There is no good way to "peel" off chrome, but all hope is not lost. As one who owns a gun refinishing business I have run into this on occasion. Our solution is to take the piece to a plating shop and have them de-plate it. In other words they reverse the polarity on the electods and instead of plating it de-plates. Not all shops will do this for you so you may have to put on some boyish charm to get it done. Good luck.

Six volt guy living in a twelve volt world