July 28, 2014

There is a famous pub in the old gun quarter called  'The Gunmakers Arms ' which was frequented by many who worked in the Birmingham gun trade. There is a story, possibly apocryphal, about an engraver working in a local gunmakers many years ago who apparently, was very fond of a little liquid refreshment at lunchtime at  this public house. During the morning , he had been working on two guns; one a shotgun and the other a double rifle. Mistakenly he had engraved elephants on the shotgun and pheasants on the rifle. After lunch, he staggered back to work and his error was  pointed out to him and he was told in no uncertain terms to go and ' sort it out' before the day was over. He was not pleased! At the end of the day, he had just engraved a pair of wings on the elephant and a small trunk on the pheasant..........