Rock Island Auction Company, the world’s leading auction house for firearms, edged weapons and military artifacts; offers live online bidding through AuctionZip Live! at their Premiere Collector’s Firearms Auction, May 20-22, 2011.  The Illinois-based auction house presents three Premiere auctions per year, featuring rare, unusual, mint and highly collectible pieces.  On offer at the May auction, the first at Rock Island’s new 85,000 square foot facility, is a wide variety of antique and collectible firearms manufactured by Colt, Winchester, Holland & Holland and more.  For additional information, or to bid live online on AuctionZip Live! please visit www.AuctionZip.com.

Highlighting the sale is a U.S. marked and inspected Colt 2nd Model Dragoon Revolver ($150,000 - $225,000).  The revolver has a military blue finish on the barrel and cylinder and a one-piece martially inspected walnut grip.  The top barrel flat is marked:               “-ADDRESS SAML COLD NEW-YORK CITY-“ and the left side of the frame is stamped “COLT/PATENT” above a “U.S.” property mark.  Colt manufactured approximately 2,700 2nd Model Dragoon Revolvers between 1850 and 1851.  Only 2,000 of these revolvers were manufactured for ordinance contracts and have “U.S.” property markings.  Accoutrements include a patent-marked bullet mold and a patent-marked flask.

Also featured is an exceptionally rare gold plated, factory engraved Luger pistol made by Krieghoff Heinrich Gun Co. ($50,000 - $100,000).  Photographs of this exact Luger are included on multiple pages of “Krieghoff Parabellum” by Randall Gibson, and it is noted in the text to be one of only three factory presentation Lugers engraved in this manner.  The piece is also fitted with a set of carved ivory presentation grips and is set in a custom walnut display case.  The lavish engraving covers over 90% of the pistol, making it an incredibly rare and unique piece.

A Winchester Model 1886 50 Express Smoothbore Lever Action Rifle ($90,000 - $130,000) also crosses the block at this important three-day auction.  The rifle is accompanied by a Winchester Arms Museum letter, which describes the piece as: “Rifle 50 Express, Octagon barrel, Plain trigger, Smoothbore,” and states that it was received in the Winchester warehouse on April 16, 1909.  The 26-inch full octagon barrel is fitted with a dovetail front sight and a scarce Winchester Express rear sight with folding 50, 100 and 200 yard leaves.  The piece bears a variety of official markings by Winchester.

Additional highlights in the auction include a New Haven Arms Co. Henry lever action rifle ($65,000 - $95,000), an original M60 “fully active” New England Group/Maremont medium machine gun ($35,000 - $65,000) and a signed and engraved special order Ivo Fabbri over/under side lock shotgun ($85,000 - $100,000).

A full-color catalog for the sale is available at www.AuctionZip.com. 

AuctionZip: Founded in 2003, AuctionZip is the world’s largest directory of live auction listings. Each year, more than 22,000 auctioneers in the US and Canada list their upcoming auctions on AuctionZip. With over 160,000 auctions listed annually, AuctionZip has become the go-to destination for experienced collectors and dealers in the estate auction and collectibles market. 

In 2010 AuctionZip launched AuctionZip Live! -- the nation's newest and largest online bidding destination with more than 1.2 million bidders worldwide. Since its launch, hundreds of auctioneers have chosen AuctionZip Live! to maximize bidding at their auctions.