Great looking and RARE. I'm  anxious to watch your replies.

The John T. Amber collection was auctioned off by Richard A. Bourne Co. November 11-13, 1986. 261 pages of items. Being in jail here I spent some time going thru my copy and did NOT find this rifle listed. Not that he may have sold or traded it at an earlier date.

In the earlier discussion on this oddball Pope cartridge referenced above, what has to be this rifle was described in detail, attributed to having been in Ron Peterson's shop at one time, and also attributed to being the one made for Carey and eventually owned by Amber.  HOWEVER, I must point out that while two of the three Popes in this caliber were said to be "target rifles", Carey's, though supposedly the only high-wall, was also supposedly made for hunting.  Therefore, since I personally can't see anyone toting this rifle around in the field, and since it's not listed in the Amber Collection catalog, I'd guess it's more likely one of the two target rifles than Carey's.  In any case, being one of only three and in such great condition would be enough bragging rights for me.

And perhaps Peterson still has records.

Bill Lawrence

Very interesting proof marks on the receiver.  The WP proof was being applied to barrels in July of 1905 and then added to receivers in 1908.  The circle P was applied to barrels that were sold to outside customers in 1913 but I've never seen a circle P on a receiver.  The proof marks are quite heavy.  Could either Harry or Lucien Carey been tight enough with the factory that they would have sold a raw receiver to one of them?  I know Harry was buying barrel blanks from the factory to be rifled by himself.  I wonder if that is an original highwall hammer that Harry ground down and re-checkered.  Also, the barrel seems to be set back a little farther than usual.

This subject was brought before and you might try doing a search. I posted some information about it and Lucian Cary. But I don't recall what it was or which ASSRA Journal I got it out of. I might have made note of it in the discussion at the time.

Here's the description from the Amoskeag web page when the gun was placed at auction in June of 2016:

Lot 158: Winchester Pope Model 1885 Thick Side High Wall Rifle

serial #118464, .308-405, 32" round barrel with a bright excellent bore. The top of the barrel is marked "H.M. POPE" and the bottom of barrel is marked "595 / W.I. / H.T. / 14/0 / 11/11/21 / H.M. POPE" and the barrel has five groove right hand twist rifling. The .308-405 is a 405 WCF cartridge necked down to .308 caliber, Pope made three barrels in this caliber, two sporting rifles and one Winchester single shot which he made for Lucian Cary. The barrel retains 97% original blue finish while the action retains 98% restored blue finish. The top tang shows an extra hole with filler screw which partially obscures the Winchester address. The top of the action interestingly shows a standard Winchester proof along with a mail order proof. This would make perfect sense for a rifle ordered directly from Pope on a High Wall action. The rifle is equipped with a standard Winchester plain straight grip buttstock with checkered steel shotgun buttplate. The forend is a large custom checkered beavertail threaded for a palm rest and with a sling swivel mounted at its tip, there is no corresponding swivel to the rear. The stocks rate excellent with lots of original finish remaining. The rifle is equipped with factory adjustable double set triggers and a Winchester style Schuetzen spur lever. The rifle is sighted with a globe front, no provision for rear and no tang sight; the barrel does wear a pair of target blocks. This is presumably the rifle that Pope made for Lucian Cary, however there is no provenance with it. A neat custom Pope High Wall.

The hammer price was $1725.00

Another interesting note on this gun.  Although this is a slab-side Highwall, it's a coil spring action.

The information we can gather will be going to Tom Rowe for his book on Pope.

Thanks for all the comments.

(and it could be a Martini forend, except there's no trap for the sight inserts...)

In one of Smoke's postings above, he quotes the Amoskeag catalog listing as including  "Pope made three barrels in this caliber, two sporting rifles and one Winchester single shot which he made for Lucian Cary." 

What do you suppose "sporting rifle" meant, perhaps bolt actions like Krag, which would sort of justify using a rimmed case wildcat?

There are some things about the rifle in this post that indeed are not the norm for a Sporting Rifle. But mainly the bulbous BSA forearm, and Schuetzen lever. Beyond that the rest would fit in with a Sporting Rifle just fine. 
But maybe the 3 guns referred to were more Sporting Rifles than bench rifles? And maybe nothing like the rifle pictured?

Appears the rifle was made for Hunting but on the other hand it doesn't. It appears to have a fold down front sight and a front sling attachment but there is nothing installed on the back. Pope did allot for his friend Lucian Cary but I haven't seen anything mentioned about Lucian being a hunter or going out with Pope to do the same. Pope also took a liking to his 30-40 Krag and one might tend to think he would have talked Lucian into also using the same.

Thank you Smoke my eyes are getting old and tired. It's a very nice piece of Pope history and it is also very unique.

That's very interesting, even with its minimal information. Since the issue is from 1905, Pope would've still been officially employed by Stevens.  Therefore, if this is the first .30-405 rifle, might Pope have been developing the cartridge for Stevens?  Also, while the "Stevens-Pope" rifle used was clearly capable of fine accuracy, the cartridge itself, especially with jacketed bullets, seems more likely to have been developed as a high-velocity hunting round, a goal which many shooters (and rifle-making companies) were working on  in those days.  In any case, it seems probable that this note references the first of the supposed three Pope .30-405  barrels, said barrel being mounted on a 44-1/2 action as well as used by Pope himself.  I wonder what happened to that rifle, especially as Pope left Stevens at the end of December, 1905?

Bill Lawrence

Here is a bit of data on L&R WA smokeless powder:

W-A .30 Calibre Powder was also known as .30 Caliber Smokeless, created originally by Whistler and Aspinwall for the Leonard and then the American Smokeless Powder Companies, for the 30-40 Krag government cartridge. It was not introduced to the public by L&R until 1898, even though it had been in production for the government since 1895. It consisted of yellow tubular or hexagonal grains .08” dia. X .04” and containing 30% NG. By 1898, all L&R powders seem to have been graphited. After 1900, the type two powder consisted of perforated black discs – (graphited) .08” dia. X .045”.

Hercules discontinued W-A .30 Caliber in 1930. A one-pound can originally cost $1.25. Thirty six grains was the standard load with a 220 grain bullet in the 30–40 Krag. It had a burning speed somewhere between that of Reloader 7 and Reloader 12.

Thanks Randy, that's a neat piece of history.

Pictured below are a case for .30-405, formed from .405 Win brass, a 168 gr. bullet, and the 7 shot, 100 yd, group shot with that bullet and 14.3 gr 4227.

I don't have a pic of the loaded cartridge because the friend who owns the gun shoots breech seated.

The rifling is straight, conventional, right hand twist.

My friend also owns a Highwall musket that was barreled by Pope in .34-40 Krag.  It's also straight (not gain twist) but has Pope rifling.