Regrettably neither I nor Steve Nash, for whom he did research on pin-fires, have the address. He offered to send me some catalogues a couple of years ago but unfortunately I was in Africa and never sent my address. I do know that he sold some guns at Ryedale Auction so I assumed he was from up north somewhere. From correspondence with him both by email and here on the Reilly line (p. 57-62) he had pretty amazing sets of catalogues. - he said he had well over 1,000. These included Weller & Dufty from 1972, Evans & Partridge, Hampshire from 1990's to 2002, Nock Deighton Auctions from 1990's.
His name is David Wilton and apparently he may have been born in 1951 (based on his email address). I last heard from him in June 2022; Stephen in autumn 2022. He is a fine and knowledgeable man who went out of his way to help. If you can find him, please urge him again to have those catalogues preserved.
Sample text from Ivanhoe:
Some of these catalogs have not been thumbed through for the last 30 years.....when I see some of the guns and equipment that was sold then, for a pittance of todays money, I could weep! The Weller catalogs are 2 day affairs, with over 1,000 lots, and took place every 5 weeks! A vast amount of material, from every gunmaker in the nation! And from gunmakers etc abroad! There are even rare American guns occasionally!. They had a great cataloger in Doug Nye, who probably knew more about guns than any 3 of the London auction house "experts". Wellers proud boast was that they were not just catalogs, but reference books!
Last edited by Argo44; 03/03/24 01:06 PM.
