.





May I suggest - if you are over 18 - you get yourself a drink, perhaps a wine or a scotch and then sit back and take your time over this story. I think / hope it is a particularly special story and one to be enjoyed. And if you are under 18, well maybe you should be studying and not surfing AR - you can read on, but without the drink!

We have just returned from the most wonderful, truly awesome AR group hunting and fishing trip in Zambia, organised by Thor of Munyamadzi Safaris and Andrew of Royal Kafue. Others will be writing up the reports on the hunt and I will also contribute with text and pictures to the group reports. That's a story of its own.

But allow me here to tell the tale of the rifle that I took on the hunt - a Frederick Beesley .450/400 double in 3 1/4 inch dating from early 1911. A special double rifle by a well know British maker and all the more special perhaps as Beesley made very few double rifles during his career.

Frederick Beesley was born in 1846 at Model Farm, Hampton Poyle in Oxfordshire and at the age of 15 began a 7 year apprenticeship to Moore & Grey at 43 Old Bond Street, London. The company was later bought out by Cogswell & Harrison. Beesley is recorded in Vol 2 British Shotguns as being "a perfectionist of profound impatience with incompetence of any sort in others!" In the early 1870s, Beesley worked for James Purdey and then in 1879 set out on his own at 22 Queen Street, Edgware Road. In all Beesley registered 21 patents including the famous Patent No. 31 on 3 January, 1880, being the hammerless action. Beesley sold this patent to Purdey for 35 guineas and in 1893 he moved his business into 3 St James's Street. HIs other patents included safeties, ejectors and single triggers. It is interesting to note that some 20 of the worlds finest gunmakers were located within a 15 minute walk of Beesley's workshop at that time. In 1900, Beesley is recorded as being located at 2 St James's St. Whether he actually moved location or whether the street was renumbered is unclear.

Frederick Beesley did not make many shotguns or rifles and those that he did make were described as paragons of craftsmanship. Frederick Beesley died on January 14, 1928, aged 82, and his son Herbert continue the business until 1939, when he sold it to Stephen Grant & Joseph Lang Limited, just before the outbreak of World War II.

But back to the .450/400. After tracking this gun on eGun (the German on-line sporting and weapons auction site) for a couple of weeks in March 2017, and also phoning the sellers, Waffen Obermeier, in Bavaria, I put in an on-line bid.

I also contacted Guy Rathbone, owner of the 'London Gun Service' in Chelsea, who holds the Beesley records and title. From him I learned that this particular gun was made by Frederick Beesley in 1911 and is recorded in the Beesley ledger as follows -

15-7-1911 Serial number 2198 - .450/400 Double rifle, finished plain, lever fore-part, trade cost 16£10s0d, Commissioned December 1910, sold 15-7-1911 to R. von Arkovy, cost 36 guineas.

On researching further, I found out that Richard von Arkovy, living at 19 West Eaton Place, London SW, and a member of the London Wellington Club, a private members club dating from 1832, was a Hungarian Baron, and that he was in fact a valued client of Beesley having bought a number of guns from them including -

18-08-1910 a Harper made Boxlock ejector at GBP 24/0/0 (John Harper of Birmingham became Beesley’s maker of boxlocks and very well made they were too and the two firms worked together until 1939 and the outbreak of World War II when the company was sold)

10-7-1911 two further Harper made boxlocks at GBP 42/0/0 each

15-7-1911 two .405 Winchester Model 1895 repeating rifles at GBP 7/10/0 each (the same day as my double) and on

7-8-1911 he purchased two 12 bore Keepers’ Hammerless shotguns at GBP 11/0/0 each

so all in all 8 guns in as many months at a spend of some GBP 180/- a very large sum in those days.

(A big thanks to Tim Wilkes, Friends of Frederick Beesley, for this additional information.)

Thanks to Google, I learned that Richard von Arkovy, the styled Baron von Arkovy, was quite a character and infact not everything that he claimed to be. Arkovy, married Elsa Schroeder, an American citizen originally of German lineage, and daughter of Robert Schroeder, owner of the Jacob Hoffmann Brewing Company, which brewed “Extra Wiener”, “Saazer”, “Salvator”, “Culmbacher” and “Lager beer” in uptown New York. The young couple, Richard and Elsa, had eloped and married after they met at the theater and she fell for his golden tales of a title, castles in Hungary and his flamboyant lifestyle.

The RMS Lusitania passenger list records them sailing from Liverpool to New York on 28 January, 1911 - Mr R v Arkovy and valet, Mrs v Arkovy and maid - where they then took up rooms in the Plaza Hotel. He was 28 years old.

“Remarkable charge against a London resident” The World Newspaper!

Scandal broke shortly after their arrival when Richard von Arkovy was arrested at the Plaza Hotel charged with “Grand Larceny” having purportedly stolen two platinum crucibles worth $ 900/- from Sen. Jarron, Chancellor of the Cuban Government and Vice Consul in New York. Surprisingly, a set of spiked brass knuckles were found in the pocket of von Arkovy’s fur overcoat and he was additionally charged with possession of a concealed weapon. Arkovy claimed that the crucibles had been given to him by Jarron in settlement of a $ 50/- gambling debt and, after being allowed to call at the Day & Night Bank, Arkovy was bailed. The case was dismissed in the Jefferson Market Court although von Arkovy left the court room stripped of his title of nobility by the statements of his fellow countrymen. It was also noted that he did not wear his monocle at the court hearing!

Members of the New York Hungarian community actually appealed to Mr William Williams, the Commissioner of Immigration, for the deportation on Arkovy on the grounds that he was an ‘undesirable alien’!

Dr Arthur Kosma, of 81st & 7th Street, stated that there were sufficient grounds to deport Arkovy as by his own admission he had served a jail term in Hungary for dueling. Whilst an Hungarian lawyer, Hugo Hunfalvy, living at 309 Broadway, is reported to have said at the court hearing that he knew of Arkovy and that the man had left Hungary some six years before after a quarrel in a leading Budapest gentlemen’s club and had traveled to London, where he met and became engaged to the daughter of a very wealthy English Lord. The engagement was subsequently broken off and Arkovy traveled to New York, with a large sum of cash bestowed upon him by his Lordship.

At the same time, a Miss Jeanne Cheron came forward claiming that von Arkovy had borrowed jewellery from her to the value of $ 1.600/- and had then pawned it and then sold the pawn tickets, cashing in twice on the borrowed jewels.

A month after the theft scandal, Richard von Arkovy was discovered, near death in an apartment in Gotham, having attempted suicide by inhaling illuminating gas through a rubber tube. He was taken to hospital, recovered and was discharged.

On March 15, 1911, Arkovy is reported by The Times to have boarded the North German Lloyd Liner, Kronprinz Wilhelm, bound for Europe in a “condition that might be described as peevish”, but reclining in his lounge in his stateroom as he puffed on a cigarette before the ship set sail he was still able to boast “Nevermore shall I set foot on these shores. America is no place for a gentleman!”. Reminded by a journalist that his wife was American, he was quoted as saying “Pretty girl, but she cannot help it.”

But, clearly Arkovy was not too ‘peevish’ as to forget his guns and on July 15, 1911, he collected his double rifle and other guns from Beesley. The next records I could find were of him sailing for Angola later that year, who knows, perhaps with the .450/400 double.

Elsa returned to New York in December 1911, refusing to support her husband’s lavish lifestyle any longer, claiming that he had squandered $200.000/- of her inheritance gravitating between London, Paris and New York. Elsa had previously inherited an annual fortune from her mother and shares in the Jacob Hoffmann Brewing Company, worth $300.000/-.

Richard von Arkovy did not however enjoy the double rifle for very long. On April 18, 1912, three days after the tragedy of the Titanic sinking, he took his life whilst staying at the Carlton Hotel in London. He ingested poison.

Tragically earlier that same year, his mother in law took her life in the bathroom of her New York apartment, when her daughter, Elsa, refused to divorce Richard von Arkovy. And even more tragically the third suicide occurred when Robert Schroeder, Elsa’s father, who had now taken to drink, turned his bathroom into a lethal chamber by opening the gas valve on the bathroom radiator and asphyxiating himself in the upstairs bathroom of their New York apartment in July, 1912.

Upon her father’s death, Elsa suffered a breakdown and was briefly confined in a mental institution, before going to live with the Tucker family on their farm in Watertown. Robert Schroeder had purchased hops from the Tuckers and the families had become friends.

Elsa returned to London after Richard Arkovy’s suicide, perhaps to sort out the estate. She was then recorded sailing for New York aboard the SS George Washington of Norddeutsche Lloyd, which sailed from Southampton via Cherbourg to New York on 19 October 1912, some six months after Arkovy's death. Did she take the .450/400 with her or did she sell it or otherwise disposed of it in London? I do not know. It is unlikely that she took his guns with her, after all hunting and shooting was not necessarily a young lady's sport, especially such a large caliber. Perhaps all his firearms were sold off, maybe through a dealer such as CB Vaughan in London? Again I do not know. Licensing of firearms was only introduced in the UK from 1919, making it almost impossible to track the earlier days of this rifle.

Hungarian national archives record a Dr Richard Kalman Jozsef Elek Arkovy as being born on 2 June, 1880, and deceased 17 August, 1908, aged 28. A dentist. Was this same Richard von Arkovy who commissioned the Beesley .450/400 late 1910 and the death dates were mixed up or did someone assume his name? Again I do not know. But there is certainly enough intrigue, juice and suspense in this story to dig deeper and that’s what I will be doing.

And by the way, all this information surfaced after I had purchased the Beesley and I am still researching now. To me this all just adds to the beauty, character and fascinating history of the rifle and its previous owners.

But back to the auction. "Madness!" I hear you say! Bidding on an unseen gun on the strength of a dozen internet pictures and a 25 minute conversation with the sellers. Well, sometimes a little madness is a good thing and I waited and watched as the last minute bidding went north towards my max bid ! Another bidder dropped out just EUR 150/- short of my maximum bid an the hammer went down to me! It was April 1st, 2017, and I hoped that the joke would not be on me.

I paid for the double through on-line banking and the gun was mine!

Now I do not reload, yet. I do not have the equipment and in Germany, where we have our guns, you need to pass a course in reloading before you can buy powders etc. So I had Obermeyer send the gun to Wolfgang Romey to test fire and work up a load for the rifle for me. Obermeyer did a chemical clean of the rifle first and then off she went to Romey.

Unbeknown to me, Wolfgang Romey was in the middle of a restructuring with Herr Romey stepping down and a Herr Beckmann taking over the business. It was far from straight forward but after many many months, many many calls and some very heated discussions and plenty of emails, I finally took possession of the Beesley as well as 100 rounds of handloaded 3 1/4 inch .450/400 ammunition - 50 softs and 50 solids. At Euro 16/- a round, certainly not cheap but then again what DG big bore ammunition in non standard calibers is cheap? The rifle was consistently shooting 1 inch groups at 50 meters with the hand-loads from Romey. 400 grain Woodleigh loads measured at 2.104 ft/s.

In May 2018, a year after putting in the winning bid, I registered the double onto my German license.

Having proven that the rifle shoots, now to the restoration. I contemplated having the barrels cleaned up and re blued and the lettering on the barrel "Frederick Beesley, 2 St James's Street London" done in gold inlay but then I decided to leave the barrels and action in their present state, old and worn in appearance, carried over Lord knows how many miles and how many hours and through what countries by, I can only guess, many, many hands. Plus there was no pitting nor areas that were down to bare steel and would run the risk of rusting. The woodwork was scared, scratched and dented but solid with no visible cracks. Should I rechecker and restore the woodwork or leave it as is. Asking around on AR and also a few gunsmiths I know, the consensus was not to take off wood or restock but use her as she is. I did, however, have Michael Kueppers of Frankona Duesseldorf, replace the brown Pachmeyer shaft cap with a Silvers recoil pad purely based on personal taste and aesthetics. He also lathed, cut and fitted a screw in the forend to replace a screw that was not original and where a poor fitting modern replacement screw had been used. There are gunsmiths and gunsmiths, and Kueppers is from the old school that know their craft inside out. I think he fell in love with the gun as much as I did. He nicknamed her "the beast" due to her caliber and weight. I don't think he gets to work on many large bore DG rifles / doubles. That tidy up was - in my opinion - basically all the Beesley needed and she was good to go.

Now that she was tidy, she needed a case. I contemplated a leather and oak period case. But thinking about it such a case would just sit in the gun room and never be used for international travel. A 'nice to have' but certainly not essential. I opted for a robust travel case. I took down the rifle and measured the barrels, the stock and action and sketched around the various rifle parts on to some A3 thick paper and sent the sketches and measurements to Eisele Koffer Systeme in Germany who made up an alu travel gun case fitted with a deep foam bed. Perfect for local and international travels.

In July, I got in some more range time with the gun. Sitting, off a dead rest, the double was shooting 1 inch eyes at 50 yards! Off sticks the result was almost identical. Recoil was not bad and she was a joy to shoot - even at Euro 16/- a pop! I cleaned and lightly oiled the barrels and action, wiped down the wood and put the Beesley into her space on the gun rack, waiting for November, 2018, and Zambia.

November came and she managed the flights to RSA and Zambia without incident and on the morning of day two at Munyamadzi, I put her onto the sticks to show Thor, our PH, that I could hit his target at 50 yards.

The ammo however proved a problem with the bullets shooting high and the cases expanding to the point that the extractors would not function. I could not use her on this hunt and Thor kindly lent me his VC .500 for a hippo hunt. I will have the rounds re chrono'd and check on the powder that was loaded. The general view was that at 35-38 degrees celcius the rounds were hot.

(If you are reading this without having read the group hunt report you should know that it was an end of season quota clean up hunt and I choose the hippo as my main animal being one of the two DG animals on the list, the other being croc.)

I will have to wait a while more to hunt DG in Africa with the Beesley, but in the meantime I will continue to experiment with other loads as well whilst following up on the WR handloads.

So after some 18 months and a not too extortionate spend (for the rifle, the cost of regulating her inc 100 rounds of handloads, the recoil pad, a screw replacement and a suitable gun case), I have, what I think, is a wonderful early 20th century double rifle, being one of not many made by the well know British shotgun and rifle maker, Frederick Beesley. A rifle with a very colorful start in life at the hands of Richard von Arkovy and who knows where afterwards!?

She has been brought back into active life and I have taken her (back) to Africa although not hunting dangerous game on this trip. I am sure that there will be more excursions with her and that this is only the beginning of a long and enjoyable affair with my new, one hundred and seven year old .450/400 3 1/4 inch double rifle.

I think she is an awesome rifle and I hope to be able to enjoy her for as long as I can.

Thanks for coming along and many thanks for slogging your way through this lengthy text and reading her story! I hope you enjoyed it.


Post script

I found out that the last owner of the Beesley before me was a Herr Winter, who lived in a small town in Bavaria, near Nuremberg. On his passing, his wife sold all his guns to Waffen Obermeier, from whom I purchased the double. I have written to her to try and find out more of the guns history. Fingers crossed !

.

Wonderful story, Charlie, and clearly you did much research to get so deep into the details.

I'd urge you to post a photo of the barrel flats as I imagine the cordite charge will give you a clue as to what modern load will work (1-1/3 x (cordite charge) is a likely place for IMR4831 powder charge). If you are not a reloader, then Kynamco in the UK loads similar to the original Kynoch cartridge specifications.

Regards, Tim

quote:

I imagine the cordite charge will give you a clue as to what modern load will work (1-1/3 x (cordite charge)

Not 1.19 x cordite = Smokeless?

Ross Seyfried's calculation was 1.19 times the cordite load number. That's what I use and it works for me.

Charlie64;

I assume from your writing that your Beesley double rifle is the .450/.400 Nitro Express 3", not the .450/400 Magnum Nitro Express 3 1/4".

Graeme Wright in his book "SHOOTING the BRITISH DOUBLE RIFLE" tested 18 different loads for the .450/.400 Nitro Express 3" using 400 grain weight bullets; and provides the details in a chart listed on page 108 of the 3rd edition of this book.

If you do not have this book and wish to have the loading chart, send me a PM with you email address and I will scan the chart and send it to you via a .pdf file.

For instance one of the loads in this chart uses a Woodleigh 400 grain RN SN projectile of .408" or .411" diameter; 77.5 grains of IMR 4350 propellant; Federal 215 primer; a Bell cartridge case and produces a velocity 2100 fps with a 24 inch rifle barrel.

However, if your double rifle is the .450/.400 Magnum Nitro Express 3 1/4" Graeme Wright has 3 different tested loads for this cartridge listed on page 107 of the same above listed book. For example the same 400 grain projectile and 75 grains of H4350 propellant; using a Bertram cartridge case; and a Federal 215 primer; he listed/tested the velocity at 2100 fps in a 26 inch rifle barrel.

Your Beesley DR looks like it was built using a Webley screw grip action, is that correct?

.

Transvaal, it's the 3 1/4 Magnum. Will PM you my email if I may and would greatly appreciate a copy of p 107 loading data!

Thanks for the help and assistance!

.

Charlie64;

Good, I will wait for your PM and email address.

I will also send you page 210 from the 3rd edition of Graeme's book. This page contains a load using 83 grains of IMR 4831 that Graeme testing in the Biringham, UK proof house in 1987. This load produced low pressure (10.6 tonnes/square inch versus the pressure of 16.5 tonnes per square inch of the original British factory loads, but it produced a projectile velocity of 2070 fps in a 27 inch rifle barrel. This velocity is only 80 fps less than original factory ballistics. However, as you will see in the chart on page 107 of his book, Graeme later tested a loading of 82 grains of IMR 4831 producing a velocity of 2140 fps. Since IMR 4831 is a common easy to find propellant, this propellant may be the optimum propellant for you to experiment with, starting maybe at 70 grains of IMR 4831 for a loading and firing the rifle and checking the velocity for each shot as you increase the weight of the propellant until you reach your desired optimum regulation load.

I use a virtual ballistics software(QuickLoad) from there in Germany that produces virtual pressures and velocities for cartridge loads.

Fascinating history and a great rifle.

Woodleigh Reloading Manual is also worth getting.

Cheers, Chris

Great story. Hope to track down info on mine but it is a mere baby being born in 1922. Got some leads but records are scarce for my tier 2 brand

Thank you for posting that. I enjoyed the backstory. Beesley cases, and other suitable contemporary cases without a label, do come up at auction from time to time. Maybe you could make a card or paper template of the stock and action and mail it to some of the UK auction houses?

Graeme Wright & Ross Seyfried - 1.19 is for Re 15 & 1.33 for H4831

quote:

Originally posted by Biebs:

quote:

I imagine the cordite charge will give you a clue as to what modern load will work (1-1/3 x (cordite charge)

Not 1.19 x cordite = Smokeless?

Great story and nice buy.

Since Beesley did not make many DRs, I wonder if the action was a Birmingham trade action like a Webley.

Even H&H used Webley action for their Dominion model rifles.

Thank you for sharing a most interesting story.

Krikey what a cool story. As a mad researcher myself, this kind of thing is right up my alley. Great gun, and great history!

.

A lovely gold oval in the stock engraved 'RA' under a crown. Will post a picture of it. Great piece of the double and it's history.

.

Thanks for a great story.

If my memory serves me, I recognize this Gun from Egun. I search there atleast twice a week.
I know of W.Romey ammunition. Their homepage has been down I thought they actually didn't excist anymore.

Lovely rifle it is. You could use it on wildschwein und hirsch.

quote:

in Germany, where we have our guns, you need to pass a course in reloading before you can buy powders etc.

https://youtu.be/HwPkhbmSoJQ

Maybe the government knew that some Continental factory pressures were higher than a cat's back and feared do-it-yourselfers would try to reproduce them - for use in rifles often weaker than common in America.

Im drinking a very old wine in a rainy nIgth in Argentina Pampas ,great tale ,thank you Charlie.
Cheers Juan