Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Information on Cody Letter

I have a letter on a nice 1899 CD and it has on the last line of the information A3. Anyone know what that stands for? They also did not give me the caliber of the rifle which was 303 Savage. Very little info. for 75 bucks. I hope that A3 stands for something good. I sent a message to Cody asking for help, but at my age I won't be around by the time they get back to me.

Bill W

I believe that might refer to A3 checkering maybe. What sort of checkering does the gun have?

don't get much for the money, not worth it my .02

The checkering is the same as the 1899CD that is shown on Royal's page 46 The later model with a round barrel.

The Cody Letter identifies EXACTLY what information is in the factory ledgers for a specific gun…..nothing more/nothing less.

As Ted said, they are supposed to only say what is there. Some things that are standard would not be there. The letter for my 1902 Engraved A, does not say A, because there were no letter designations then. It does not say 26" barrel because that was standard. But, the letter did miss something. It said engraving, and might have missed special checkering, or hand picked wood. I'd have to look again. It missed one kind of obvious item. But, to me, that just means whom ever wrote that entry into the ledger missed that one item.

I'm with you on that one Ken. I've got a couple old letters that I think add a lot of value to two of my rifles. But, $75 is a lot. I didn't get a letter on the 1902. Cody had a booth at the Baltimore show and was doing look ups for $5. All the same info in the same format, just in an email, not on fancy embossed letters. So, I thought that was very worth while.

So the rifle wasn't recorded as an 1899CD, it was recorded as an 1899A with A3 checkering. Your rifle should have a pistol grip if it's an 1899CD, but the letter doesn't mention that or a p/g entry? What's the date on your rifle?

An 1899CD is just a regular rifle with A3 checkering and pistol grip. Before they catalogued the 1899CD, they offered those options as well. So your rifle might date to before the 1899CD was catalogued (around SN 44.000 or so), or the person recording it in the ledger just recorded the features rather than the grade. It's like recording "6 eggs" versus "half a dozen eggs" - different ways of recording the same thing.

I have an A2 special from 1914 or so that wasn't recorded as an A2 special, recorded just as an 1899C with a work order number.

No entry for caliber means it was in 303 Savage - early ledgers only recorded other calibers.
Same for 26" barrel - not recorded, they only recorded other lengths.

So essentially your entry should have had the following data in it:
*) A3 (for A3 checkering, there was no A3 engraving)
*) R (for round barrel)
*) Accepted from factory date
*) Shipped date
*) Who it was shipped to

No mention of caliber means it was 303 Savage, no mention of barrel length means it was 26".

Bill, Please post pics of the rifle and the letter.
Then folks will have a clear understanding of the rifle, the letter contents and can better comment and help you.
Calhoun is all over it, but the pics will save a helluva lot of typing and questions.
And the dream is that the letter haters refrain.