Great post. Here are a couple of thoughts.

1) This is a letter to the editor (a personal sort of feud) to "The Field" 14 Aug 1855. The author states what was "commonly known": That London gun makers were essentially finishers:


2). However, re pin-fire breech-loaders, we have not yet established when Birmingham actually began to make a breech-loader. Steve, you previously mentioned early 1860's. I posted a census entry from April 1861 re Breedon advertising himself as a breech-loader action maker. But that's the earliest found. So who made those Lang, Reilly, Blanch breech loader actions and lump barrels in the 1855-57 period...or the H. Holland and Purdey pin-fire breech-loaders in 1857-58 etc. if not London?

Baluch are not Brahui, Brahui are Baluch