I bought it a few years ago and the plan was to shoot it.  The seller said he originally planned to shoot it in Africa but changed his plans.  Even included the balls and bullets he had for it.

I finally got around to leaving it with a local BP gunsmith, who finally got around to looking at it and then I finally got around to picking it up (elapsed time, over 6 months).  The verdict is that the barrels and locks are good, nipples are bad (which is obvious) and the stock looks good externally but won't hold up to shooting.  Darn.  But it is still good looking and pretty uncommon in the US.

It is likely Belgian made and certainly Belgian BP proofed.  No makers marks.  One barrel is about 17 gauge smooth bore and the other is about 64 caliber rifled.  The weak point of the stock is in the barrel channel near the chambers.  Just a nice display piece.







Rob

Restock it!!

My thought as well.

If the barrels and locks and sound, there is no reason it is unsafe to fire.

Change the nipples.

Stock looks like it has been repaired once before but, it doesn't look un-repairable. It can be fixed with Brownell's Acra-Glass easily.

Pull the locks, clean and de-grease the wood with acetone. Use some modeling clay to fill in voids under the recoil shield and inside the lock mortise. Apply release agent to the recoil shield and the breech end of the barrels and acra-glass it. Once it sets up, take it back apart and clean out the clay and release agent and it will be stronger than the surrounding wood.

Your "smith" could have easily done this. Given your timeline, he probably didn't want to do it.

Wpns Man