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Cleaning up my hard drive and tagging some photos for archive, I ran across some shots of a truly 'rare Behr' I picked up from Mark Reynolds about a year ago. As shown below, this is a DR from a small German shop that I tracked down as around from the early 1900s with the last reference in the 1930s, L.A. Frank. The rifle stands apart from most other DRs of the era as it uses the rare "Behr's Patent Action Express" Described as "8x57 JR, Nitro proof, 26" barrels with front ramp sight and one standing rear leaf, double claw mounts, barrels marked: " L.A. Frank , Stettin ", Krupp steel barrels, gold double triggers with the front also being set, 7 lbs. 12 oz., 13 7/8" LOP to pad, pistol grip with engraved steel grip cap, vacant gold oval, horn trigger guard, greener safety, checkered side plates, cheekpiece, splinter fore end with rosewood inlay, extractors, scalloped boxlock with vine engraving and stag on bottom, rare Bear's [Behr's, actually]Patent action similar to Kersten, cased in beautiful mohogany and leather case with accessories. A stunning rifle in wonderful condition." As usual, Mark's description was accurate as saw as soon as I opened up the shipment.

The action is fascinating to view. I had only seen it in a few pictures, and understand that it is rare in any of its three iterations. This particular rifle locked up tight and the action is quite smooth in usage. From the rounds I have put through it, the comments I have read about the action being very stable appear to be correct. The fit and finish of this particular rifle, is excellent, the wood much better and with quite a bit more color and figure than normal for the era and the area it originated from. The metal work is very neatly executed and the inletting on the wood exceptionally well done. I don't know if the rifle was a 'bring home' or built and sold for the US market (which would explain the extra care and selection of the wood) but I would put his rifle well up the food chain for time and place. Shoots well and appears regulated for 100 meters as it puts two out there over the iron sights just fine at that distance. I presume that this rifle was scoped for use on light game at 100 to 150 meters, and the original owner had the scope on it for that reason. Need to get around to finding some proper claw mounts for a scope, but no rush.

Just sharing something a little different than you see every day. Dave

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Time Wounds All Heels

Edited by dnovo (16/05/08 09:56 AM)

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