Swiss Vetterli Model 1869 Sharp Shooter Rifle

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  • mawkie

    C&R Whisperer
    Sep 28, 2007
    4,337
    Catonsville
    -At the turn of the last century in Europe many countries were engaged in promoting the shooting sports. Often arms manufacturers would sell complete rifles and carbines in military configuration for civilian use in hunting or competition. Ross sold Military Match rifles. BSA and LSA sold Long Lees and Speed Lees. French gunsmiths could order 1889 Lebel actions and components for building rifles for competition (See my previous thread about the USTF Lebel rifle I found). And the Swiss sold complete Vetterli rifles and components to civilians for the same use.
    -I had been on the hunt for an early M69 Vetterli for my collection. But this model wasn't built in large quantities to begin with and most examples I found were in rough shape. I was determined to find a nice one, esp. after seeing Milsurp Dan's beautiful M71 Stutzer sharp shooter's short rifle.
    -Fate kicked in this weekend with a two day auction that featured items from the fabulous collection of the late John Sukey. I knew John from the Lee Enfield forum over on Gun Boards. After his passing earlier this year his family consigned a large number of Lee Enfields and other arms to Reata Pass Auction. I bid on an Enfield No9 trainer but my mouse finger was too slow and I lost out. Also bid on a nice Canadian Ross MKII** but it sold for $150 more than what I thought it was worth and it needed a period target sight that would have cost another $300 or more and lots of time and effort to find.
    -Then there was a third item on my short list. I initially thought M71 Stutzer with dual set trigger and Stutzen type buttplate. But it had some of the features of a M69: longer 33 inch barrel and dual barrel bands. And no serial number. Did some poking about the net and found my answer over on Swisswaffen.com and Swissrifles.com. It's a sharp shooter's version of the M69 for civilian use built by SIG. Hence the lack of a SN, very much like my 1889 Lebel built for USTF competition. They have it listed as a Repetirstutzer M69 on Swisswaffen.com but with the mix of Repertierstutzer and Repertirgewehr features I'm not sure what to label it other than cool.
    -This example pulled my trigger and in the end I got it for $100 above my high pre-auction guesstimate. Still a bargain in my eyes as it also came with a bayonet for under $1k. Spent the last couple of days looking for comps and found one in the US and five sold in Switzerland in the last 10 years. The spread on those five sold in CH was from $400 to $950 (Swiss franc is on parity with the US dollar at this time). I think rule of thumb on these is to value them at 2-3 times what a Repetirgewehr in the same condition would bring.
    -Who knows how many were built. Just know it's very rare here in the US.
    -Auction photos for now until it arrives. Will post a more complete set then.
     

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    mawkie

    C&R Whisperer
    Sep 28, 2007
    4,337
    Catonsville
    Did some searching in the Swiss forum over on Gun Boards where John Sukey, the previous owner, hung out. Ten years ago he mentioned converting this one to centerfire. Won't know for sure until it arrives but that would be nice if it's already done and done right. Think the only other mod would be to raise the front sight for plinking at 100m and John just might have done that too.
     

    K-43

    West of Morning Side
    Oct 20, 2010
    1,881
    PG
    Sad news when John passed away last Spring. He was well known as an expert on collecting Enfields. I didn't know he was into Swiss rifles too, but that doesn't surprise me.
    I heard family or his estate auctioned off his collections.
     

    mawkie

    C&R Whisperer
    Sep 28, 2007
    4,337
    Catonsville
    Sad news when John passed away last Spring. He was well known as an expert on collecting Enfields. I didn't know he was into Swiss rifles too, but that doesn't surprise me.
    I heard family or his estate auctioned off his collections.

    Reata Pass Auction handled a bunch of his guns. An amazing pile of Enfields. He was always modest, never knew he had an Enfield collection that large and deep. I'm happy to have one tiny part of that collection.
     

    mawkie

    C&R Whisperer
    Sep 28, 2007
    4,337
    Catonsville
    -John's Vetterli arrived today. Reata Pass Auction house did an amazing job of packing this looong and heavy puppy along with the bayonet. Checked the bolt and yup, John converted it to centerfire so I'm good to go if I want to shoot 'er. The set trigger is pretty slick, tight with little to no take-up. Perfect pull.
    -In the last 3 weeks I've been scouring the web, looking for similar examples of commercial Swiss Vetterli and have only found one other up on a Swiss Rifles thread in 2008. It too was a M69. So safe to say it's very uncommon here in the US.
     

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