• This community needs YOUR help today. We rely 100% on Supporting Memberships to fund our efforts. With the ever increasing fees of everything, we need help. We need more Supporting Members, today. Please invest back into this community. I will ship a few decals too in addition to all the account perks you get.



    Sign up here: https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/account/upgrades

Suspicious pair of flintlock pistols

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

bb455

32 Cal
Joined
Jul 21, 2018
Messages
3
Reaction score
9
Location
United Kingdom
Late 18th/ early 19th Century tap-action pistols by Gill of London. Not!
I don’t know where these were made but the smith seems to be very competent. Everything seems to work including the sliding safeties. Convincing at a distance.
Apologies for the fuzzy images- they were taken on my phone.
 

Attachments

  • Gill1.jpg
    Gill1.jpg
    157.8 KB · Views: 252
  • Gill2.jpg
    Gill2.jpg
    88.2 KB · Views: 250
  • Gill3.jpg
    Gill3.jpg
    53.5 KB · Views: 239
  • Gill4.jpg
    Gill4.jpg
    104 KB · Views: 239
  • Gill5.jpg
    Gill5.jpg
    80.2 KB · Views: 222
Thank you for the suggestion. I can’t move or delete this post so if anyone could help me out that would be great
 
No need to delete anything. Just copy and paste this same post into the section on this site called "Firearm Identification"
 
Looks like they'd put a "hurt" on an assailant when up close and personal. But you might need to be in knife-range to hit anything with them and definitely in sword range. On the other hand maybe just looking at those two big holes in the ends of a brace of such pistols settled a lot of arguments without firing either?

LD
 
Looks like they'd put a "hurt" on an assailant when up close and personal. But you might need to be in knife-range to hit anything with them and definitely in sword range. On the other hand maybe just looking at those two big holes in the ends of a brace of such pistols settled a lot of arguments without firing either?

LD

It's been my experience that gazing into the down range end of a firearm seems to have a settling effect.
 
What makes you think they are fake? If so, someone went to a lot of trouble for a gun that the vast majority of flint enthusiasts would know nothing about.
Robby
They may not have been deliberately trying to fool anyone into believing they're actually antiques. In which case, instead of calling them fakes I'd say they're replicas. or copies, or 'in the style of...'
 
Whatever they are, they are VERY well made in the style of the original maker. They are convincing at a distance of one inch. If I were the OP, I'd be sending images to Mr Andrew Bottomley, one of the UK's forefront arms and armour and militaria dealers - with almost 50 years of dealing with this kind of thing, he may very well be able to give an instant verdict. Google him.

Whinemeal, here's the skinny on the putative maker -

Thomas Gill (British; Male; 1805; fl. c.)

Also known as
Gill, Thomas; T & J Gill

Address
No.83, St. James's Street, opposite Pall Mall, London

https://research.britishmuseum.org/...ction_database/term_details.aspx?bioId=201500
...and a pair of nice-looking duelling pistols, too - https://www.rockislandauction.com/d...-gill-flintlock-dueling-pistols-a-gill-pistol
 
Last edited:
They look right enough, if the barrels are of a bronzy brass and the butts look too new maybe the brls where lost & the worms ate the original butts .? Not a simple piece of workmanship what ever they are. Rudyard
 
I have to say that this pair of pistols actually look the real thing to me. Why would anybody make a pair of pistols like this in order to fool anybody? A pair of high-grade duellers, perhaps, but not a pair of small travelling/pocket pistols. Now I come to think of it, I've never come across a set of fake duellers, either, at least, in the last fifty years or so. The cost of making a perfect replication of the products of Manton, Egg, Wogden or similar, are just as high as making the real thing, as are the skills involved. You only have to put a genuine Manton dueller beside the Pedersoli replica to see what I mean - the replica looks what it is, and the real thing really does look different in ways that the replica cannot replicate because it would just be too costly to do so in mass-production. Remember, too, that brass ages in a different way that of iron - and note that firearms of the time WERE iron, and not steel. The muzzles of those two pistols tell me that they are the real thing.
 
Thanks for your replies. They are approx .45” cal. It was a combination of the gap between the barrels being different, the inconsistent engraving and overall new look which made me think they were not what they were trying to be.
 

Attachments

  • Gill7.jpg
    Gill7.jpg
    63.6 KB · Views: 78
  • Gill8.jpg
    Gill8.jpg
    77.9 KB · Views: 69
yes the real deal. what's the problem. hasn't any one seen shinny brass on guns be fore, it keeps the Verdigris off of them.
 
yes the real deal. what's the problem. hasn't any one seen shinny brass on guns be fore, it keeps the Verdigris off of them.

Not only that, but brass has always seen use in firearms designed for sea-service. not that I'm suggesting that this pair had such usage.
 
Back
Top