Not many companies still make double rifles, but for London gunmaker John Rigby & Co. their Rising Bite double rifle which was reintroduced in 2015, after a break in production of over 80 years, is still in demand. The double rifle, once the mainstay of the deer stalker, the big-game hunter and the driven-boar enthusiast, has largely been surpassed by bolt-action magazine rifles, which are cheaper to make, accurate, reliable and, above all, easier to make shoot tight groups and simple to adjust.
The old double rifles of the Victorian and Edwardian eras were painstakingly tested and adjusted in order to make them deliver accurately with the desired powder load and bullet weight. Looking into the cases of vintage double rifles, we will often see, on hand-written labels pasted to the lid, detailed loading instructions, with specific notes on powder, bullets, wads and patches. If the sportsman followed the recipe, he could be confident that the rifle would shoot in
