Mystery Pistol

[bsurfsd]

New to all this and i have acquired what i believe may be a belgian pistol. it is a single shot breech loaded weapon with bore slighlty smaller than a 22. barrel about 9" long and octogon shaped. i have detailed photos of proof mark and logo up at Pictures by bsurfsd - Photobucket but can't find a match for them anywhere i look. any help identifying it, maker, date of manufacture et al would be greatly appreciated as i'm stumped.

thx for y'alls time and Merry Christmas

bruce

[Steve M1911A1]

It looks like a Flobert indoor target pistol, made in France...but I can't be sure. I can't read the stamped marking on its triggerguard.
Certainly it is well beaten up. The stock has been ill used, and the ornate buttcap is missing.

If it isn't French, it may be Belgian.

Are there any other visible markings? Are there any markings on the barrel, covered by the stock?

[bruce333]

I agree...

Found something that looks like it. The second one on this web page.

http://www.horstheld.com/0-Flobert.htm

Louis Auguste Nicolas Flobert designed and built these guns. Best description of the rimfire cartridge he used was a percussion cap with a lead ball pushed into the end.

Louis Nicolas Auguste Flobert

JM Firearms Collection :: Colección particular de Jesús Madriñán

[bsurfsd]

its provenance would make it either french or belgian as it was acquired from a belgian family. unable to contact them to find out what buttcap may have looked like, sorry to say. and it is so beaten up that the crack running thru it lengthwise is probably a break as the safety mechanism almost fell out at one point and entire stock is loose from one piece to the other but not from stock to barrel/mechanism. as i'm new to antique firearms and have no tools i'm not about to try and dissemble it to check for more markings so what you see is what you get, unfortunately. i have no idea what the 1655 number stamped on barrel represents and the crossed flag with stick figure near rear sight has me baffled as well. if stock was repaired it would still be a functional piece but with each successive manipulation of the mechanism it gets looser so i quit fooling with it although i did get it to work successsfully a few times before it became too loose to work correctly. i'm referring specifically to the safety action wherein the gun is held in cocked position after insertion of the round.

[Steve M1911A1]

The number may be a serial number in the order of manufacture.
The mark by the sight does not correspond to anything in my library, and is not a proof mark (which would normally be on the hidden portion of the barrel anyway).

Since we are not to be treated to views of the underside of the barrel, I have no further comment to offer.

BTW: The action is not exactly like a Flobert parlor pistol, since it has a Remington-style "rolling block" component. Still, that's my best guess.
It may have been made by a Belgian competitor of Flobert's, designed to be just different enough to evade patent complaints.
I'm pretty certain that it's a parlor pistol, though.