James Purdey & Sons

James Purdey & Sons, or simply Purdey, is a British gunmaker based in London, England. It specialises in high-end bespoke sporting shotguns and rifles. Purdey holds Royal Warrants of appointment as gun and rifle makers to the British and other European royal families.

James Purdey was born in Whitechapel in 1784 and apprenticed to his brother-in-law, Thomas Keck Hutchinson. After completing his training, he worked for both Joseph Manton and the Rev. Alexander Forsyth before establishing his own company in London in 1814. He located his business on Princes Street, now Wardour Street, near Leicester Square.^{[citation needed]}

In 1826, the company moved from Princes Street to Manton's former premises at 314-315 Oxford Street. Due to a conflict of numbering, the business used the address ‘314½ Oxford Street’ from 1827.^{[citation needed]}

The founder's son, James Purdey the Younger, took over the company's running from his father in 1858. James the Younger saw rapid change in the development and design of guns and rifles during his lifetime, essentially moving from muzzle loading flintlocks in the 1820s to breech loadinghammerless ejectors by the 1890s. James the Younger was always at the forefront of advances in designing and building his guns and rifles, and he took out several patents for technical innovations over the years. These included the famous 'Purdey Bolts' locking system, and his concealed third "bite" (square notch that holds the side-by-side barrels closed). Both remain in production today, and other gunmakers have adopted these features.^{[citation needed]}

In 1878 James the Younger took two of his sons into the business, renaming it James Purdey & Sons. In 1882, the company moved from Oxford Street to new premises at 57-58 South Audley Street, on the corner with Mount Street, where the company remains today. James the Younger designed this building to accommodate his showroom and the factory, and later, the building provided living quarters for James' family. The City of Westminster unveiled a memorial plaque on the shop at 57-60 South Audley Street on 30 April 1992.^{[citation needed]}

Purdey introduced their self-opening hammerless gun in 1880. Designed by Frederick Beesley, a former Purdey craftsman, his hammerless self-opening mechanism uses one limb of a V-spring to operate the internal hammers and the other to operate the self-opening feature. This action was modified in 1888 through the incorporation of William Wem’s ejector design. Apart from occasional refinement and the optional single trigger mechanism, very little change has subsequently been made to the design of the side-by-side gun.^{[citation needed]}

In 1900, Athol Purdey took over from his father and ran the business through the prosperous Edwardian years, as well as supervising Purdey's manufacturing of sniper rifles and aerial gunnery sights for the War Office during World War I. Athol's sons, James and Tom, both of whom had served in France, joined the firm in the 1920s.^{[citation needed]}

On 2 October 1925 James Purdey & Sons became a limited company, taking on investment from Jim Purdey’s in-laws, the Oliver family. Athol Purdey continued to run the business until 1929, when he was succeeded by Tom. In 1935, the Oliver family sold their shares to Sir Wyndham Portal and Major Godfrey Miller-Mundy, who in turn sold them to John Cobbold in November 1943. Sadly he was killed when the Guard’s Chapel was hit by a V1 bomb on 18 June 1944. In 1946, Tom Purdey convinced Hugh Seely, 1st Baron Sherwood, to purchase the shares, eventually passing them to his nephew, the Hon. Richard Beaumont. Tom Purdey remained the Chairman of the company until his retirement in 1955 due to ill health, with day-to-day management of the company being handled by the Managing Director, Harry Lawrence. Richard Beaumont became Chairman of the company in 1970, and in 1994, upon deciding to retire, sold James Purdey & Sons Ltd to Compagnie Financière Richemont SA.