A Fine Cased Pair of Flintlock Box-Lock Small Pocket Pistols by Samuel Henry Staudenmayer, London. 4 5/8” overall, 1 ½” round bright turn-off 96 bore barrels each engraved with a band of foliage at the breech and numbered '1' and '2' respectively on the lug, with London Proofs, border engraved rounded actions each decorated with a martial trophy on both sides and signed Staudenmayer on L/H side and ‘London’ on R/H side. Rectangular pan, engraved thumbpiece safety-catches also locking the steels, the latter each with blued spring, ring-neck cocks, blued folding triggers each within a border of beadwork, silver escutcheons engraved with owner's crest, and chequered figured rounded butts: In a contemporary fitted mahogany case lined in red velvet with a brass powder flask, barrel-key and bullet mould, the pistol tray lifting out to reveal a compartment beneath, the exterior of the lid with circular ivory escutcheon engraved with owner's crest and motto.’ Disponendo me, non mutando me.’
Circa 1805
In fine crisp condition, most original finish, one leg of bullet mould broken short.
Provenance
The Dr. Shaun Brown Collection
Literature
Peter Hawkins, The Price Guide To Antique Guns & Pistols, 1973, p. 126
Samuel Henry Staudenmayer.Former apprentice to John Manton. Gunmaker, 35 Jermyn Street, 1799; 35 Cocksure Street, 1802-14; 32 Cocksure Street, 1814-25. Will presented 1825. Business continued up to 1834. Gunmaker to Prince of Wales & Duke of York. Noted maker of rifles and repeating airguns.
The crest and motto of the Dukes of Manchester. The most likely candidate is Colonel William Montagu, 5th Duke of Manchester (1771-1843). Following his education at Harrow he joined the army, attaining the rank of Colonel in the Huntingdonshire Militia in 1794, having been appointed Lord Lieutenant of the county the year before. He served as Governor of Jamaica between 1807 and 1827, and was instrumental in preparing the colony for emancipation. He retired to England to serve as Postmaster-General under Wellington. In 1841, due to ill health, he resigned the post of Lord Lieutenant and died in Rome two years later. Or they could of belonged to his wife Susan Montagu, Duchess of Manchester (2 February 1774 – 26 August 1828), formerly Lady Susan Gordon, the couple were estranged by 1808, when the duke became governor of Jamaica, and his wife remained in Britain. The duke was notoriously unfaithful, but it was the duchess who became the subject of a scandal when she left him for a footman. They separated and she was given a settlement. An exile from polite society, the duchess died at Bedfont Lodge in Middlesex, in August 1828.
(This item is registered for the ‘less than 10% by volume’ exemption to the Ivory Act 2018 ref MUZ8RLJ1 ) UK sale only - NOT FOR EXPORT.