DMZ

Here's a photo of a forearm that was on GB (tried to find it today -- no luck). Must be from the same source as the Rock Island piece.

Thank you, ArtR -- really appreciate you checking. Too bad it came up empty. Maybe someone else who has a hand-stamped serial numbered barrel might submit theirs. Anyway, this is a great board! Again, I certainly appreciate yours and Brian's replies.

Thank you, Brian! Did you mean that Winfield kept a log of serial numbers or that it was rare that rifles sold by Winfield matched the recorded configurations as shipped from the factory? I wonder if we might try this: Would it be possible for someone to look up rifle no 1862 and check if the barrel/barrel bushing number 2068F was listed? If by chance they matched the original configuration, we would have at least one indicator that the barrel number = rifle serial number hypothesis might be correct.

This is my first post so here goes. I finally bought my first Johnson last year, serial number 6346 (thanks to metrotps and ArtR for the serial number info on another board). Naturally, not a single part matched the original configuration. On it was an original Johnson/Dutch inspected barrel with a serial number 1862 hand-stamped on it (see photo). I assume this is the serial number of the rifle it was originally part of. My question is this: Is this assumption true: hand-stamped number = rifle serial number? If so, since the barrels are so easily removed, did the Dutch remove the barrels to clean them and did so in a group such that the serial numbers ensured that the barrels got back to the original receivers? As an example, the cylinders in the Remington-Beals/Army/New Army (and Navy of course) pistol of 1858 are commonly found mismatched to the frames due to the ease of removal and group cleaning. Also the question arises how much barrel swapping did Winfield do when they sold “military configuration” rifles which might also explain the mismatched receiver/barrel serial numbers.