|
WINCHESTER GREEN LABEL BOX
OF 25 .45 CALIBER, 300 GRAIN “EXPRESS BULLETS” – ca.
1880: A
scarce and very collectable box of .45 caliber, 300
grain, “Express Bullets” bearing the desirable
Winchester Repeating Arms Company green label.
Winchester introduced the
“Express Bullet” in their 1879 catalog, describing the
cast lead bullet as “…..having a hollow point that is
filled with a copper cup and modeled after the famous
English bullets.” Winchester continued to offer these
Express Bullets as an option in their .40-.50 caliber
ammunition offerings for the balance of the 19TH
century and some continued into the early 20TH
Century. In addition to providing the fully loaded
cartridges with the Express Bullet, Winchester also
packaged components such as these bullets for sale to
the shooters who did their own reloading, such as was
practiced on the buffalo hunting range and the far
reaches of the western frontier. Certainly, these boxes
of bullets would have been in the inventory of the
dealers and hide buyers supplying the last of the
commercial buffalo hunters on the Western Frontier.
According to Giles and
Shuey’s excellent reference work Winchester Cartridge
Boxes, any of the cartridge boxes with the “Express
Bullet” call out are scarce today. As it is likely that
fewer of these bullet boxes would have been produced,
and further, as the survival rate of these bullet boxes
as the contents were expended is almost unimaginable, it
stands to reason that this box of Express Bullets is
likely a very rare survivor.
This box is in excellent
condition, retaining its full form with all of the
corners and edges intact, and it features a full,
legible cover label and side banner as can be seen in
the photographs below. The box has been opened and it
retains five of the original .45 caliber grooved Express
Bullets of the 25 bullets the box originally contained.
All five of the matching bullets are in excellent
condition, are full form, feature the copper cup in the
hollow point, and the copper cups are marked with the
capital “X”, Winchester’s logo to identify these Express
Bullets.
This is a very nice
specimen of a rare box of Express Bullets manufactured
for the large caliber rifles on the buffalo range and
across the frontier, and one that does not appear on the
collector market very often. This box will make a nice
addition to rifle and/or cartridge collection.
SOLD
|
