Savage made a long action 1920 prototype in 30-06 for the U.S. military to consider as a supplemental rifle to the 1903 Springfield. The decision was made to go with the modified P14 Enfield which morphed into the 1917 Enfield. I have seen pictures of this rifle and it was very well done, a well finished product that suggests to me that Savage worked hard to get that contract.
Savage made as least 2 of the long action 1920 prototypes in 303 British that use the SMLE magazine. I have seen the one pictured and it was not nearly as well finished as the 30-06 prototype.
Savage made a long action 1920 prototype in 7x57 that was probably intended for sale to countries in Central America that had bought Remington Rolling Block rifles in 7x57 and were looking to upgrade to a bolt action. Most of the Central American countries chose Mausers to replace their single shot rolling blocks, but Honduras bought the 1934 Remington, basically a Remington Model 30 in a P14/1917 style stock with an upper handguard that was inletted for an open rear sight.
The rifles were all sold during the auction of the Savage R&D collection sometime in the late 1980s. All of them passed through multiple owners and at least one of the prototypes in 303 British and the 7x57 were sold by the Kittery Trading Post at some point.
There is also a long action 1920 prototype sporting rifle in 256 Newton with an "engraved", probably cast, aluminum trapdoor buttplate. Mark Benenson owned it at one point in the 1990s and it ended up in Bruce Jennings' collection Jennings' daughter sold it to settle the estate and where it is today is unknown to me.
Thanks, Jeff.
Off the top of anybody's head, do any of those cartridges achieve 3000fps in 1915? I'm thinking there might be a military prototype or two out there in 250-3000 to meet that velocity?
