My wife and I just got back from a two week vacation in London and Paris. On one of our "off days" in London I left my wife at the hotel and took to the "tubes". After a short subway ride and walk through several London neighborhoods I arrived at John Rigby & Co..

My visit was unannounced, but the Rigby staff was extremely friendly and took time out of their work to show me their workshop and showroom. They answered my many questions and showed me a number of rifles in various states of completion. In the showroom I was able to handle and examine a number of new and vintage Rigby rifles. A highlight was being able to handle Jim Corbett's 275 Rigby Mauser.

Corbett's 275 Rigby Mauser



The workshop









The showroom











A big thanks to the Rigby staff for their hospitality!

Lee
baumgartknives@gmail.com
http://baumgarthandmadeknives.blogspot.com/

Thank you for sharing! Visiting the many great British rifle companies is on my bucket list. I was able to see the Corbett rifle at the DSC show last year but they didn't offer to pull it out of the case for me to handle A lot of history there.

Thanks for posting this. Thank God Rigby is back in London!!

Thanks for sharing your pictures and experience! Marc (Newton) and the guys (and ladies) at John Rigby & Co. London are a fabulous group of people. They are currently completing a restore and refurbish on a vintage .275 Rigby of mine. The project was initiated in May 2015 so I am really looking forward to getting her back in the not too distant future. In fact, it should be ready to ship back home this month or next! I can hardly wait.

I talked to them about "Rigby's" stint in California, which I view as something best forgotten. They view it as just another part of the firm's history. What I found interesting was that their main stocker, Mark Renmant, was working for John Roberts when Roberts owned the firm and is once again working under the Rigby banner. One of the things they emphasized during my visit is that Rigby is back to stay.

Lee

Mark is a great gunmaker and very skilled when it comes to stocks. And as you say…they are indeed back to stay!

Neat trip. Something I wish to do as well.

It is nice to see that there are younger guys working in their shop. Not just a fading generation of craftsmen.

They look busy. Lots of barrels and stocks on the racks. Good for them.

Jeremy

quote:

Originally posted by MNR:
Thank you for sharing! Visiting the many great British rifle companies is on my bucket list. I was able to see the Corbett rifle at the DSC show last year but they didn't offer to pull it out of the case for me to handle A lot of history there.

The rifle that is at DSC and other tours is not the original but a finely crafted duplicate. I was able to handle the rifle at DSC in 2016 and asked several questions about details on it and was then told that the real rifle is in the vault at the home office.

Nice report!
The folks at Rigby are wonderful.
The California years put the name in the sewer. Thank the Lord it only lasted a few years. I see their rifles and shotguns on the market now and they are a glorified Sabatti. It's good to see the company back where it belongs and under proper management.
Did you make it to any of the other makers?
I visted Holland many years ago and they were great.
Purdey would not let me in the door!
Next time, maybe your Mrs. would like to go!? Perhaps take her shopping for a new rifle or shotgun that you will make the kind offer to take care of it for her and keep it your gun safe for security!
Thanks again for the pics and report.
Cal

Very cool. I would like to visit there some day. I really like the lines of their new highland stalker. Would love to have one.

Thanks for posting the photos.

The British version of OSHA must not come through there very regularly.

Neat place though.

The original Corbett rifle now sits in the London showroom and went on a world tour in 2016. Just to clarify, the rifle displayed at Dallas Safari Club and also SCI in 2016 was the authentic rifle. In 2017 Rigby took an exact replica with them to display what the guys in London could do. Most people didn’t know the 2017 version was a replica.

I had no idea. It's a very convincing replica. It certainly makes sense to keep a rifle with that much history somewhere safe and let a replica be lost by the airlines.

quote:

Originally posted by Snellstrom:

quote:

Originally posted by MNR:
Thank you for sharing! Visiting the many great British rifle companies is on my bucket list. I was able to see the Corbett rifle at the DSC show last year but they didn't offer to pull it out of the case for me to handle A lot of history there.

The rifle that is at DSC and other tours is not the original but a finely crafted duplicate. I was able to handle the rifle at DSC in 2016 and asked several questions about details on it and was then told that the real rifle is in the vault at the home office.

Fine report Lee!
It sounds like the high-point of the trip for a gun and history buff.
Thanks for sharing,
Zeke

Cal,

Rigby was the only maker I was able to visit. I would have liked to traveled to Birmingham to visit Westley Richard's, but my wife had put together a pretty full schedule of sightseeing.

I'm a little soured on Holland and Holland. A few years ago we traveled to the east coast to attend my son's Coast Guard boot camp graduation and I was able to sneak away to H&H's showroom while we were in New York. I was treated like a non-person by their staff and don't have a strong desire to repeat that experience.

I really like your thought process regarding taking my wife along while visiting gun makers and wished I had thought of it while we were in London. There was a Rigby marked Farquarson in 350 #2 that I am sure my wife would have loved me to buy for her.


Lee

Just curious Lee. if somebody showed up on your door and wanted to come in and hang around for awhile watching you make knives, what would you say.

lindy2,

If you are referring to my experience at H&H, it was their NY showroom not their workshop. If I had a showroom I would absolutely love to have people come in.

Lee

I was referring to a place where people are working as opposed to a showroom which by its very definition is a place to shop. I am not criticizing anyone for doing so. Just seeing what people say about being visited at their shop when they are working.

this isn't the first time that I've heard that H&H treat people like an inconvenience...........unless of course they're ordering expensive guns.

Purdeys have a good reputation for welcoming people.

Don't know about the others.

I spent a week in London in 92' with a friend that lived there before heading up to Scotland to hunt stag. We visited James Purdy, Holland and Holland, and, I think, Rigby.

Purdy was ok, nothing special. H&H however rolled out the red carpet, and we were just looking. We got to go into the workshop area, and to the special vault area. I got to see, and handle, several very rare guns. We were treated very well.

I have all ways been treated well at H&H in NYC but then again I've been there enough times that they keep a coffee mug for me.

Where does Rigby source their actions and barrels.

quote:

Originally posted by lockingblock:
Where does Rigby source their actions and barrels.

Rigby was acquired by Blaser a few years ago. Blaser also acquired Mauser. The new "Cheap" $15k rifles, you see for sale all over the major auction and classifieds web sites, are basically mass produced at the Mauser shop in Germany. These barreled actions get a tough nitride finish. The stocks are machine made. The London Rigby shop makes the more upscale "London Best" and bespoke guns more the old fashioned way. I don't know about their barrels, but the actions come from the relatively new Mauser shop in Germany. These actions are not exact copies of pre-war Oberndorf magnum actions, and were designed with more manufacturing efficiency in mind. Functionally, I imagine they are as good or better than the pre-war action. However, purists may lament.

I visited the shop in '94 when Paul Roberts had it. Staff at that time were very welcoming. I could have bought a 416 Rigby ready to hunt for $6,000. Penny wise and dollar foolish.

Mark

I am surprised that folk her say that they were treated rudely at Holland's. I have always found them the most helpful, the most polite and the most willing.

In fact when you go there it as if you are their most important customer that week let alone that day. By contrast Purdey were, when at Dover Street, appalling.

Which I though might be just me. Until I read the account of your American gentleman that now owns Boss. Seems he must have been in there the later or eralier the same day that I visted! LOL!

quote:

Originally posted by Lee Baumgart:
Cal,

Rigby was the only maker I was able to visit. I would have liked to traveled to Birmingham to visit Westley Richard's, but my wife had put together a pretty full schedule of sightseeing.

I'm a little soured on Holland and Holland. A few years ago we traveled to the east coast to attend my son's Coast Guard boot camp graduation and I was able to sneak away to H&H's showroom while we were in New York. I was treated like a non-person by their staff and don't have a strong desire to repeat that experience.

I really like your thought process regarding taking my wife along while visiting gun makers and wished I had thought of it while we were in London. There was a Rigby marked Farquarson in 350 #2 that I am sure my wife would have loved me to buy for her.


Lee

That's interesting. I went by H&H in NY a couple of years back, on a whim. Just stopped by in normal street clothes, no appointment. They were gracious and accommodating. They even allowed me full access to the gun cabinets, to handle all of the rifles and shotguns, and took time from an ongoing photo shoot to answer some questions.

Very positive experience.

Then again...racks of 100K$ double rifles...so they aren't short on funds.

quote:

Functionally, I imagine they are as good or better than the pre-war action. However, purists may lament.

Is the front receiver ring a C section or an H section on these new Mauser rifles?

quote:

Originally posted by enfieldspares:
I am surprised that folk her say that they were treated rudely at Holland's. I have always found them the most helpful, the most polite and the most willing.

In fact when you go there it as if you are their most important customer that week let alone that day. By contrast Purdey were, when at Dover Street, appalling.

Which I though might be just me. Until I read the account of your American gentleman that now owns Boss. Seems he must have been in there the later or eralier the same day that I visted! LOL!

One of my goals as a young man was to own a Holland and Holland Royal 12 Bore, I ended up buying a used one and wanted to get the history of the gun from Holland and Holland, I paid the fee to get the history and told them that I would be in London in a few months and I would like to pick it up personally at the gunroom. We agreed.

When I arrived they did not have the history ready, something about the books getting rebound. I was disappointed but figured I would look around a little. I was treated very poorly, I got the feeling that I was an inconvenience to them. I asked to see one of the guns in the cabinet and they asked me if I could afford to buy it. At that point I left.

The next week I was at Dickson in Edinburgh and had the exact opposite experience. They showed me every gun in the place and the guy even took me down to the basement and gave me an old grip cap that was laying around down there when he heard that I dabbled in rifle building.

Maybe I was there on a bad day but it definitely soured my opinion of Holland and Holland.

quote:

I asked to see one of the guns in the cabinet and they asked me if I could afford to buy it. At that point I left.

That is awful! Really awful. I have never had that!

In fact last time I was in Holland's, 2015, Bruton Street, I looked at a couple of their guns and I told them that I couldn't afford them!

So went back around the corner to Bruton Place to William and Co and bought a Boss. Considerably cheaper than the Holland guns that H & H had on sale.

And I had only gone down to the Leica store to buy a new set of Leica 7x42 binoculars as a present for my son before they stopped making that 7x.

And I looked seriously underdressed in all! Just having come from work in France so wearing a pair of cheap black polyester work trousers.

I remember Dickson and Martin from visiting Scotland in the late 1970s. This was pretty much the end of all those old houses in that "old" manner. I saw a lovely Martin ribless boxlock ejector...it was about UK Pounds 300.00. Silly! I passed on it! But in any case for me the stock was too short and a re-stock then was more than the cost of the gun.

Interesting and the opposite of my experience at H&H. First I went in Purdey's and they had no time or interest in a scruffy young yank backpacker. Who could blame them really?

I expected the same when I entered the H&H facility. When I walked in they treated me as I was the most important client of the day. I immediately told them I was just looking and could not afford to purchase anything. I was then told that did not matter and one day I might be in a different finical position and if so, they hope I would remember my visit. While I did not buy them from the maker, I do now own a couple of H&H creations and they are both my favorite hunting guns.
Steve

quote:

Originally posted by enfieldspares:

quote:

Functionally, I imagine they are as good or better than the pre-war action. However, purists may lament.

Is the front receiver ring a C section or an H section on these new Mauser rifles?

I asked Mauser and they said C.