Update 1^st February 2016

Welcome to my February 2016 Update.

I arrived home from the Las Vegas Beinfeld Antique and Sporting Guns show on Thursday and have been fighting the resultant paperwork and jetlag over the weekend.

The show was a mixed pleasure: I sold several high-value guns and a pile of antique accessories so financially it was very good. However, even with the new venue of the Westgate (formerly the LV Hilton), the familiar bugbears of Las Vegas (silly in-hotel restaurant prices, poor air quality plus smoking in most public areas) resulted in a badly dented wallet and a nasty, dry cough. Why do I do it? Because I love meeting other enthusiasts for beautiful old guns. And you don’t need to pack waterproofs!

The Heritage Guns booth at the Beinfeld Las Vegas show before the show opened on Friday morning.

Note the ‘ivory antiques’ in the background. Never got to take a close look but I heard it muttered that they
owed more to the petrochemical industry than to pachyderms! I couldn’t possible comment.

While I was away, Moss the Delinquent Labrador’s infection of his ‘water works’ really kicked off and my wife found herself working full time with a dog that couldn’t go more than a couple of hours between comfort breaks.
Plus, while washing their clay-caked paws after a dawn walk, her back went. Joy.
Fortunately, our wonderful gardeners stepped in and covered at frequent intervals during the day so she muddled through.

With the old boy hors de combat, Tilly and I had the last day of the UK shooting season out with the local estate where we have picked-up since November. It was an ‘invite only’ day as a thank you to all those who had worked on the season’s shoots and was tremendous fun. Complete with ‘elevenses’ in the hall gardens between 3^rd and 4^th drives and a hot, sit-down lunch, it was a real treat. The pheasant and partridge flew brilliantly in the brisk breeze and under (mainly) clear blue skies, we had a bag of some 60 birds and probably missed twice as many. Although not shot on this estate, we saw a multitude of woodcock: allowing for double sightings, maybe as many at 20.

Tilly covered herself in glory by finding 3 tricky birds that had been marked down as lost and, for a change, I shot well so we both came away with inflated egos!

I start working towards the Southern Side by Side Spring show on Monday and new guns coming through for then will include:

John Dickson & Son 12b RA Ejector with 30” Damascus barrels.

Holland & Holland 12b SL with 30” original steel barrels. Later Royal style gun with baraction locks. Unusual, silver presentation plaque on side of stock.

Holland & Holland 20b SLE with TIG sleeved 26” barrels. Lovely, early Royal gun with baraction locks.

James Woodward & Sons 12b Hammergun with 29” Damascus barrels. Snap underlever with backaction locks and probably unique variant on the Purdey Bolt concept. Very rare beast.

Henry Atkin (from Purdey’s) 12b Baraction SL with 30” TIG sleeved barrels and Teague multi chokes. Quite astounding condition with a Thumblever!

And lastly a James Purdey BiW 12g hammergun. 28” TIG sleeved barrels and lovely replacement wood.

Most of the guns mentioned above are nitro proofed for a minimum of 2 3/4" cartridges and all are pre-1897.

Lastly a reminder that we now have a Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Heritage-Guns/1456166597974211. Facebook is not everybody’s cup of tea but we will post photos and news there that are not relevant to our main web site pages.

Enjoy your guns and shooting wherever you are!

Toby Barclay

Links to our show venues can be found on our Home page.