Winchester model 12 pigeon grade

Question
I am apprasing a gun collection. Most guns are straight forward as the model 12 should. It is a pigeon grade 30" FC, VR, SN 112XXXX (1948), select walnut. It has a red Winchester recoil pad. It has engraving, but what I can't find is; grades? Most I have seen are just engraves but this one has gold inlay of a pointer on the left side of the reciever and a pair of ducks on the leftr side of the receiver.I could find no engravers initails. How does the gold inlay impact the value?

Answer
Jim,

As you well know, it depends a lot on what type of engraving and "inlay" it is, who did it and when.

I'm guessing that based upon the information provided that it is an original Win. Pigeon Grade with factory gold inlays as described.

Without researching and/or inspecting the personally I can tell you that guns that I've priced and had sell with inlay/s raised the value by 25% to 40%.

You may want to give the factory a crack at helping and see if perhaps they could narrow the value down a bit more for you. Just a thought.

Thanks for the question Jim.

Sid Lark