My Monkey Wards Mauser, aka the Hawthorne Model 760

[Richard Simmons]

Congrats to the OP. I think you got a nice rifle in a great caliber. My first shotgun was a hand me down Monkey Wards SxS in 16ga. It had the Rynite stock and forearm. Actually shot quite a few pheasants and my fair share of quail with that old girl.

Talking about odd gun retailers. Bought a French Berthier 07/15 rifle years ago at an auction. The gun itself was covered in rock hard cosmoline and old newspaper, Spanish newspaper as it turned out. I suspect it made it's way from France to Spain for use in the Spanish Civil war.

Anyway, the neat part was the rifle came in it's original shipping carton with the address of some woman in a town in Kansas. The shipper? Spiegels. I never even know they sold guns let alone milsurps. The carton is long gone but I do recall the lady in Kansas had no zip code on her address nor did Spiegels. That with the fact that it was shipped to what looked like a residence I suspect it was before 1963. Kinda neat.

P.S. Still have the rifle. Took forever to get her clean but we've been to the range and she'll be one I keep for ever.

 

[beagleye]

Check out the rifling. Some of the monkey ward had micro rifling, like marlins.

 

[sigp220.45]

Check out the rifling. Some of the monkey ward had micro rifling, like marlins.

I think mine does - there sure are a lot of grooves in there. I'll try to get a picture tomorrow.

 

[alwslate]

The barrel on my Wards rifle has multi groove rifling also. It seems to
be the exact same rifle as yours except for the barrel markings and the
stock walnut is darker. I will try to take some pics of mine and get
them on here. The house brand FN Mausers are some of the best used
hunting rifles available at the going prices but the word is starting to
get around and prices are slowly climbing. I've seen some of them
listed on GB at ridiculous prices just like any other classic quality
rifle.

 

[beagleye]

The throats on those micro grooves are more prone to throat erosion than regular barrels. Works fine on 30-30s but 30-06 is a little to much heat for those tiny riflings. If it was mine I would just not rack up a huge round count, probably last a couple lifetimes shooting deer but if you go down to the range and blast away, accuracy will be at risk. If you reload check your seating depth.