Hello Jim,
Sorry I have not been around much. Work seems to get in the way!
Re. notches, I had an old book on gunfighters etc called "triggerometry" if I remember right! Must have been written in the 40's or before.
It had a chapter on John Westley-Hardin, called; "40 notches" from his most likely dime-store career, and supposedly 40 kills.
That's about as close as I can come with any actual evidence!!
There is only one gun I can think of off-hand with notches, in this case filed into the side of the trigger-guard, and this was from an earlier time, and was a full-stock plains rifle owned at one time by Joe Meek.
If I remeber right, it has an inscription on it in German, saying it was "for the defence of (German) Immigrants in the US (Can't remember if a state was mentioned, it May have been Utah)
Wether it got it's notches at the hands of the original Teutonic custodian, or at Joe's hands I can't say. Neither do I know wether the notches stood for deer,...... or hostile Indians.
Anyway Jim, That's all I can contribute. A gun with notches, yes, but that's all.
Now, I Do have an old ww1 era kukri with 2 notches, but that's different, and about as questionable!!
Best wishes,
Richard.
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