doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com 19th Century European Shotgun Sellers & Agents

I'm trying to develop a list of 1870-1915 importers and sellers of European shotguns, British, Belgian, and German primarily. I'm trying to focus on mid to higher grade guns, not your lower "Hardware Store" field grade types. If anyone has any input or can provide a reference I'd very much appreciate it.

I'll start with a few listings, I'm sure woefully lacking scope of inventory. I'm especially curious to know the sellers of the mid to higher grades of English shotguns. I realize that many will be "sellers" rather than the actual "makers", but that is fine, but reference to actual makers (if possible) would be great.

DS&G: Prussian guns, hammer and hammerless, marketed under the "Charles Daly" name.

VL&D (later A&F): German and Belgian guns, Sauer 1900 hammerless sidelock (model 1900) and later a Francotte boxlock, marketed under the "Knockabout" name.

Regards
Ken

Schoverling, Daly & Gales spanned the spectrum. August Schoverling & Henri Pieper were very chummy(they were the same age) and Schoverling personally handled Pieper's accounts/wares until say 1890 when he developed heart issues and had to distance himself from the work. Remember they both worked at Hermann Boker & Co.(50 Cliff Street) and Charles Daly was at Tufts & Colley(Walter Tufts, Jr. & Charles Gates Colley) at the same time as George W. Van Tine, who was a pillar at Hermann Boker & Company for say 20 years.

Kind Regards,

Raimey
rse

VL&D had a nice line of Francotte Guns,from that Knockabout up through several lovely sideplated BLs,all I have see were VL&D.
Have seen soe nice Slocks too, but not in hand, not sure if they were VL&D.
All the few Francottes I;ve had were from 1904 thru 1930.I wonder when they started importing them?
Perhaps the earlier SD&G had them too.
There is a guy here , Bob Beach I think, he has access to some Francotte info, & has been very help full to others in the past.
Id stick up a seperate post for him, to make sure he sees it.
Good luck with your search for info,
I am a big fan of good Belgian Guns
cheers
Franc

Beach's Post:

"Abercrombie & Fitch was established in 1892 when David T. Abercrombie opened a sporting goods store under his own name in New York City. In 1900, a client by the name of Ezra H. Fitch, a practicing attorney and outdoor enthusiast, persuaded Mr. Abercrombie to allow him to become a partner in the store, and in 1904 the name of the store was changed to Abercrombie & Fitch. The two partners had differing ideas about marketing however, and in 1907 David Abercrombie resigned and went out on his own. Ezra Fitch is responsible for the unique sales strategy for the time, where the goal was to provide an environment in which clients could examine outdoor wares as they might actually be used and the sales staff was made up of practiced outdoorsmen. The store occupied several locations over the years and finally ended up at 45th and Madison Ave. in 1917.

Ezra Fitch retired in 1928 and the leadership as president of A&F passed on to James S. Cobb, the brother-in-law of Mr. Fitch. Otis Love Guernsey, a store employee, became vice-president.


Justus Von Lengerke, born in Germany, arrived in the United States at the age of 17 years in 1871. His father had had a sporting goods business in Oldenburg and that gave Justus a background for starting a similar business in America. He formed a partnership with Ernst Detmold and together they opened VL&D in New York City in 1882. Although the store was hugely successful, Justus Von Lengerke should be best appreciated for his contributions to the success of the smokeless powder industry in America. Justus acquired the United States Agency for smokeless powder and is said to have been the first man to fire off smokeless powder in the United States. He promoted the use of the powder through his participation at the many live pigeon shoots that he attended. By 1912, VL&D holdings had been consolidated into the Keystone Powder Co.

The VL&D sporting goods store made a major effort to import firearms from Europe and was as well known as a distributor of guns as they were a retailer. The brands that they imported included Francotte, JP Sauer, Greifelt, Mauser, Mannlicher-Schoenauer, Purdey, Holland & Holland, WW Greener, Woodward, Boss, Lang, Churchill, and GE Lewis.


Justus Von Lengerke also enabled his mother and all of his siblings to immigrate to the United States. One of his brothers was Oswald Von Lengerke, who with hunting companion, Charles Antoine, opened his own sporting goods store, known as Von Lengerke & Antoine, in Chicago in 1891. Although a separate entity from VL&D, the two stores cooperated in their similar ventures.

Griffin & Howe was established in 1923 when Seymour Griffin, James V. Howe, James L. Gerry, and Col. Townsend Whelen came together to create a business to manufacture and repair rifles and shotguns. James Howe stayed with the company only for four months. Ownership of G&H changed in 1929 -30 and the name was briefly changed to Griffin & Hobbs to reflect the new partnership, but that name change lasted only a few months.


When James S. Cobb took over the leadership of A&F in 1928, he decided to expand the business and by 1930 A&F had purchased VL&D, VL&A and G&H. The purchase of VL&D added a significant firearms inventory, the capability to import firearms from Europe, and the addition of several valuable staff, including and especially, George Henry Krug. Mr. Krug had been the vice-president of VL&D and was in charge of the VL&D gunroom. At A&F, he was given the management of the A&F gunroom and it is very likely that it was Mr. Krug who was responsible for the maintenance and preservation of the gun sales records that we have today.

The purchase of VL&A by A&F gave the store an important and reputable outlet in the Midwest and Von Lengerke & Antoine continued to operate under that name even after the acquisition.

The purchase of Griffin & Howe gave A&F the ability to manufacture and repair firearms �in house� although G&H continued to do business at its own location, with its own inventory and sales staff.

In the late 1950�s A&F began to expand further by opening stores in San Francisco, Short Hills, NJ, Palm Beach, Bal Harbor, Colorado Springs, Southampton, and Troy, MI.

However, the shopping preferences of the American public were in flux and A&F could not respond. In 1976 A&F filed for bankruptcy and finally closed its doors in 1977. G&H was purchased from the corporation and exists today under private ownership."

http://www.doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=317844

Kind Regards,

Raimey
rse

William Read and Sons, 107 Washington Street, Boston. They were established in 1826. They listed guns from W.&C. Scott, Joseph Lang, James Purdey, W.W. Greener, A.H. Fox, and guns marked with their own name.

In the early days H.&D. Folsom handled fine guns

1890



1907



Wm. Read 1902



The 1906 William Read & Sons catalogue lists the following guns and prices: "Highest Quality" Wesley Richards with a single trigger for $595, W.W. Greener "Imperial" $500, W&C Scott "Premier" $375, Scott "Imperial Premier" was price on application, Purdey was given at 89 pounds 5 shillings sterling, and the "Highest Quality" sidelock ejector Joseph Lang & Son was 65 guineas.

1897 Sears Roebuck & Co. Catalogue
http://books.google.com/books?id=CSVIpqnFMTMC&pg=PA527&lpg

Daly
150AE............$129
250AE............$190
Greener
No. 3AE.............$187.50
Facile Priceps....$93.75
No. 6 Forester....$69.95

"The Panic of 1907" hit the U.S. economy hard.
A credit crisis similar to that of 2008-2009 occurred in 1907. Strains in the financial system started to appear in 1906 when American industry and railroads found it increasingly difficult to obtain credit from Europe, previously a large source of capital flow into the US. Liquidity became increasingly tight through 1907 and on October 23 panic occurred when New York�s third largest trust, the Knickerbocker Trust Company, collapsed related to an attempt by then president Charles T. Barney and Otto Heinze to corner the copper market. Banks began to fail when depositors at other trusts sought to withdraw their money and other banks in New York were forced to retract loans. Lending ceased and the credit crisis spread world wide. Were it not for the intervention of J.P. Morgan, and President Theodore Roosevelt�s agreement to set aside the Sherman Antitrust Act to enable his plan, the entire US banking system may have imploded.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 48% of its value from January 1906 to November 1907. Industrial production dropped by 11%, imports by 26%, while unemployment rose from less than 3% to 8%. The stock market, and the economy, did not recover until the summer of 1908.

Hibbard, Spencer & Bartlett in Chicago and both Simmons and Shapleigh in St. Louis were big names, and likely carried high grade guns. Cornell Pubs unfortunately does not list catalog reproductions for Simmons or Shapleigh.

Clabrough & Golcher
http://www.cornellpubs.com/old-guns/item_desc.php?item_id=158

Thanks,

Excellent info, please keep it coming. How about the pre1890 British hammer guns? Second-tier British makers (top tier being Purdey, Holland & Holland and Boss) like Fred Williams, Claybrough (already mentioned above), Lang, Scott, and others that could have supplied the mid-grade American market during the end of the Victorian Era, mainly before the McKinley Tariff?

Anyone with specific info on trade names please contribute. A good example is that I'm still trying to confirm the English seller/maker of the F A Loomis line of shotguns. I've confirmed around 20 models, usually with a number-letter combination such as "IXL No. 19" engraved on the sideplate. The name may have been owned by a specific importer, which would explain why there are so many models. Claybrough, as well as Williams seem to be possible candidates.

Excellent. Great information. He's one I wasn't familiar with. Do you happen to know if he bought his guns direct from England or if he was an importer, or is it more likely he bought from an importer in the U.S.? I'm having a mental block, the name of a major importer located in NYC currently escapes me..

Folsom comes up quite a bit. I wonder if they were the major importer, and if these other retailers sourced their Langs, Scotts, etc. from them? I suspect that they were the major importer. I base this on the sheer numbers of Crescents produced post 1890, starting when Folsom bought the company in 1893. If Folsom used Crescent production to replace previously imported guns prior to the tariff, totaling over 2,500,000 guns produced, they must have been importing a huge amount of guns before.

I can tell already that this "Flow Chart" is going to be huge.