While perusing the net looking at George Gibbs rifles, I cam across CJD3's post about his Gibbs Farquharson (falling block) which had been rebarreled as a 16G shotgun.
I happen to be a collector of British single shot rifles and have a few of these rifles.
Unfortunately for the George Gibbs collector, there are few records of his company's work as the factory in Bristol was largely destroyed during the Blitzkrieg!
In fact, the only ledger that survives has information on just the last ten or so Farquahrson rifles built.
Gibbs made 974 Farquaharson rifles in total so they are quite rare as compared to American made rifles.
Of these 974, there were three general types: Match Rifles, Military Match Rifles, and Sporting Rifles. It is believed that more Match rifles were made than sporters and the Military Match rifles probably are the least common and, ironically, maybe the least desireable.
There were at least three different action sizes and there was a continual evolution of the action style and mechanism throughout production from 1873 or so to 1910.
CJD3's Gibbs was rebarreled as a shotgun at some time.
As terrible as this sounds, it was a common practice to rebarrel old single shot rifles in obsolete chamberings to make them more usable.
His Gibbs, Farquahrson patent use #611 (being the 611th Farquharson made by Gibbs under his license of the patent) was originally what is known as a "Back Position Match Rifle" chambered in the legendary 461 Gibbs No.1 cartridge.
Target match shooting was a passion of George Gibbs and his rifles are still regarded as some of the finest ever made for the purpose.
During the last quarter of the 19th century, competition shooting was immensely popular in Britain as well as in the United States and specialized rifles for competition from many makers were quite common.
Gibbs #611 is such a rifle.
Target shooters are an eccentric lot and the variation of shooting positions led to customization of the rifles to suit.
The typical "Back Position Match Rifle" has the tall staff rear sight mounted on the heel (or top) of the stock just ahead of the butt. This allowed for the maximum sight radius but required the shooter to lay on his back with the butt of the rifle more or less in his armpit.
The barrel of the rifle was supported by the legs or sometimes between the feet!
Some competitors adopted this position and some maintained the head to target prone position and both methods yielded wins in matches so it really came down to personal preference.
Keep in mind, the breech loading match rifles in this period were using black powder and heavy paper patched bullets very much as the muzzle loading match rifles had in the prior decade or two. Also consider that the competitions were for distances out to 1200 yards using iron sights!
Now, how did I come to this conclusion?
Well, one part of the answer is that 611 falls right in the range of other known Gibbs match rifles but that is largely assumption.
The features of this action tell the rest of the story.
The first thing that one sees, once you get over the fact that it is indeed a Best quality Gibbs Farquharson, is that the gun is totally devoid of any kind of safety!
Sporting rifles usually had a safety lever on the right side of the action or very rarely just above the trigger and on the last 20 or so rifles on the top tang.
Match rifles' actions worked in the same way working the underlever but also had a lever on the right side which upon lowering the block comes to half cock allowing loading and getting into position before fully cocking the rifle.
CJD3's action was presumably altered to go to full cock when loading and the cocking lever removed from the action.
I also have a Gibbs match rifle which was converted to a 303 sporter which goes to full cock upon loading but retains the cocking lever which can be lowered to half cock as a safety of sorts.
One other feature of the BPMR and other match rifles is that the grip area (wrist as the Brits call it) is built quite robustly to live up to the punishing recoil generated by shooting hundreds of 570gr bullets with a charge of 75-80grs of black powder!
611's wrist is typical of a match rifle of this type as are the stocking dimensions having a high comb and heel in relation to the bore.
All in all, 611 is a great "Best Quality" Gibbs Farquharson that could to be brought back to it's original specification but that, of course, is depending on CJD3's desire and pocket book. There are only a couple smiths here in the US whom I would entrust to such a job and I can tell you they aint cheap! That, and unfortunately, for this rifle, returning it to its correct configuration with a Metford rifled barrel of .461" bore may even prove impossible as there is a dearth of men making Metford barrels at the moment.
Very long winded, I know, but these rifles are a passion of mine and once you get on a roll...
I happen to be a collector of British single shot rifles and have a few of these rifles.
Unfortunately for the George Gibbs collector, there are few records of his company's work as the factory in Bristol was largely destroyed during the Blitzkrieg!
In fact, the only ledger that survives has information on just the last ten or so Farquahrson rifles built.
Gibbs made 974 Farquaharson rifles in total so they are quite rare as compared to American made rifles.
Of these 974, there were three general types: Match Rifles, Military Match Rifles, and Sporting Rifles. It is believed that more Match rifles were made than sporters and the Military Match rifles probably are the least common and, ironically, maybe the least desireable.
There were at least three different action sizes and there was a continual evolution of the action style and mechanism throughout production from 1873 or so to 1910.
CJD3's Gibbs was rebarreled as a shotgun at some time.
As terrible as this sounds, it was a common practice to rebarrel old single shot rifles in obsolete chamberings to make them more usable.
His Gibbs, Farquahrson patent use #611 (being the 611th Farquharson made by Gibbs under his license of the patent) was originally what is known as a "Back Position Match Rifle" chambered in the legendary 461 Gibbs No.1 cartridge.
Target match shooting was a passion of George Gibbs and his rifles are still regarded as some of the finest ever made for the purpose.
During the last quarter of the 19th century, competition shooting was immensely popular in Britain as well as in the United States and specialized rifles for competition from many makers were quite common.
Gibbs #611 is such a rifle.
Target shooters are an eccentric lot and the variation of shooting positions led to customization of the rifles to suit.
The typical "Back Position Match Rifle" has the tall staff rear sight mounted on the heel (or top) of the stock just ahead of the butt. This allowed for the maximum sight radius but required the shooter to lay on his back with the butt of the rifle more or less in his armpit.
The barrel of the rifle was supported by the legs or sometimes between the feet!
Some competitors adopted this position and some maintained the head to target prone position and both methods yielded wins in matches so it really came down to personal preference.
Keep in mind, the breech loading match rifles in this period were using black powder and heavy paper patched bullets very much as the muzzle loading match rifles had in the prior decade or two. Also consider that the competitions were for distances out to 1200 yards using iron sights!
Now, how did I come to this conclusion?
Well, one part of the answer is that 611 falls right in the range of other known Gibbs match rifles but that is largely assumption.
The features of this action tell the rest of the story.
The first thing that one sees, once you get over the fact that it is indeed a Best quality Gibbs Farquharson, is that the gun is totally devoid of any kind of safety!
Sporting rifles usually had a safety lever on the right side of the action or very rarely just above the trigger and on the last 20 or so rifles on the top tang.
Match rifles' actions worked in the same way working the underlever but also had a lever on the right side which upon lowering the block comes to half cock allowing loading and getting into position before fully cocking the rifle.
CJD3's action was presumably altered to go to full cock when loading and the cocking lever removed from the action.
I also have a Gibbs match rifle which was converted to a 303 sporter which goes to full cock upon loading but retains the cocking lever which can be lowered to half cock as a safety of sorts.
One other feature of the BPMR and other match rifles is that the grip area (wrist as the Brits call it) is built quite robustly to live up to the punishing recoil generated by shooting hundreds of 570gr bullets with a charge of 75-80grs of black powder!
611's wrist is typical of a match rifle of this type as are the stocking dimensions having a high comb and heel in relation to the bore.
All in all, 611 is a great "Best Quality" Gibbs Farquharson that could to be brought back to it's original specification but that, of course, is depending on CJD3's desire and pocket book. There are only a couple smiths here in the US whom I would entrust to such a job and I can tell you they aint cheap! That, and unfortunately, for this rifle, returning it to its correct configuration with a Metford rifled barrel of .461" bore may even prove impossible as there is a dearth of men making Metford barrels at the moment.
Very long winded, I know, but these rifles are a passion of mine and once you get on a roll...
