Yesterday I went to a gun show with absolutely no intentions of buying anything. I have way too many irons in the fire right now (gun related stuff and life in general) and I've gotten to the point that very little easily obtainable stuff gets me fired up anyway. I had no cash to speak of handy and just went to tag along with my buddy who was on a mission to find a particular handgun, which he found. We paid our $8 admission and started down the first isle when three tables in, this .444 jumped out and grabbed me. I saw it and hoped it was a .45-70, which I do not want and could have painlessly walked away from. A .444 has always been on my "list" but I kept putting it off because they were common and easy to get. Then the Remington fiasco happened and "good" Marlins got scarce and went through the roof. Clean, "good" .444s have gotten ridiculous on GunBroker and I just kind of pushed a .444 out of my mind, until yesterday. This one was as clean as new and obviously had a little age on it because of the lack of safety and its uncheckered wood, which I much prefer. He had $650 on it, which seemed reasonable in these times of "JM Marlin" madness. But alas, I only had a couple hundred on me and I don't do ATMs so I walked. The thought of it haunted me all night. I knew I'd never find a cleaner specimen for that dough and had it been a weekday, I'd have gone to the bank. Ashamed to say that during church this morning, my mind kept drifting back to the Marlin. After I took the wife and my mom to lunch, I had a thought. A good friend had a table at the show so I called him on his cell and asked him to go ask the seller for a phone number so I could contact him if he still had the gun. He did and while he was talking to the guy, he asked him (without my prompting) if he was firm and I heard him say "I'll take $600." On a whim, I asked Chuck to ask him if he'd take a personal check, which I doubted. I was surprised when he said he would, so I asked Chuck to ask him to hold it for an hour so I could go home and fetch the check book and drive back to the fairgrounds. So I paid him half cash and wrote a check for the other $300 and brought it home.

Honestly, I think it is unfired. It is a pre-safety 444S, dates to 1979 and still has the factory screws in the top of the receiver and the sticker on the forend. A few tiny little insignificant marks on the stock is all I can find. It has a sling that looks similar to the original Marlin slings but does not have the Marlin stamp, so may not be original.

I "needed" another brush gun like I need woman trouble but life would have been hard to face had I let this one go. I'm sure no of you have ever felt that way, have you???

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It looks awfully good. Like you, though, I'd have a hard time talking myself into another rifle right now.

I just never liked the .444, couldn't see much use for it. Still don't, in fact. That's me, though, and not you, so I'm not criticizing your choice.

Wow! Great looking rifle!.....Good luck....Hb

The nicest .444 I seen bought in a long time.....great snag.

Doc

Congrats SCGunNut, you done good. That rifle is pristine and the wood to metal fitting looks to be excellent judging from the photos. Like you, I prefer no checkering and no cross-bolt safety. My only personal nitpick is, I've never really liked white line spacers. An article I read about the 444 back when I was in high school captured my imagination and so my first rifle purchase was a .444 Marlin with ballard rifling. It has checkering and cross-bolt safety. Later, I purchased a first year produced 1965 444 Marlin. Still have both.

Now you just have to get some brass which has become scarce. Maybe you will luck out and find some locally. It can be rather pricey on gunbroker. Here in Texas, I had not seen any factory Remington 444 ammo on the shelves for several years. However, I saw five boxes of it on the shelf at Gander Mountain a few weeks ago for a mere $55/box . Despite that high price, maybe the presence of it in the store is an indication that Remington may have caught up on some of the ammo backlog and will perhaps resume making seasonal runs for cartridges like the 444 Marlin and 35 Rem.

Luckily, I work in a gun shop and we are well stocked on .444 ammo. I'll get around to rolling my own but in the meantime, I'll shoot the Hornady 265 gr Flat Point, that they've seen fit to discontinue in favor of the FTX, which I have no interest in. Luckily, we still have some of the FP stuff, along with some Buffalo bore with the 270 Gold Dot and the run of the mill Remington 240s.

Lucky you. That's great. I still have a few boxes of Hornady 265 FP bullets and enough Remington 444 brass to last a couple of lifetimes.

You did just great!

That's a good looking rifle. It's fun when you stumble into fun stuff.

you did good and thankfully hornady is still making 265 fp your seeing them more and more.my 444ss is a tack driver as i'm sure you will probably find yours the same

it's a curious life indeed, I managed to snag a similar rifle in .44 mag


ran an excavator from 7:30 a.m. till 3:30 p.m. today, had a snack and a nap, while nappin I heard this swap shop on the TV that my sis was watching and the guy said he had the rifle.


woke me right up it did. Same as the OP's minus 1 .4 (grin)

few stock scratches, no checkering, no cross bolt safety. Was going to try and get him down to $600 but he was an old timer in not too great a digs, so I didn't even quibble, just gave him the seven bills he wanted and was on my way.


would have preferred the trapper version (forget what Marlin calls theirs) as have one in Win. mode pre safety that looks like it just rolled outa the factory.


I like old rifles and old men and women.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^THIS^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

"Yesterday I went to a gun show with absolutely no intentions of buying anything...."
......I knew where this was going right from the start!
BTW - GREAT FIND! Perfect Marlin and fun caliber! I would have been all about it too!

Nice find.

I ended up putting an older Burris 1.75-5x20 Fullfield heavy plex on it. It shoots the Hornady 265 gr FP into a little over an inch so I'd say it is a keeper.

Congrats!

That's an awesome find, SCGunNut. Congrats!

Very nice indeed. My bud has one just like it only maybe a tad older I think. Mine was made in early 90s.

I have taken deer and black bear with mine. All with 270 gr. Speer Gold Dots (Uni-cor) over H322. Excellent accuracy and terminal performance.

Enjoy.....

2muchgun,

Where have you been hiding?? Glad to see you back.

Doc

Why thank you Doc. Yes I took a small hiatus from the internet. But all is fine.

Right now I'm hiding 20 ft up in a tree staring at 4 does and about 20 turkeys and hoping a shooter buck comes along.

Good to hear from you.....

I should have opened this thread before today - great find on a classic!

Congrats! Looks like a dandy! 444 and marlins are like blackberries and vanilla ice cream!