Bespoke London gunmaker John Rigby & Co is celebrating its 250th anniversary this year, and is celebrating by making commemorative firearms, hosting four parties on historic warships and shouting itself a new headquarters in an historic building.
The parties, according to the company, “will be spectacular” on board the historic HMS Victory, which Admiral Lord Nelson commanded during Britain’s victory at Trafalgar, and HMS Warrior, Britain’s first iron-hulled warship. Both ships are preserved at the UK’s National Museum of the Royal Navy.
“The choice of these historic ships as the location for celebrations is not random,” archivist Diggory Hadoke, who has co-written a modern history of Rigby, says.
“A number of coincidences link the fortunes of all three. John Rigby was born in 1758, the same year as Admiral Lord Nelson. Victory herself was built in the period Rigby was founding his firm.”
The Warrior was in service during a notable period of the gunmaker’s history, too, when Rigby shifted from its original home of Dublin to prosper in London.
As well as tours of the ships, speeches and historical presentations, those invited to the parties will see Rigby’s gunmakers on board, demonstrating their craftsmanship in wood and metal.
“To step onto these ships is to be immersed in the materials, the craftsmanship and the environment of Rigby’s formative years,” Hadoke says.
“Gunmakers, like shipwrights, are masters of their craft, using incredible engineering knowledge and applying remarkable trade skills to create entities which are far more than the sum of their parts.”
The commemorative rifles Rigby will launch will have suitably nautical themes to mark the anniversary.
An anniversary edition of both Big Game and Highland Stalker models will also be released this year.
Hadoke’s book, written with Rigby managing director Marc Newton, covers the very recent return to London from American of John Rigby & Co and the successful turnaround that has followed. A thousand copies will be printed.
John Rigby established his gunmaking firm in Dublin in 1775 during a difficult period of British history, with the American War of Independence just starting, and he suffered a major setback when he was accused of supporting the Republicans, resulting in his stock being impounded.
However, he carried on and became a successful businessman.
“He was an innovator as well as a maker of fine guns, as were his children, William and John, who took over the business when the founder died,” Hadoke, says.
“However, it was his grandson, the third John Rigby, who oversaw the most important growth of the company. His tenure coincided with the great period of invention which defined the second half of the 19th century.
“During this period, Rigby not only played a key role in the development of firearms, particularly rifles, both sporting and military. He was himself a champion rifle shot and competed for Ireland in international competitions, including winning the prestigious Elcho Shield, the oldest running long-range rifle contest in the world.
“However, his most important decision was to re-locate the business to London in 1865, where he gained a new, wider clientele, retaining his links with the premiere Irish families, while gaining new London-based customers.”
After World War II, the company struggled under several owners until the ultimate ignominy of being bought by Americans and relocated there. It became a shadow of its former self, with quality and reputation crashing.
The Lüke and Ortmeier Group bought the company and moved it back to London in 2013.
They brought in Newton to run the business. Newton had apprenticed to gunmaker J Roberts & Son, one of Rigby’s pre-US owners. It is clear when you meet him that his business skills are matched by his enthusiasm and passion for the guns.
John Rigby & Co has become Britain’s largest gunmaker, underscored by a return to top-shelf quality, and its commitment is reinforced by the reintroduction of classic models, notably the Rising Bite double rifle.
“Since returning to London, Rigby has re-introduced the famous Rigby-Mauser collaboration, which began at the beginning of the 20th century and created the template for the classic British magazine stalking rifle, an aesthetic which endures to this day,” Hadoke says.
The gunmaker’s return to glory has led to it outgrowing its current premises and so, almost as a 250th birthday present, it is renovating a 175-year-old former ballet school to move into later this year.
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