[Jeff Higgins]

I had a J.P. Lower marked Borchardt action that went missing in Montana some 20 years ago. I couldn't make the trip, but a couple of buddies were going to the Rosebud for some prairie dog shooting, so I gave them the action to drop off with who was then the foremost gunsmith working on (and actually building brand new) Borchardts. We had made a few phone calls back and forth regarding what it needed, then after awhile, I never heard from him again. I went as far as to drive over to get it back. He was gone.

Borchardts are weird. It's impossible to get a really good trigger on one, due to some design problems. They are not legal in NRA silhouette, but they are legal in mid and long range matches. Dave Gullo (proprietor of Buffalo Arms) used to shoot one in some of our matches, and did quite well with it.

If you compare it to the '75 Sharps (of which only three prototypes were actually made), it's clearly an evolution of that design. The '75 still had a side hammer, the '78 Borchardt dispensed with that and went to a striker mounted in the breech block. Many say that is what killed it, and eventually, the Sharps company itself. Shooters were not ready for an unseen, internal striker. It made them nervous. That, and Sharps really needed to come up with a repeater, but that's another story.