BY JOHN TWIGG, LONDON, CIRCA 1781-87

Details

An Exceptional 88-Bore Seven-Barrel Flintlock Box-Lock Pepperbox Revolver
By John Twigg, London, circa 1781-87
With hand-rotated turn-off barrels, engraved action signed within trophies of arms, engraved thumbpiece safety-catch also locking the steel and retaining traces of original blued finish, rollers, steel-spring also with some original blued finish, wing-headed tension adjuster on the left side, engraved trigger-guard, and flat-sided figured walnut butt (minor bruising), in fine condition throughout apart from some minor rust staining
9¾in. (24.8cm.)

Provenance

Mrs. A.C. Eccles, sold in these Rooms 8 December 1969, lot 176 (1,750 gns. to Neal)
Clay P. Bedford Collection, Phoenix, Arizona (no. 1506)
Anon. sale in these Rooms 20 November 1991, lot 300 (£12,650 including premium, to the W. Keith Neal Foundation)

Literature

Peter Hawkins, The Price Guide to Antique Guns and Pistols, p. 194 The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Early Firearms of Great Britain and Ireland from the Collection of Clay P. Bedford, p. 177
W. Keith Neal and D.H.L. Back, Great British Gunmakers 1740-1790, pp. 54-5, 163, plates 149-150

Exhibited

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1971, cat. no. 199
The Game Fair, Shuttleworth Old Warden Park, 27-29 July 2001

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price plus buyer's premium.

Lot Essay

Clay P. Bedford (1903-1991) was involved in a host of large-scale construction projects during his distinguished career with Kaiser Industries. These included the Central Highway in Cuba and the Boulder Dam. He was also a committed and knowledgeable collector, initially of Huguenot silver, and subsequently of British, then Continental antique firearms. Highlights from his very extensive firearms collection (much of it acquired from Keith Neal) were exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1971, and at Colonial Williamsburg in Virginia, in 1977. The collection is now dispersed
This pistol, probably the finest survivng example of the later type of flintlock pepperbox revolver, fires the first five barrels individually, and the last two together, giving an impressive finale

More from FINE ANTIQUE FIREARMS FROM THE W KEITH NEAL COLLECTION

View All