M1917 Unicorn captured! (aka unaltered Eddystone)

[jpm]

Here's something I bet most of you have never seen before, an as-issued M1917 Eddystone! Its unmolested since it left the factory back in October 1918. The only thing that wasn't right was mixmaster bolt, which I'm in the process of replacing with the correct one. My thanks to John Beard and Martin08 for their wisdom and help in confirming what I thought about it and helping me identify some of the minute details which I was unaware of.

I first spotted it online in one of the Cabela's gun libraries. The reddish tiger striped stock immediately caught my eye and I started looking at the details more closely. I could see the bluing on the bands looked like it was still intact and the finish on the receiver looked to be original. I could clearly see the flaming bomb on the left side and the rollmark was nice and crisp.

I called and asked for the barrel date and markings which are E 10-18 which matched the receiver serial number's manufacturing date so I thought it could be the original barrel! But how bad is the bore going to be on an original barrel? They say its pretty good, strong rifling and some shine to it which surprised me after seeing so many sewer pipe original barrels from years of firing corrosive ammo and/or blanks. I keep going back and studying the pictures and this detail catches my eye:

That's the trigger guard housing front screw and its staked and obviously unmoved. The rear one is also staked and unmoved too!

Now I'm wondering if this could possibly have been left intact since it left the Eddystone factory? I'd never seen staked screws on an Eddystone before so I started googling and found a post from Martin08 in which talked about staked screws on his gunshow find of a correct Eddystone a few years ago. I decide I need to see this in person, so I pay the $25 to have it shipped to the local Cabela's where I can go check it out with a boresnake, bore light and magnifier. I had read about the parts markings on John Beard's website so knew where to look on various parts for their markings to see how correct it is.

First thing I notice is the bolt is a Remington not Eddystone and I get a little disappointed thinking its going to be a typical mixmaster of parts. The room was not well lit so it wasn't easy to find all of the small marks I was looking for, so I check the bore and it actually looks good. Definitely strong rifling and some shine, so I run my boresnake through it and it shines right up! Wow.

Looking over the various metal parts, the bluing on them looks original and in good shape and the other screws look to be unturned as well. I notice though the receiver is not blued like the other metal parts as I expected it to be, its rougher almost like a parkerized finish, but looking at the barrel its got a nice brown patina that is definitely not parkerized. So now I'm a bit confused because the staked screws and barrel seem to indicate its unaltered but the receiver doesn't look 'right'. I keep looking and I find E marks on many parts I expect to find them on, but I don't find them on some others like the handguard retaining ring. The sight ladder too looks odd to me since its bright silver and all the ones I'd seen before were black/dark.

Not sure what to make of that so I keep looking and finding E marks here and there. I pull the floorplate off and check that and the spring & follower and they're all properly marked. I open the butt trap and there's an E on it where it should be and lo and behold inside is a correctly oriented (leather pad end against the trap door) nickel oiler that also looks like it is untouched since it went in there. Opening it up, the brush and pull thru are in there and the thong is still wrapped up tight as it was when it was put in there. A bonus!

Inspecting the stock I find no cartouche on the left side, which is how I'd expect it to be if its not rebuilt, and all the small inspector marks on the underside with the eagle heads are there so that's good. Can't seem to find any E on the upper or lower handguard, but they matched the stock so well that I didn't see how they couldn't be original. Couldn't see the E on the nose of the stock either at that time but the staked screws made me think its the original stock so I didn't sweat that...

 

[jpm]

I decide to not buy it yet as I want to investigate further and come back another time for a second look. They agree to hold it for me for a week and I go home and start searching for more info and reach out to a few experts I know for their opinion (Martin08, John Beard, Rick the Librarian). As I'm reading Martin08's thread about his rifle, he mentions the odd lighter area of finish on the left side of his receiver, which I also noticed on this one and had concerns about. In that thread, the receiver finish is also discussed. I learn that on late Eddystone receivers they started to use parkerizing instead of bluing. Its an iron oxide rather than manganese park so it doesn't look like your typical WW2 parkerized finish, and for some reason it didn't take well on that area of the receiver's left side where the flaming bomb mark is. When I compared his to mine, the odd looking finish on those areas lined up almost perfectly so now I'm back to thinking this is correct after all.

The staked screws are still a bit mysterious to me though, one poster mentions they have some relation to a USMC rifle but I can't find any explanation or backup for that. I reach out to John Beard and tell him what I've found and ask him to look at the pics and see what he thinks and if he thinks its worth the price. He tells me the screws on all 1917s were staked at the factory by default and had nothing to do with USMC provenance and from what he can see confirmed my thought that this is almost all original and correct. He then asks if the sight ladder is bright or dark and says that they were issued in the white as this one is. Another point for originality! And he says he would pay the asking price if he were in the market for one.

Well that pretty much seals it for me. I realize this is quite an unusual find and call Cabela's to tell them I am going to take it and will be in soon. I inspected it a bit more when I returned and found a few E marks that I hadn't seen in my first visit so I'm even more excited about it. We do the deal and back home we go for a closer inspection and bath.


Now I need to be careful cleaning the grime off without removing any screws that haven't been turned in 100 years. Gonna be slow going, but I get a bunch of qtips and a couple of tooth brushes, etc and get under a nice bright light and start going over every inch. I start finding a lot of the missing Es that I couldn't see in the darkish room at Cabelas. More and more and more. They're everywhere that they should be and even one place I didn't expect. Found the one on the retaining ring I expected, and there's one on each handguard that I couldn't really see before too. I even find one on the lower end of the buttplate that is typically blank on an Eddystone according to JB's site.

I see what seems to be an E on the nose of the stock so I scrub that a little with a brush and sure enough, there it is as expected. And I find very small eagle's head inspector marks here and there - on the top of the buttplate, on the safety lever, and on the trigger housing next to the floorplate release. Even the tiny nut on the rear sight ear is staked and unmoved!

 

[jpm]

Everything but the bolt is Eddystone and correctly marked and remains where it was installed almost 100 years ago! Next step is to clean the grime off the stock with the 50/50 BLO + turpentine mix and cheesecloth and she cleans up to a beautiful reddish brown with a ton of tiger striping throughout. Simply gorgeous stock which looks better in person than in these photos. I snap pictures of all the markings to share with John as he requested and his verdict "You have a splendid rifle! You did very well!" Coming from an expert like John, that says it all.

Now its time to hit the range to see how that gorgeous original 5 groove bore shoots. I grab a bando of HXP73 in 5rd clips and head up to the range on a mid-40s slightly breezy afternoon. Setup on the bench with a sandbag and put a target out at 50yds to sight in. First shots show the elevation is good and now I'm just getting the feel for the trigger and sight picture. Seems to be shooting POI is POA maybe just a hair to the left. Nice tight group though once I have everything dialed in so its time to try it at 100yds. Same ammo on SR-1C with a 6 o'clock hold and my first 10 shots yields this result:

Looks like a 93 with 1x, I'll take that! Obviously still has a little leftward bias which I will wait to try to adjust until I try some of my reloads and the outstanding Creedmoor match ammo. The only way to adjust the windage is by drifting the front site so if I don't need to, I'd rather leave it.

I was thrilled to find a correct unaltered Eddystone in the first place, having it be a fine shooter on top of that is a real bonus in my mind! Never thought I'd find one in the wild like this at an affordable price. I'd only seen them in auctions before. I'd love to know where its been all its life, it was obviously well cared for. The bolt most likely got swapped along the line with another rifle maybe during cleaning or whatever. Its too bad but finding the right one isn't too difficult.

Now here's a montage of all the markings I found on the rifle - enjoy! More and full size pics can be viewed in the album here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/WVvotPzeF73otSdA2

 

[majspud]

Nice. Most people don't realize that 75% of the Doughboys carried the M17, not the M03 Springfield.

t

 

[jpm]

I had no idea it was that many, wow!

 

[76Too]

It was easier to make because we were already making them for the brits in their limey chip chip Cheerio caliber .303

Rechamber in the the caliber of freedom and viola!

That is a gorgeous find Jpm...now i’m Racking my brain trying to guess how much you paid for it :/

 

[Mountain]

Awesome 1917 and great shooting!

Bring it to the next OCSA vintage match!

 

[Sweeney]

That's a nice rifle. Read up on their history and how they came to be.

 

[jpm]

It was easier to make because we were already making them for the brits in their limey chip chip Cheerio caliber .303
Rechamber in the the caliber of freedom and viola!

And don't forget, by getting rid of that pesky rim you get an additional round in the mag. Instant 20% increase in firepower!

 

[jpm]

nobody told me the first 3 pictures were broken, they're fixed now!

 

[Picton]

Nice!

My Eddystone is unaltered too... but it’s a Pattern 14, a VERY rare bird with intact volley sights and stock disk.

I like this design better than the ‘03, though I know that’s sacrilege to a lot of milsurp guys. Something about that peep sight...

 

[jpm]

Nice!

My Eddystone is unaltered too... but it’s a Pattern 14, a VERY rare bird with intact volley sights and stock disk.

Oh wow that's a rare one for sure!

I like the ladder sight on the 03, you get a choice of a couple of peeps with that. I only wish the '17 sights had an easier windage adjustment than drifting the front sight, that's the only real flaw IMO.

 

[slap shot]

My dad dropped an eddystone in my safe a couple of years ago and it’s just been sitting. I wish I knew more about it. Definitely a beautiful rifle.

 

[jpm]

You should pull it out and get it to the range! They're a lot of fun to shoot, the weight sucks up a lot of the recoil and the cock on close bolt is an interesting change of pace from what most of us are used to.

 

[mac1911]

My dad dropped an eddystone in my safe a couple of years ago and it’s just been sitting. I wish I knew more about it. Definitely a beautiful rifle.

shoot it! If you your dad wanted to sit and rot maybe he would have kept it....time for a