Originally Posted by
abellringer
Interesting thread this is turning out to be, whilst I worked as an R & D engineer in Birmingham, we had a manager appear at our factory who was an ex BSA director; chatting with him produced some interesting little tit bits which I was never actually sure about as being authentic. He did have the last two [or so he said] BSA Bantams ever made, still crated, brand new [ related to me circa late 80's]. When he found out about my air gun interests, he said that after the war, BSA and Webley were colluding, to strip and split the equipment from the German factory, but couldn't actually agree on as to how to 'split' the spoils. During which time Milbro overtook them with the 'deprived area' backing of the then government and took over all of the equipment for air gun manufacture. Reading bits of various posts this now seems believable especially with the inclusion of the motorbike info. Not sure how this may pan out, but if anyone has more info it would make interesting reading.
Incidentally I did actually own the very last BSA Merlin ever made, sadly, maybe stupidly, now long since sold; and no record kept of it, it was brand new, never shot, still boxed; just one of 1/2 dozen rifles of the time I owned in the same condition.
ATVB
abellringer