I collected and restored a Marlin Ballard no4 38-55 last year after a long search to find a forged steel Ballard hunting model worth buying.

These are a very uncommon rifle in New Zealand and it was a bucket list items for my collection.
Fast forward about one year and I got offered another MB no4 38-55. Despite it being practically identical to the one I restored last year I was glad to have another, despite it lacking a fore end, sights and having a broken hard rubber butt plate.

When I finally picked the new old one up and did a quick investigation of its known faults and identified its other issues.
Then I decided a group image was required to look at any variations between the who rifles of the same model and caliber but likely from very different periods of the no4s production.

That is when I realized that they are consecutively numbered.
They most likely came into New Zealand new in a single consignment.
What a thrill to realize my good fortune to have brought these two vintage rifles together on one small collection.

Maybe this is more likely to happen in a small country like NZ

cheers

Oh wow!  That is just amazing.

23693

Both rifles are mechanically good.
The fully stocked one I previously restored required pins and the hammer repaired. 
It's bore is 4/10 but it shoots cast lead powder coated bullets quite well considering its age.
The recent addition doesn't need anything particularly done to its action and the bore is easily 7/10 with bright continuous rifling and no obvious pitting.
With the addition of some period sights I expect this to be a very good shooter.
And I have its consecutively numbered sibling to reverse engineer the missing sights and fore end from.
Just need one of those re production hard rubber butt plates from USA.
( no easy thing from NZ with import and export permits required ! )

I would guess that it's maybe more possible for this to happen in a country where less of these Ballard rifles got imported to than might happen here! I'm sure there are a great number of consecutive numbered Marlin Ballard rifles, but the chance of two being found together here are pretty slim.
But I did own two Ballard rifles with the exact same serial number! Because John Marlin started making Ballard rifles marked "J.M. Marlin" from 1875-1881, and then changed to "Marlin firearms co." after incorporation; he restarted serial numbers. So there are literally thousands of Ballard rifles with each rollstamp that have numbers duplicated!
My two were a #2 in .38 Long, and a #6 Scheutzen in .32-40. I sold the #2, but had recorded the number in my records. Then later got the #6 and realized it had the same number as the one I'd sold.

oneatatime wrote on Mar 28^th, 2023 at 1:25am:


The wood is serial numbered to the rifle on Ballard's so you wouldn't want to mix and match.

I will just make a new fore end copy of the good one I have in the pair.
I've made a number of rifle stocks before

That’s an incredible coincidence! If you have the lottery in NZ, perhaps you should buy a ticket!

marlinguy has unbelievable luck in finding and acquiring some really nice, unusual, and rare firearms. Many of them have great documented history also. Now he has discovered he has two sequentially numbered Ballard rifles. 

Simply amazing.