The Shotgun On Pawn Stars That Was Worth Triple The Asking Price
One of the greatest guns ever featured on Pawn Stars showed up in season 17 last year. The Harrisons of the History Channel reality show have bought and sold some high-quality firearms over the years, but this one was particularly special. Rick Harrison gave the seller a pretty good deal for the historic shotgun, by Rick Harrison standards. This particular gun sale began when a guy named Dennis walked into Gold & Silver Pawn Shop with a beautiful, well-maintained antique long gun. Corey welcomed him and took a look at the gun, which he recognized as French, but that was about all he could discern for sure. But he knew enough to know it was something special. He called Rick over to take a look.
Rick identified it as a Boutet. "He was like the Rembrandt of guns," Rick said of the Parisian gunmaker Nicolas-Noël Boutet. "Before Boutet, there was the art, and then there was the function," said Rick, "and then this guy was like the first one to really combine the both of them." "You had to be really, really wealthy to have a gun like this," Rick added.
Doug said that he wanted $10,000 for it. The baseline was set.
Rick Harrison, hang on to your Boutet
Rick and Corey called in their friend Alex Cranmer, CEO of International Military Antiques, who said "holy moly" when he saw the gun. Cranmer explained that Boutet was the royal gunsmith for Louis XVI, the last king of France, in the late 1700s. Boutet was so good at gunsmithing that during the revolution, Napoleon made him his gunsmith, too. "The guy had a long career as basically the finest gunsmith certainly in France, but many people would argue in the world," Cranmer said.
Cranmer explained that simple Boutets start in value at around ten grand, and more ornate ones go for higher. On the decorative scale, Dennis' gun was about a 6/10. But before Cranmer made an estimate, he wanted to test it to make sure it fired correctly. So they all headed out to the gun range. At the range, Cranmer packed the shotgun and explained that if it fired properly, that would help its value. The boys argued about who would get to shoot it, but Cranmer said he'd been waiting half his life to shoot a Boutet and he really, really wanted to. He fired it at a piece of fruit. It worked perfectly. Cranmer was ready to give his verdict: "I think if this went to auction in this condition, I wouldn't be surprised to see it sell for $30,000," a sum three times what Dennis had initially asked.
With all the info he needed, it was time for Rick to make a deal. Dennis upped his asking price to $20,000, and Rick worked him down to $16,000, using his classic excuse that he "won't see money back for a year or two." Dennis took that deal. International Military Antiques ended up selling the gun for $24,995. Not quite $30,000, but still pretty good for the Pawn Stars crew!