Quote Originally Posted by Garvin View Post
Now there's an interesting idea: 'we' made the Austrian army Girandonis!

It sounds quite plausible, but wouldn't it have made some waves in London?

A contract of that size at that time couldn't have been fulfilled by a single manufacturer, could it? If the work was sub-contracted out to several or many gunmakers, wouldn't news of this 'bounty' in employment terms have found its way out there eventually - whatever secrecy conditions were imposed by the contractor - leaving some sort of trace in London/English gunmaking circles, ie trade press/archives/oral history?
Remember that we already have identified a number of London gunmakers (Mortimer, Staudenmayer) who built this model type.

The real question about these proud-to-be guns was: How could they be Austrian Military Air Rifles, if they were made in England?

We how have a very plausible answer.

Reading an account of the 1800 battles in Italy, there was one piece that was interesting. It recounts how the French advanced all the way to Triest (Austria's only access to the sea) and captured 20,000 British made rifles intended for the Hungarians and Croats.

The real key to understanding how plausible it is for a few thousands of airguns intended for the Austrian Military is to remember that in 1800 England is the star of the world in manufacturing: England is in the middle of THE Industrial Revolution. Which is also another identifier that these Austrian Military Airguns are English:they are manufactured to the quality standards of part interchangeability. I've been told by the highest authority that they had 3 of these air guns (civilian and military) and they could not find a single solitary variation in the parts. This was presented to me as somehow a verifications of how "military" these guns were. No, this is just another indication that they were produced by the modern industrial gun parts factories of 1800 England.

These guns have always been British made. Now, they are also legitimate Austrian Military Airguns used primarily by the k.k. Genie-Korps in defense of fortresses during the Napoleonic wars.

As you suggest, there may well be a paper trail of these guns from London to Vienna. We already know that they would have been shipped via Triest.

With all the focus on anything concerning the Napoleon war, bet there is something or someone focused on British-made weapons for export.