THE .450 NO 2 NE – FEW, BUT DISTINGUISHED COMPANY
In many hunting books of an older generation, especially those written by Americans, one often finds references of professional hunters shooting double rifles that fire cartridges “as big as bananas”. This kind of language almost certainly refers to that odd trio of cartridges developed when politics intervened in cartridge design in the early 1900s: the .450 No 2 NE, .475 No 2 NE and .475 No 2 NE Jeffery.
After Rigby introduced the .450 NE in 1898, they were astute enough to release the cartridge to the trade and many other makers started chambering rifles for the cartridge as well. The result was that the .450 NE quickly became the dangerous-game double rifle cartridge of the era and it saw use in almost every corner of the then-vast British Empire and elsewhere.
Following close on the .450 NE’s heels, however, was Holland & Holland’s .500/450 NE. As Holland & Holland was probably the leading British gunmaker of the period, it was a given that they would develop a cartridge of their own to offer to their customers, many of whom were wealthy Indians who kept the order books turning over briskly. In 1903, the .450 No 2 NE was introduced as well. It was developed by Eley
