Culture Minister Defers Export Of An English Breech-Loading Magazine-Primed Flintlock Fowling Piece By Robert Rowland, Dated 1718

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Culture Minister, David Lammy, has placed a temporary export bar on an English breech-loading magazine-primed flintlock fowling piece by Robert Rowland, dated 1718. This will provide a last chance to raise the money to keep the fowling piece in the United Kingdom.

The Minister's ruling follows a recommendation by the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest, run by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council. The Committee recommended that the export decision be deferred on the grounds that the fowling piece is of outstanding significance for the study of 18th century firearms.

Robert Rowland's inventions centred on producing break action firearms with a re-loadable steel cartridge. This gun of 1718 represents a very early experiment in this particular type of breech-loading which appears to have been abandoned by the 1750s. Like many experimental breech-loaders this design exceeded the limits of the technology then available but the concept pointed the way forward for future developments.

The decision on the export licence application for the fowling piece will be deferred for a period ending on 20 February 2006 inclusive. This period may be extended until 20 May 2006 inclusive if a serious intention to raise funds with a view to making an offer to purchase the fowling piece at the recommended price of £85,000 (excluding VAT) is expressed.

Anyone interested in making an offer to purchase the fowling piece should contact the owner's agent through:

The Secretary
The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art
Museums, Libraries and Archives Council
83 Victoria Street
London
SW1H 0HW

Notes to Editors

1. From April 2005, responsibility for administering the work of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) was passed by DCMS to the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA). Media enquiries on the operation and casework arising from RCEWA and from the Acceptance in Lieu and Government Indemnity Schemes and the export licence system should go to Emma Poole/ Gemma Crisp on 020 7273 1459, email emma.poole@mla.gov.uk and gemma.crisp@mla.gov.uk

2. The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest is an independent body, run by MLA, which advises the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on whether a cultural object, intended for export, is of national importance under specified criteria. Where the Committee finds that an object meets one or more of the criteria, it will normally recommend that the decision on the export licence application should be deferred for a specified period. An offer may then be made from within the United Kingdom at or above the fair market price.

3. Robert Rowland was first recorded in London in 1704 when a number of his barrels were impounded by the Gunmakers' Company. From this inauspicious beginning he progressed to setting up his own business in 1717 and he died in 1721. His name is particularly associated with the guns produced for the merchant John Tournay during the period 1718-19. Little is known about John Tournay other than basic information contained in parish and church registers but it appears he ordered from Rowland 'special firearms' including breech-loading pistols and longarms. Three breech-loading fowling pieces using reloadable steel cartridges have survived but this is believed to be the only one known to be in Britain. A similar rifled gun is in the Royal Collection at Windsor Castle

4. Breech-loading guns are known from as early as 1537, two matchlock guns made for Henry VIII are in the collection of the Royal Armouries and experiments continued throughout the Seventeenth century including repeating flintlock designs by the Dutch manufacturer Kalthoff and the Italian Lorenzoni.

5. This gun, which measures 54in in length with a barrel length of 37 ¼ in, has a polished three-stage barrel, with swamped muzzle and steel foresight. The tapered twelve-sided breech is engraved with leaf sprays and strawberry foliage and it is struck with the London Gunmakers' Company proof marks and the mark of Robert Rowland, R beneath a crown, and signed on the top flat R ROWLAND LONDINI. The bevelled back-action lock, engraved with stylised foliage and signed R. ROWLAND, has a stepped and dished extended tail, swan-necked cock with engraved and faceted top-jaw and steel, tubular priming powder magazine incorporated under the pan and fitted with a hinged cover chiselled in the form of a demon mask. The figured walnut butt is decorated with carved leaves, inlaid with silver wire scrolls around the beech tang and furnished with steel mounts. The mounts comprise a long sideplate, pierced and chiselled with a scrolling serpent at the rear, extended at the front with a solid plate to provide support for the barrel pivot and finely engraved with foliage and a monster.

6. The trigger guard can be drawn backwards to release the catch securing the barrel against the breech face and is engraved on the bow MR JOHN TOURNAY NEAR LONDON BRIDGE OR NEAR KINGSTON IN SURREY 1718. There is an elaborate butt plate that incorporates a swivelling cover behind which a trap has been cut in the wood of the butt for ball, that plate being engraved with a hare amid trees on the trap cover, five dogs running around the rim of the trap recess, a sportsman with his dog, shooting at birds in a tree and, on the long chiselled tang, exotic birds attacking a monster. The Tournay Arms and Crest are engraved on a cast and chased, silver, demon-mask escutcheon.

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