Hi Gerben,
I am not 100% convinced that the take-down lever is blued. I look carefully at the photo again and, IMHO, I think it might be poor lighting conditions showing the straw color in partial shadows...???
I thought/think this might be original finish as the Crown/W stamping on the left side of the receiver appears to have portions of the stamping "in the white"...but it is hard to tell from the quality of just the one photo on the web site...if reblued, I would think the stamping would have blue in all of its recesses.
The grips are immaculate ! I would ask the seller to show me the "GS" stampings on the inside sufaces...
It might also be possible the 1st. owner of this Vickers luger was an officer and so did not have the old-style unit marks added. Then when the gun was re-issued at a later date (after 1938 as you say), the brass plate and unit markings were added...just speculation on my part...
I did see an averaged condtion Vickers 2 years ago at the Reno, NV gun show. It had been rebarreled with a date on the barrel, but it did not show any evidence of attachement/removal of any brass side plate in either typical location...asking price on that one was $ 2200 if I remember correctly...and it also had "GS" made grip panels but much more worn...
Regards,
Pete... <img border="0" alt="[typing]" title="" src="graemlins/yltype.gif" />