Tag Archives: mares leg

Mare’s Leg, Updated

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Rossi has trimmed down its R95 Triple Black lever-action rifle into a much more packable pistol variant for 2025.

The company debuted its new R95 Triple Black Pistol, or TBP, to the recent NRA Annual Meeting at Atlanta, and we were able to lay hands on it for a closer look. Much like its rifle-length older brother, the TBP is clad in a black Cerakote-coated finish with matching black furniture. A paracord-wrapped medium loop lever and a top-mounted Picatinny optics rail are also features that are carried over from the original.

Specific to the TBP is its abbreviation, shipping with suppressor-ready 13.25-inch barrels and a pistol grip, allowing the lever-action mare’s leg an overall length of just under two feet. Weight is 5.5 pounds, unloaded. While Rossi had the .357 Magnum variant on hand in Atlanta, the TBP will also be offered in .454 Casull, .45-70 Govt, and .44 Mag for those looking for something a little spicier.

I got to handle one at the recent NRAAM in Atlanta.

The side-loading Rossi TBP has a paracord-wrapped medium lever, which splits the difference between big loops and standard rectangular slot-style levers. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

The pistols have threaded muzzles with the .357 at NRAAM fitted with a JK Armament can. All four caliber options run a four-round underbarrel magazine tube. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

Note the top-mounted Picatinny optics rail. Other features include a cross-bolt manual safety and two sling swivel studs. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

With an overall length of just 23.5 inches, the Rossi TBP line is more easily stowed than a full-length carbine or rifle. (Photos: Rossi)

More after the jump to my column at Guns.com.

Steve McQueen’s Original Mare’s Leg Sold…in France

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In a strange twist of fate, a sawn-off lever-action cowboy rifle that drew the close attention of federal agents in the 1950s and went on to arguably become a star of the small screen, was for a princely sum in Paris last week.

From 1958-61 CBS ran an Old Western TV series called Wanted: Dead or Alive as part of the overall trend at the time in shows of that period, such as Gunsmoke and Bonanza, being extremely popular. After all, the days of Tombstone and the O.K. Corral were only just a few generations past.

The series, which ran some 94 episodes, featured Steve McQueen as a Civil War veteran Josh Randall with a sawed-off rifle as a holstered weapon makes a living as a bounty hunter in the Wild West of the 1870s. The SBR, known popularly as a “Mare’s Leg,” was a shortened Winchester Lever Action.

According to the Internet Media Firearms Database McQueen’s prop gun was a chopped-down Winchester Model 1892 saddle ring carbine in .44-40 with a large lever ring.

Wanted_-_Dead_or_Alive_Poster

In a funny twist of fate, the gun was made without adhering to the National Firearms Act requirements of the time for Short-barreled rifles, which led to Treasury agents showing up on set the day after the first episode aired. After some good-natured explanations and $1,100 in licenses and fees paid by producers (about $9300 in today’s cash), the ATF went away and the studio had an FFL with a SOT to produce more guns if needed. Hey, it was a simpler time back in 1958!

At least three different versions of the gun were used in production and studio imagery and one made it into a European auction last week.

How did it make it there? Read the rest in my column at Firearms Talk