early G&H rifles and Petrov advised me they were stocked by Griffin. The buttstocks of those rifles are identical to this one and you can see the same shape on many G&H rifles from that period on everything from magnum Mausers to Winchester 52s. There is one for sale now on Gunbroker, a Mauser in .375 H&H (serial no 20).

The things I find less convincing are – why would he build a blunderbuss like this thing? I don’t know of any other full stocked rifles that he built. I don’t think it could have started with an Armory stock, so why the cross bolts. Why is the barrel flat ahead of the receiver polished bright and lacking any sight? The barrel is 23.5” and the LOP 14.5” so it’s a big stick to wave around and the front sight (if original) is great for hanging on brush. Is it even a sporting rifle?

Probably never going to have an answer to these questions.