History

THE ALTERNATIVE WEBLEY STORY

What connects an assassinated US President with the star of a seminal UK sitcom? General George C Custer with Emma Peel? James Bond with Sherlock Holmes? Why, Webley & Scott of course!

The definitive Webley Story was written in 1962 by the magnificently named William Chipchase Dowell (you couldn't make it up, could you?) and re-printed in 1987 by the Commonwealth Heritage Foundation of Washington U.S.A. Its 342 pages are full of facts about the families, the factories, the weapons and the ammunition. Serious Victorian gentleman with even more serious beards  peer out at you from between pages of illustrations of guns and cartridges, charts and drawings. But this article is an alternative history, whose aim is to show, in a light-hearted way, the link between Webley, historical figures and popular culture over more than two centuries. My hope is to give a humorous flavour of why this iconic brand has passed into the U.K's,  and the English speaking world's folk memory.

Webley in Fact and Fiction

Over the last 200 plus years Webley & Scott has a habit of cropping up in unusual places and at not always auspicious times. In the late 19th century Webley & Scotts very ubiquity lead to a degree of infamy.

George, you never bring enough ammunition

Webleys first popular success came with its first double-action revolver, adopted by the Royal Irish Constabulary in 1867. A pair of these Webley RIC model revolvers were presented to Brevet Major General George Armstrong Custer by Lord Berkely in 1869. Custer, became the Founder Member of The Heroic Failures Club as it is believed his beloved Webleys were found empty alongside his lifeless body at the Battle of Little Big Horn on the 25th June 1876.

 

CusterCuster 2

Just like that afternoons Pigeon Shooting  you never have quite enough cartridges

Ah Fook! I should have worn my Steel Strides as well

Edward Ned Kelly (January 1855 - 11th November 1888) was Australias most famous Bush Ranger, to many a folk hero for his defiance of the colonial authorities to others, a murdering scum-bag. Born near Melbourne to an Irish convict father, he clashed at an early age with the police. In 1869, aged 14, Ned was arrested for assaulting a Chinese pig farmer named Ah Fook (yes, really!)

A string of increasingly serious incidents ensued  some to this day dispute Kellys guilt.

The Killings at Stringybark Creek

What cannot be disputed is that on 25th October 1878 a Sergeant Kennedy set off in search of the Kelly gang, accompanied by Constables McIntyre, Lonigan and Scanlon. The wanted men were suspected of being in the Wombat Ranges (Shades of Dame Edna?) North of Mansfield, Victoria. The police set up a camp near two shepherd huts at Stringybark Creek in a heavily timbered area.

Whilst in the camp the police fired at some parrots, unaware that they were only a mile away from the Kelly camp. Alerted by the shooting the Kellys investigated and discovered the well armed camp. Sergeant Kennedy and Constable Scanlon had left the camp to search for the Kellys and so Ned, with his brother Dan, together with other members of the gang, advanced into the camp ordering Constables McIntyre and Lonigan to surrender. Constable McIntyre dropped his hands in surrender and was not harmed. Lonigan drew his revolver and aimed. The first volley of fire from Ned hit Lonigan and killed him instantly.

When Kennedy and Scanlon returned to the camp, McIntyre called for them to surrender as they were being held up, Sergeant Kennedy went for his gun; Ned stepped forward and the shoot out started. Scanlon was killed and Kennedy made a break for it, shooting from tree to tree, with Ned in hot pursuit. Eventually he was caught and shot. It is claimed that Ned and his compatriots went out of their way to help Sergeant Kennedy after the shooting, making him as comfortable as possible, but, realising the wound was fatal and he would not live, Ned decided to fire again to end Kennedys misery we may be forgiven for thinking this element of the story is Apocryphal.

In the noise and confusion McIntyre escaped on horseback.

All four officers were armed with regulation .45 calibre Webley revolvers; the Kelly gang now added these powerful weapons to their armoury.

The shoot-out at Glenrowan Inn

A further 2 years of outrageous and high profile bank robbery’s followed and the Kellys notoriety grew, with police in ever increasing numbers hot on their trail. On the 27th June 1880 the gang took 70 hostages in the Glenrowan Inn, and donned their now famous armour which was made from stolen or donated plough parts. Each mans armour weighed about 96lbs (44 kilos), all four had helmets completely covering the head and neck.

At dawn on Monday 28th June Ned Kelly emerged from the Inn in his suit of armour he marched on the police firing his stolen Webley 45’s whilst the police bullets bounced off his armour. A great plan in principal, however his lower limbs were totally unprotected and he was shot in them up to 28 times. (It's not known if Kellys membership application to MENSA was ever processed)

Ned Kelly survived to stand trial and was sentenced to death. He was hanged on the 11th November at the Melbourne Jail

Although Kelly had adopted the motto if you want to get ahead  get a hat, he should have perhaps added and a pair of cast iron Strides as well

Motto: Never get assassinated by a Cheapskate

Our next Victorian with prodigious facial hair, whose association with Webley was less than a 100% satisfactory, was James A Garfield, the 20th President of the United States  and yes, here it comes  the 2nd US President to be assassinated (the 1st of course being Abraham Lincoln) regrettably this bought a further element of notoriety to the Webley name, in that the assassins weapon of choice was a .44 Webley British Bulldog revolver.

Garfields stalker was Charles Guiteau a 40-year old hack lawyer and political groupie. His strange behaviour, and statements during his trial and up to the minute he was hanged earned him his ludicrous 15 minutes of fame. Somewhat of a delusional megalomaniac, Charles Guiteau claimed that he was ordered by God to shoot Garfield who Guiteau felt had wronged him by refusing him his just reward for writing his speech originally intended for Ulysses S Grant, but revised after Grant had lost the presidential nomination. Typically, Guiteau, conveniently ignored the fact that his revision of his own speech left the description of Grants accomplishments unchanged and simply attributed them to Garfield!

Guiteaus preparations for the assassination and stalking of Garfield were likewise almost humorously surreal. He had an earlier opportunity to shoot Garfield when Garfield was at a train station accompanied with this wife. Guiteau in a strange gesture of chivalry, having learned that Mrs Garfield was feeling unwell decided “not to upset her and postponed the assassination a true Victorian gent!

Guiteau knew very little about firearms  but did know that he would need a large calibre gun; his choice of the .44 Webley British Bulldog was, therefore, obvious.

Then he had to choose between a model with a wooden handle and one with an ivory handle he badly wanted the model with the ivory handle because he wanted it to look good within a museum exhibition that he was sure would be established after the assassination  but he didn't want to spend the extra dollar for the ivory handled version. Hence Garfield was assassinated with the humbler, wooden-handled model.

It was not used as an exhibition exhibit. It only goes to prove, it's always worth being assassinated by someone with style.

You Dirty Old 12 Bore!

Moving rapidly on, and some may say from the faintly ridiculous to the marginally sublime, the actor Harry H Corbert (he inserted the additional H into his name to avoid being confused with Sootys best friend, Harry Corbert) always viewed himself as a serious ak-tor and grew to despise the Galton and Simpson, revolutionary British sitcom of the 1970s Steptoe and Son almost as much as he came to despise his co-star Wilfred Bramble who played the dirty old man his father. My colleague Paul Garrity remembers well Harry H Corbert being fitted for his Webley 700 side by side box lock ejector in the 1970s. That proud possession, I am confident never ended up in Steptoes scrap yard

Don't lose it it's the negative

Patrick Anson (any relation to the Anson of Anson Deeley does anyone know?) born in April 1939 and died on 11th November 2005 – spookily, exactly 125 years to the day after the execution of Ned Kelly, is perhaps better known as Patrick Lichfield, the 5th Earl of Lichfield, Cousin of Queen Elizabeth 2nd and Society Photographer.

As well as shooting Webley shotguns, Patrick Lichfield was delighted when he visited the Webley factory to become the proud owner of a Webley Eclipse air rifle, serial number 0001, effectively the negative from which all other examples of that model were prints.

I understand that he was deeply chagrined sometime later when discussing his unique gun with a shooting chum, to find that he, also, had a Webley Eclipse serial number 0001. This was because the then Webley management had decided to make the model more collectable by simply having 10 samples all with the serial number 0001!

The link between Webley & Scott and Lord Lichfield continues to this day, in that the company currently produces a premier over and under sporting game shot gun simply designated The Lichfield .

Webley in the movies

It may come as a surprise but Webley has had quite a long and illustrious film career, making an appearance in a very wide variety of genres, but especially in the early days of cinema, in British colonial adventures such as Gunga Din, Khartoum, Lives of a Bengal Lancer and The Four Feathers.

Lawrence is that a Webley MK VI in your pocket  or are you just pleased to see me?

The MK VI is arguably most famous for its appearance in the Oscar winning film Lawrence of Arabia, as T.E.Lawrences personal side arm. Made in 1962 and starring Peter OToole and Omar Sharif, the film is unique in being the only major cinema release of modern times, that has no speaking parts for women: I have no comment.

There is a certain serendipity in that Toole, who was born in Galway in the Republic of Ireland in 1932, is also starring in a new film released in 2008, 46 years after Lawrence of Arabia, called the Iron Road, the story of the building of a railroad in a mountainous region of China. O Toole stars as Relic, a Webley Bulldog wielding sinophile. The films producers, very professionally approached Webley for our sign off to approve the historically accurate inclusion of an original Webley Bulldog within the story line. As they say “what goes around comes around.

Here's looking at you Webley

Yes, I know that my corrupted quotation is from another Bogey Classic (Casa Blanca), but The Maltese Falcon (1940) based on the Dashiell Hammett Novel, cast Humphrey Bogart brilliantly in the role of Sam Spade. Early on in the movie Samâs sidekick, Miles is killed by a baddy and Sam correctly identifies the weapon as a Webley Fosbery as Sam says in the film they don't make em (like that) anymore. Much more than that, the Webley Fosbery was an experiment to get a hand gun to automatically reload and cock itself between shots. We are familiar with a typical semi automatic pistol with a moving slide, but this was a revolver that used its backwards momentum to cock the hammer and rotate the cylinder, readying it for the next pull of the trigger. The Fosbery can get off shots as fast any conventional semi automatic. Collectors agree the Fosbery was fun to shoot, accurate and reliable. Its excellent trigger and good feel made it evident why it was popular with targeteers some 80 years ago and why in certain conditions it may not prove to be to bad a combat side-arm, as Sam Spades partner discovered, to his fatal cost.

Two Pussies and a tank full of Piranhas

Whilst the quintessential English Spy, James Bond is closely associated with the Germanic Walther PPK, Webley figured on more than one occasion in some of his more exotic adventures. In Goldfinger (1964) the interestingly named Pussy Galore

(Honor Blackman) shoots Bond with a dart gun which is a converted Webley MKI or a Senior air pistol.

Similarly in the film of Ian Flemings (1908 - 1964), You Only Live Twice Sean Connerys Bond picks up a Webley MKVI dropped by the fiendish Blofeld whilst stroking his cat (the 2nd pussy get it?) having fed a variety of friends and foes alike to the Piranhas housed in a tank under the floor.

Bond then uses the MK VI in his assault on the control room inside Blofelds crater at which point everyone gets both shaken and stirred.

You're going to need an awful lot of chips with that fish

Moving on from the small Amazonian predators to the Great White Shark, that had us all squirming in our seat for the 1975 movie of Peter Benchleys Jaws.

Nasher received his comeuppance (and his conversion into 2 million shark goujons) when a Greener harpoon gun, manufactured by Webley, was used to attach the multiple plastic barrels that were to repeatedly bring Jaws to the surface.


TO BE CONTINUED...