Questions on two stamps on R.I. M1903

[p246]

I should be picking up several of the other Rock Islands this week. I know there is a 1905 1909 and two 1912 dated ones in the liter. The first thing I was going to look at was the area under the bolt handle to see what they looked like.

[cplnorton]

CPL N:

Sure you're not refering to shooters taking rasps and files and carving wood out of the stock where the barrel touches the wood, so as to make the barrel "free-floating"? Leaving only the trigger guard screws holding the receiver in the stock, and the lower and upper bands holding the hanguard in place.

They 100% for sure did do that. The two stocks I pictured earlier in this thread have that done interally as well. But they are stocks that are from former Marine team rifles. But that wasn't the only thing they did to them, the Marines really worked them over. These mods weren't done on the normal rebuilds.

See it almost seems that star has some association with either Marine team rifles, or Special Target rifles that were former team rifles rebuilt by Philly for use in Marine Divisional Matches. Or rifles that were built from parts leftover by this program. At least the stars that you see on the barrels seem to have that correlation. If the star stamp on the stock means the same as the ones you see on the barrel, I really honestly suspect that stock might have had a similar past as well.

His barreled action doesn't show any signs of that, so my guess is that stock has been recylced to that action either in rebuild, or added at some other time, or that star on that means something different entirely.

But it's all a guess at this point, and a lot hinges on if that star stamp on the stocks and the barrels mean the same thing. Which we don't even know what that meaning for sure is on the ones on the barrel.

So just a lot of questions, and not a lot of supporitng documentation.

[p246]

Cpl Norton your post got me going over metal looking for a star. I did miss this P stamp on underside of barrel just below front sight. IMG_1494.jpg

[p246]

So no star on end of barrel. Unless it's under the cosmoline below the stock line there is no star on barrel. I did take a picture of punch mark on front of sight.IMG_1496.jpg

[cplnorton]

Yeah the star stamp isn't like the star guage stamp from SA. It's on the top of the barrel underneath the date, and forward of the band.

Here's one on a Marine rifle. We just don't know a lot about them though and why they are so rare.

star stamp 2.jpg

[p246]

Got it. Thanks again

[Richard H Brown Jr]

Back again in ref to the bolt dimple on the stock.


Excuse the poor photo's as I'm not really good with this digital camera.

photo 001a.jpg is the area where the bolt handle meets the mainn part of the bolt sleeve. I increased the contrast to show how the round part melds into the flat and shows the straight line across and the bit of an angled areaat the meeting point. (If that makes sense)

001a.jpg

Photo M1903 Stock Dimple 003a.jpg is the area on the stock where the dimple is. I put the area in a badly done white square and posted the approx size of the dimple as best I could measure it.

M1903 stock dimple 003a.jpg

If you can see the roughness of the stock, the was extremely dry when I got the weapon and I treated it with Boiled Linseed Oil to nourish the wood. But at a cost of causing the grain to pop up.

I'm wondering if part of the tooling marks commented on, are actually the grain of the wood popping out after the 90-70 yr old walnut stocks being treated with BLO or other wood treetment compounds.

Comments?

R. Brown

[p246]

I don't know. On my Remington 03 and 03A3 there is some marring from the bolt handle touching the stock but not the half moon cut I see on this rifle. I'm interested to get my hands on the other Rock Islands and look that area over. Like so many things about these guns you usually end up answering one question only to raise three more. You could absolutely be right or maybe the marines did a minor relief cut. I think unless one of the guy doing research finds a document at the archives we may never know. Hopefully they can continue to dig up more information on this kind of stuff.

As far as BLO if the wood grain is broken I can't see it moving much, but if the wood grain is just dented then like steaming one could raise it at least some.

[Richard H Brown Jr]

Just had another thought.

How many USMC rebuild facilities were used in inspecting and reassembling 1903's after they were returned from general issue and replaced with M-1 Garands and M-1 Carbines? It could be that all those relief millings (if they are millings) were done at ony one facility?

The trouble with all the time that has passed, is that the records and any memorandums/letters are either totally lost, or they're totally lost in all the USMC records in NARA.

And another problem is that there are two distinct types of bolt sleever, the original 1903 straight bolt sleeve, and then the later WW2 angled bolt handle sleeve.

I just love coming up with more variables to the problem.

R Brown

[rayg]

Re: that dent in the stock. I don't have my 1903A4 rifles with me currently to try/check, but would a 1903A4 bent handle bolt that was tried in the rifle make that kind of dent? Ray

[Richard H Brown Jr]

Rayg:

Good point. Did a quick check at numrich catalog and we get: https://www.gunpartscorp.com/ad/525410.htm

So there are curved handle and straight handle field test bolts. One wonders if the curved field bolt or the straight filed bolt handle would make these dents.

An aside: I did a quick goohoo ( google/yahoo ) search for "M1903 field test bolt" and among the hits was Brophy's book _The Springfield 1903 Rifles_ . There is a lot of information that he culled from offical documents including all sorts of information on cartouches. Makes me wish I have a copy.

R Brown