I've got an old circa 1920 Westernfield 620. It was a basement find, rusted shut, ugly as sin. After a lot of rust remover, oiling and banging, got it apart and cleaned it up some and got it working - sort of.

The issue is that the slide/pump does not release when the trigger is pulled, you have to use the release button. The slide release is to the left of the trigger attached to the trigger guard. That's cool if you want to slam fire and these were used as trench guns for that purpose, but I prefer it operate correctly.

Does anyone have any experience with this issue and with these guns? I'm making this into a replica trench gun, already cut the barrel down to 20" and painted it flat black (I had no choice, the bluing was completely gone). But, I'm not going to order the heat shield bayonet lug until I know it run correctly.

Fixed it!!! it was the slide lock release spring. I was able to 'turn it' enought o provide tension though I think I'm going to order a new set of springs and redo the trigger group.