The British Shotgun - Vol 3

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THE

BRITISH SHOTGUN VOLUME THREE

1891 – 2011

I. M. Crudgington & D. J. Baker

Quiller

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Illustrations, Photographs and Copyright Inevitably, the drawings and pictures which illustrate this work are drawn from a diverse range of sources. The bulk of the line drawings derive from the illustrations lodged with the Patent Office.

The annotation on the originals is irrelevant to this book, so it has been removed in order to make the drawings clearer. In pursuit of the same goal of clarity, some of the drawings have been retouched, while others have been redrawn.

For the rest, the bulk of the photography is the work of David Baker. The pictures were taken over many years, in all sorts of locations, some more congenial to photography than others. Other images are credited to their source or photographer (if known) in their captions.

The publishers tender their apologies to anyone who considers their copyright to have been infringed, and will be glad of the opportunity, upon being satisfied as to the owners title, to pay an appropriate fee, as if they had been able to obtain prior permission.

Copyright Š 2011 I M Crudgington & D J Baker First published in the UK in 2011

by Quiller, an imprint of Quiller Publishing Ltd British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978 1 84689 095 6 The right of I M Crudgington & D J Baker to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patent Act 1988 The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. All recommendations are made without any guarantee on the part of the Publisher, who also disclaims any liability incurred in connection with the use of this data or specific details.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the Publisher in writing.

Jacket and book design by Sharyn Troughton Printed in China

Quiller An imprint of Quiller Publishing Ltd

Wykey House, Wykey, Shrewsbury, SY4 1JA Tel: 01939 261616 Fax: 01939 261606 E-mail: info@quillerbooks.com Website: www.countrybooksdirect.com

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CONTENTS

Introduction Foreword Acknowledgements

6 7 8

Chapter One The Single Trigger Chapter Two The Over and Under Gun Chapter Three The Machine-made Single Chapter Four The Continuing Development of the Side-by-Side Shotgun Chapter Five Guns of Aberrant Form Chapter Six The Ejectors Chapter Seven The Safety Catches Chapter Eight The Aids to Shooting

9 97 140 168 225 244 264 287

Bibliography Appendix: The Patent List Index

307 308 317

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INTRODUCTION

Ever since we completed The British Shotgun, Volume Two of this series, we have been constantly requested, not to say badgered, to complete the trilogy. That it has taken so long is the result of many factors, not least the antics of the publishers of the second volume and their reprint of the first. Now, with the aid of computer technology and changes in lifestyle, we have achieved our goal.

We have sought to write an account of the innovations that were proposed and, in some cases, applied to the British-made shotgun in the period 1891–2011. It had been our hope to include some biographical material on the men whose ideas we are describing, but it is a sad fact that, in the majority of cases, all that survives are the basic facts of birth, marriage and death. This lack of information is especially regrettable in the stories of those who, while not leaders of the trade, made significant contributions, which were patented by others. We must never lose sight of the fact that the patentee is the man who obtained the patent, not necessarily the true inventor.

The pattern of invention in this third period has changed greatly from the middle of the 19th century. The aftermath of two world wars and the stability that has come to the design of the sporting gun have had their repercussions in the Patent Office. The result is not just a reduction in the numbers of patents, but an influx of foreign specifications. We, the authors, have decided that these overseas inventions are not part of the story of the British shotgun and so have decided not to deal with them in detail. In some ways this is regrettable, because they are often ingenious designs. In reality, these foreign inventions are

evidence of the parallel development of the sporting gun that took place on the continent of Europe and in North America. We can only hope that other authors will chronicle these stories.

While the archives of the Patent Office are an invaluable resource, it would be a great fallacy to believe that they tell the whole story. Guns will be encountered which have no patent history. We can only speculate that they may be prototypes or experimental essays that have been finished and sold. Moreover, in recent times, the cost of obtaining a patent has risen, so, to some degree, we have returned to the state of affairs in existence before the 1852 Patent Act with its inspired encouragement of inventors.

In order that our descriptions shall be understood more comprehensively we have, wherever possible, included a drawing with each account. These illustrations usually derive from a patent specification. The majority of patents have several drawings showing both variants and different phases of the cycle through which the mechanism progresses. Unfortunately, lack of space precludes the inclusion of all of these and the reader with a special interest is urged to acquire a copy of the full patent. The rest of the diverse images are included in the hope that they will paint a broader picture and thereby convey something of the world in which this remarkable catalogue of invention unfolded.

Despite our best efforts, this treatise is not the definitive work and we are under no illusions that other guns not described in this volume will come to light. It is our hope that they will not be too numerous.

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FOREWORD

A very great man called David Perkins was asked, in my presence, how he went about making the wonderful guns and rifles he is justly famous for.

“Its easy,’ he replied. ‘You get several pieces of metal, a couple of pieces of wood and chip away at all of it until you have a gun!” Whilst this was a flippant remark in the extreme, he was in essence right, although having the right person ‘to chip away’ is a huge part of the process! Much the same could be said of writing a book but having grown up witnessing the effort the co-authors of the trilogy of books, of which this volume is the last, have put into research, technical writing that the layman can understand, as well as detective work to rival that of Scotland Yard in running down patents, examples of those patents and biographies of the inventors, you may understand the parallel I draw between the ‘art and craft’ of gun making and the production of this tome.

When you handle examples of the products detailed in the three books spare a thought for the

craftsmen who designed and created them; they are very rarely honoured in any way. The external adornment is admired and revered, the figure of the wood in the stock is given the same treatment, but the ‘heart and soul’ of the gun is often overlooked. Yet without the craftsmen who would not accept second best either in design or manufacture, we would be left with nothing but anonymous machine-made objects, indistinguishable from each other – much the same position we would be in if all books about guns were written as manuals!

I do hope that in a hundred or so years time someone may write a sister volume to this, about creations of the English gun trade yet to appear; we have a great heritage and if we ignore it we will all be the poorer.

Written by

Mark Crudgington

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CHAPTER FOUR

THE CONTINUING DEVELOPMENT OF THE SIDE-BY-SIDE SHOTGUN

Given the level of perfection that had been attained by the British side-by-side sporting gun of 1890, it is more than a little remarkable that there was a perceived need for further development. While it is true that many of the changes in this type of gun that have occurred since then have been little more than cosmetic, we must not overlook the fact that innovation was the way of life for the gun trade. Moreover, much of the focus of invention was then increasingly directed towards ways in which sporting guns could be produced more easily and hence more cheaply. In short, there is more than one definition of what is an improvement.

There is probably no better illustration of these various influences than the changes that were proposed to gun actions deriving from the classic Anson & Deeley. This boxlock, or as some would call it, body action, is a mechanism of such elegant simplicity that it would seem that any proposals for improvement were excellent examples of attempts to gild a lily. Yet a sizeable group of such

designs can be assembled. It is true to say, however, that very few examples of these are encountered and while this may be an indication of the little use made of these alternatives, there is the very real fact that many bear so close an external resemblance to a standard Anson & Deeley that unless one is stripped by a perceptive gunsmith, it could well be used, worn out and scrapped without its significance ever being realised.

These remarks apply with particular relevance to a group of designs for boxlocks in which a coil spring is used as the mainspring. The attractions of such a spring are both the ease with which it can be made and the fact that when mounted on a guide rod it will continue to function even if rusted through in several places.

With his patent No. 10,377 of 1907, William J. Whiting, “Director of a Public Company� of Douglas Road, Handsworth, Birmingham,

William T. Whiting. Patent No. 10,377 of 1907

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the continuing development of the side-by-side shotgun

makes a foray into the development of the sporting gun.

The somewhat obscure personal description conceals the fact that Mr Whiting was a director of the firm of Webley & Scott. He had a special interest in the development of handguns with a long series of patents concerned with improvements to traditional revolvers, the Fosbery automatic revolver, an air-powered pistol and a self-loading pistol, both these last two of his own design.

Covered by Whiting’s shotgun patent is the idea of mounting a coil mainspring with its associated central rod in a rocking lever reminiscent of an Anson & Deeley cocking piece.

The spring and rod are fitted into a blind hole in the lever with the rear end of the rod, which carries a friction-reducing roller, bearing on the tumbler. When the front of the lever is in the down position, that is to say when the barrels are open, the spring-loaded rod bears on the tumbler above its pivot point. In this way the tumbler is pushed back to the full-cock position where it is caught by the sear. Then as the barrels are closed, the point of contact between the tumbler and the rod alters so that now the point of contact is below the pivot point. As a result of the way the tumbler is shaped and the pivot points of the lever in this lower position, the coil mainspring is put into compression ready to power the tumbler.

Given the proven virtues of both the boxlock and the coiled spring, it is not surprising that there was another patent of a method to combine the two. Patent No. 29,413 of 1909 is in the name of

Charles Ryland. Patent No. 29,413 of 1909

Charles Ryland. In several ways his 1909 patent is closer to the concept of the Anson & Deeley than the Whiting gun, for here we have a cocking lever acting directly on the tumbler. The coil spring and its internal rod lie in the bottom of the action, between the bottom of the tumbler and a shoulder on the cocking lever, and are held in place by the rod being loosely fitted into a hole bored in the cocking lever and the residual compression of the mainspring.

Claiming a very small change to the established Anson & Deeley was the idea of using coil sear springs, fitted behind the sear pivot, part into a hole bored in the action body of the gun and part in another hole in the top of the sear.

This is the sole claim of patent No. 159,807 by George Hayes of 76 Warwick Road, Sparkhill and Frank T. Murray of 86 Weaman Street, both addresses in Birmingham.

In addition to these Anson & Deeley derivatives, there were other proposals to use coil mainsprings in body action side-by-side guns.

Perhaps the best-known example of such, not because of numbers encountered but because it is illustrated in the later editions of The Gun & its Development, is the design of Harry Greener, patent No. 2,697 of 1891. This gun, called The Sovereign in the Greener literature, is exceedingly simple. The lockwork consists of a coiled spring mounted on a central rod, set at an angle diagonally through the action bar. At the front end this rod projects from the knuckle of the

George Hayes and Frank T. Murray.

Patent No. 159,807 169

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the british shotgun

Harry Greener. Drawing from The Gun and its Development.

Patent No. 2,697 of 1891

action and, as the gun is opened, the rod is forced backwards by a cam formed in the rear of the forend iron. The rear end of the rod is flattened with a slot cut in it. This slot fits over a projection on the upper side of the tumbler, so that the rearward movement of the rod pushes the tumbler back into the full-cock position. At the same time, the mainspring is compressed because the rear end of the hole in which the rod and spring are fitted is only bored to the size of the central rod. Despite the write-up and the theoretical advantages of this

gun, examples are rarely encountered suggesting that the patent was not a commercial success.

Somewhat similar is the coil spring-powered body action gun jointly patented by Charles Osborne & Co. of 12, 13 & 14 Whittall Street, Birmingham and Charles Ryland, then this company’s foreman. The inference is that Mr Ryland was the true inventor. The purpose of this invention, patent No. 2,576 of 1909, was to create lockwork which could be both cheaply made and easily assembled, which would reduce

Charles Osborne & Co. and Charles Ryland. Patent No. 2,576 of 1909 170

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the continuing development of the side-by-side shotgun

Leslie B. Taylor and Charles Gardner.

Patent No. 19,403 of 1911

manufacturing costs further. The lockwork consists of a rod carrying a coil spring, pivoted at its rear end to the tumbler and at the front end to a cocking lever. As the cocking lever is depressed as the barrels pivot open, this movement draws forwards the bottom of the tumbler and at the same time compresses the coil mainspring between a collar threaded onto the rear of the central rod and a loose collar which abuts against a stop machined in the action.

The virtue of the threaded rear collar is that it could be used as a built-in spring cramp to enable

the lockwork to be put together outside the gun and retained in position by the tumbler and cocking lever axles. This is a gun which could so easily pass for an Anson & Deeley, the only external clue being the pivot pin for the cocking lever on the lower side of the knuckle.

Very much in the same vein as the foregoing, with the declared purpose of simplifying the gun’s construction but, at the same time, a throwback to the guns of the 1870s, is the coil-spring-powered body action gun patented by Leslie B. Taylor and Charles Gardner of the Westley Richards company. Their patent, No. 19,403 of 1911, shows a lever-cocked hammerless gun with a push-forward lever which doubles for the trigger guard. This lever is keyed into the barrel-locking bolt which has shoulders on either side to engage with corresponding projections on the tumblers.

These are powered by coil springs mounted in blind holes bored into the body of the action.

While shown on the patent as an underlever, the patent mentions the possible realisation of this design using a side lever. Again no examples have been encountered by the authors.

From our perspective, it is a failing of the British patent system that there was no requirement to state why a proposed mechanism was an improvement. While it is true that some inventors include such statements, others do not.

We can only assume that they believed the virtues of their bantling were self-evident.

John White and Harry H. Payne. Patent No. 137,662 171

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the british shotgun

One such patent is No. 137,662, which has an acceptance date of 1920. Again it is in the name of two men with Birmingham addresses: John White, “contractor� of Boulton Road, Handsworth and Harry H. Payne, gunsmith of 30 Bristol Road, Bournbrook. This design, which frankly echoes other British and continental inventions, is a total revision of the lockwork of a side-by-side gun which would seem to offer the twin advantages of a gun that was cheaper to manufacture but which, at the same time, could be got up to look very attractive with a round action bar reminiscent of a Dickson Round Action or a Manufrance Ideal.

The lockwork on the White & Payne gun has been reduced to a coil spring-loaded rod with a striker mounted on one end. This is to be released

by a sear fitted with yet another coil spring that engages with the underside of the striker and which has a tail that needs to be depressed to release the lockwork.

To return the striker to the cocked position, a third coil spring is mounted ahead of the striker to push the whole assembly to the rear, while to compress the mainspring, an L-shaped lever, pivoted in the action bar at the top of the longer limb, is squeezed back into the action bar as the barrels close.

Another advantage of this design, again unmentioned on the specification, is that the springs that return the strikers to the cocked position act every time the gun is opened. So, even if both locks are fired, the gun is a self-opener.

The disadvantage of the Payne gun is that both

Lockwork from Payne gun patent No. 137,662, stripped

Gun marked on rib only "The Payne Gun Company Birmingham". Incorporating patents Nos 137,662, 173,319 and 173,463

Lockwork from Payne gun patent No. 137,662, assembled

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the continuing development of the side-by-side shotgun

Samuel A. Leonard and Harry O. Tilley.

Patent No. 172,066

mainsprings and cocking springs have to be compressed every time the gun is closed. The result is a gun that has most of the unpleasant handling characteristics of a Lancaster Wrist Breaker. This begs the question as to why Harry Payne, one-time foreman with Westley Richards, would market such a gun in the aftermath of the First World War, especially as Harry is remembered as a martinet, who insisted that the guns stocked in his shop should be capable of being fired without any of the pins in place.

On the theme of the lack of originality, the student of arms could write a thesis on patent No. 172,066 of 1921, for it is a mosaic of parts deriving from earlier sources. The patentees were yet another pair of Birmingham men. Samuel A. Leonard of 720 Coventry Road and Harry O. Tilley of 713 Coventry Road. S.A. Leonard quotes

a profession of gunmaker, while no occupation is listed for Mr Tilley. Their patent covers a whole gun mechanism, all of which seems to be created to simplify and cheapen manufacture.

We include it at this point because the mainsprings are yet again coils with central rods.

They are fitted into blind holes bored fore and aft in the bottom of the action. These act on the bottom of tumblers mounted on a pivot running across the body of the gun.

To cock these tumblers there are a pair of rods running diagonally through the bar of the action and slightly protruding at the knuckle. These are forced backwards as the barrels and forend drop, assisted by the fiction-relieving rollers mounted on the forend. The tumblers are held at full cock by conventional sears with coil sear springs fitted under the front end.

Samuel A. Leonard and Harry O. Tilley.

Patent No. 172,066 173

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