A very warm welcome to Heritage Guns

We are dedicated to the restoration of fine shotguns and their accessories. Using a finely balanced combination of traditional and modern techniques and materials, we work tirelessly to bring these beautiful examples of true craftsmanship back to full working condition.

 

Upcoming Shows

The Vintage Gunners Cup 3rd-5th October 2024 Venue:Hopkins Hunting & Sporting Clays in Kennedyville, MD. This event is on the move again to a venue that have hosted them before. Hopkins is an excellent venue and I am sure the event will be a great success. Our presence in person is not certain due to conflicting family committments but I am sure that Bob Nay of MacNab Fine Firearms will be there and will be exhibiting many of my restored guns for sale. Full details of the event can be found at this link.

The Southern Side by Side Championship & Exhibition 24th to 27th April, 2025 Venue: Deep River Sporting Clays, Sanford NC. This is really the premier, dedicated S/S show in the USA and we look forward to exhibiting our stock, meeting old friends and making new ones! If you have been before, you will know that a single day wouldn't do it justice so try and make the whole weekend. Click below for more details.

Recent Shows

The Southern Side by Side Championship & Exhibition 25th to 28th April, 2024 Venue: Deep River Sporting Clays, Sanford NC. We had the best time this year at the 'Southern': the weather was really kind and footfall was excellent. We found new guardians for several stock guns and enjoyed meeting with friends and customers, old and new! Looking forward to next year's event already! Click below for more details.

The Vintage Gunners Cup 7th-9th September 2023 Venue: Warrington Sporting Clays in Wellesville, PA. This was a new venue for the Vintage Gunners Cup and it was a huge success. There were upwards of 40 vendors selling everything from fine guns and accessories to clothing. In times past, this really was the go-to event for classic and antique shotguns and rifles but in recent years it has really struggled to get the attendance it so richly deserves. We seem to have reached a turning point and the attendance was tremendous. Full details of the event can be found at this link.

 

 

Some Recent Additions To Our Stock List

This gun is the most extraordinary example of conservatism within the shooting world from the last decade of the C19th. The new gun was specified as ‘best finish’ and ‘safety not automatic’ but amazingly with ‘external false hammers’ and ‘knob fixed on guard same as on double grip lever’. It was ordered by Spear & Jackson, a highly successful gardening tool manufacturer, for a T K Watson who was obviously a hammergun devotee but perhaps tempted by the novelty of a sidelock ejector for ease of use and speed of fire. Having an automatic safety was obviously a step too far and the mechanism was made manual by the simple expedient of filing off the end of the activating pushrod! In fact it is fairly certain that the hammers were added to an already finished SLE as there are file marks on the lock plates from when the hammers were retro-fitted, marring the hardening colour on the inner surfaces. The gun is presented in its original ‘Best Leather Case’, stamped T.K.W. SHEFFIELD, relined in best wool baize and fitted with several tools and accessories. Read full details here.	Click on the photo above to see the gun with hammers fitted (although the hammers have been removed, the engraved blanking plus are removable and the hammers are supplied for retro-fitting if required.)
This pair of James Purdey hammerguns are a very rare thing in that they have never apparently been broken up nor lost their original case, complete with original charge label. Hammerless pairs of the late C19th can quite often be found together but as hammerguns were superseded, they were almost invariably split up and sold on or gifted to employees and impecunious relations.  We opted to have them sleeved together so balance, weight etc could be best maintained. Both guns now balance exactly on their hinge pins and there is only 2oz difference in total weight. The engraving is beautifully crisp on all the hard metal which is testimony to the high quality of Purdey's hardening and there are substantial traces of original hardening colour in protected areas. Both guns carry their delicious, original French walnut stocks and forends, with 14 7/8" LOP’s including 3/4" leather covered recoil pads. Presented in their relined, original Oak & Leather double case with some cleaning and reloading accessories, original charge card and digital reproduction label Click here for the full story.
Holland & Holland records show that this gun was finished in 1891 for ‘Dodd’ and is a very lovely example of Holland & Holland's 'flag ship' gun. The original Whitworth Fluid Pressed Steel barrels have survived the intervening years brilliantly and were specified with cylinder chokes but a little choke has been added over the years in the left barrel. There is considerable original hardening colour on lockplates and parts of the action. The highly figured restock is thought to be quite recent and although we have no indication of just when it was done, the head of the stock is stamped ‘AWR’ which might help in tracking down the stocker and his records. The stocking is the work of a very skilled craftsman and this leads one to assume that the work was done by a stocker with considerable experience of H&H stocks, maybe even an ex-H&H worker. The gun balances almost exactly on the knuckle. With its excellent weight and balance, interceptor sears, fine stock and barrel dimensions, this gun would make a superb target or game gun for the discerning shooter. Presented in a contemporary leather & brass case, relined with ‘Rifle Green’ baize, equipped with some accessories and fitted with the Gunmakers’ labels. For more details on this lovely gun, click here!