News from John Dickson & Son - April 2025
April 2025
We are heading to The Southern,
Vintage Gun Inventory Update,
10 Gauges, Ducks and Bourbon
We are heading to The Southern
In just under two weeks we will be back in North Carolina attending The Southern Classic Side by Side Championship and Exhibition, which takes place at Deep River Sporting Clays, Sanford, April 24th to 27th. If you are considering a new, re-manufactured or vintage gun from us, the team will be on hand to discuss your options and an appointment can be booked here
We will be bringing some fine Scottish guns, which are available for purchase:
John Dickson 12 bore Sidelock Ejector with 28" steel barrels
John Dickson 12 bore Hammer gun with 30" steel barrels
John Dickson 12 bore Round-Action with 28" steel barrels - full re-manufactured specification
J. D. Dougall 12 bore Boxlock Ejector with 30" steel barrels
J. D. Dougall 12 bore Boxlock Ejector with 30" damascus barrels
For all our Dickson Owners Club members
please drop by our booth to collect
your 2025 DOC members badge
As one of the sponsors of the show, and in conjunction with MacNab Fine Firearms, we are very pleased to offer the MacNab / John Dickson & Son Scottish Round-Action Challenge, where participants can shoot the course at Deep River but must use a Scottish made Round-Action. We have acquired this beautiful trophy that has been handcrafted in Scotland to award to the high gun of the Round-Action Challenge. Prominently featuring the wild native Scottish game bird that the Round-Action was designed to shoot, the Red Grouse, the trophy will be on display during the show and awarded on the Sunday afternoon once the results are in.
Will you be taking this trophy home?
Vintage Gun Inventory Update
We hold the largest selection of pre-owned Dickson Round-Action guns and whether you are looking to grow your collection or upgrade your current sporting gun, John Dickson & Son has a superb range of pre-owned vintage guns from other Scottish gun and rifle makers. All guns have been prepared through our workshop making them available for immediate sale and delivery, and working with our export partners we can facilitate sending your purchase to a nominated firearms dealer in your country. We have consignments leaving for the USA on a monthly basis.
We have just added a couple of interesting Round-Actions to our inventory:
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1894, 12 gauge, 29in steel barrels, beautiful stock
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1895, 12 gauge, NEW barrels, 2 3/4in chambers
We also have a number of Dickson guns currently going through the workshop being prepared for sale:
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1894, 12 gauge, 29in damascus barrels
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1901, 12 gauge, 28in sleeved barrels
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1904, 12 gauge, 28in steel barrels, 2 3/4in chambers, 2025 proof
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1904, 12 gauge, 29in damascus barrels
- John Dickson & Son Round-Action - Built 1927, 12 gauge, 29in steel barrels, one family ownership
If we can assist with any further information on the guns above, please get in touch using our contact form Here
Please note that the vast majority of our guns find new homes before they even make it to our website so get in touch if you are looking for something specific.
10 Gauges, Ducks and Bourbon
Every month we receive enquiries from around the world in regard to the gunmakers records we hold. Often it is current custodians looking to find out more about their gun - when was it made? who was it made for? Whilst researching a 10 gauge hammer gun from 1872, we were very surprised to find that only twenty eight 10 gauge breach-loading hammer guns have been made by Dickson's between 1866 and 1904 (excluding the nine 10 gauge guns made for Charles Gordon). Even more surprising is that half of this number headed to the USA, five to Chicago and nine to New York, no doubt to be used on duck hunting in these areas.
In the records for 1874, we find a gun collected on the 31st of July by Mr. G. S. Chapin, of Chicago - a 10 gauge with 32in barrels. This is very unusual, as the large majority of Dickson's orders originated and were delivered in Scotland. Bizarrely, an identical gun on the same day follows this record entry and is also heading to Chicago for a Mr. J. J. Gore. This is no coincidence, the gentlemen were in the Bourbon business together and likely in Edinburgh on all things related to the Scottish whisky industry.
Writer George Ade, who spent a decade working on newspapers in Chicago, claimed in his book, “The Old Time Saloon” that the Windy City’s drinking establishments ranked with those of Port Said and Singapore as being the wildest and wickedness ever. “Chicago was just as tough as it knew how to be....Saloons were everywhere, many of them open all night and all day Sunday.” According to Ade, it was commonly stated that when a new drink parlour opened anywhere in Chicago’s Loop, the saloon keeper threw the keys to the place in Lake Michigan. “The famous hangouts had not been closed for a minute for years and years,” he claimed. Perhaps the most famous of all the city’s saloons was the one founded by Gardner Spring Chapin and James Jefferson Gore whose “Chapin & Gore” partnership led them to the pinnacle of Chicago fame.
Their story began inauspiciously in the early 1850s. Born in Georgia, Gore at the age of 19, by his own later account, had driven a team from Texas to California overland and then “because of his love of adventure” had joined the Forty-Niners prospecting for gold. His biography says: “It was the day of the six-shooter, the quick draw, and the steady eye and hand, when he was learning his apprenticeship and learning the ways of the world....” Eventually Gore drifted into the life of a teamster, driving a team of mules and hauling freight to Nevada. In reality, when Chapin, a broker in mining stocks, met Gore, the latter was sick and broke. He asked Chapin for the loan of $200 so he could continue to his destination. Impressed with the younger man’s personality and despite that being a large amount of money at the time, Chapin loaned him the cash and thereby began a lifetime friendship. From Chapin’s “grubstake”, Gore prospered and eventually relocated in Chicago. Meanwhile Chapin moved to Fairbault, Minnesota, where he opened a dry goods store. When business there proved to be poor, he moved to Chicago and opened a modest grocery on Madison Street. Remembering Chapin’s kindness, Gore sought him out and suggested they go into business together.
The partners subsequently opened a grocery store in 1865 at the corner of State and Monroe Streets. Gore convinced Chapin to add a liquor department and before long liquor was their principal merchandise. They put out a brand of their own which they called “1867 Sour Mash”. That reportedly was the year they made liquor their prime enterprise. But it was the great Chicago Fire of 1871 that brought the pair to public notice. The Chicago public came to dote on the colourful Gore, known fondly as “Old Jim” because of his response to the conflagration. To keep the stock of whisky safe from flames and looters, he hired men to roll barrels full of bourbon and rye - some claim as many as several hundred kegs - into Lake Michigan. While some was diverted, many reached the water to be recovered later. Chicago newspapers headlined the story. Chapin & Gore advertised this whisky as “fine as silk” and sold it for an inflated price as “Lake Whiskey.”
So popular was their liquor that the partners eventually opened seven retail outlets in downtown Chicago. They decorated them with large colourful cartoon caricatures of famous personages. Chapin & Gore also opened a saloon they called Chapin & Gore’s Cafe. Chicago historian Stephen Longstreet says that this drinking establishment featured good food and had a reputation for being “high toned.” Illustrious patrons included William McKinley, later to be elected President, Author Mark Twain, and “Buffalo Bill” Cody. Of Cody it was said he could always be found where there were good listeners and, more important, good whiskey. Chapin & Gore’s liquor was so good it began to attract a national audience to its brands which included “1867” and “Old Jim Gore,” which the firm trademarked in 1904. The partners eventually acquired their own Kentucky distillery near Cloverport in Breckinridge County. They opened branch offices in Kansas City, Indianapolis and even Paris, France.
Chapin & Gore also became known for the design of their whiskey containers. Bottle collectors are familiar with their several very attractive versions of a glass amber barrel-shaped bottle. Those are attributed to the Frankstown Glassworks and later the Hawley Glass Company, both of Pennsylvania. Also shown here are examples of the firm’s straight quart bottles and embossed flasks. Other containers were ceramic including a jug with a gold lip and label with an overprint of a cobalt “1867”. Another two-handled jug design replicated a Greek amphora and featured a flared lip. The partners also issued an moulded and embossed ten-sided shot glass.
Another part of the enduring Chapin & Gore legacy is a building that their firm commissioned and still bears their name. Located at 63 East Adams the 1904 structure combined warehouse and office space with a street-level liquor store and bar. Hired for the design were noted Chicago architects Richard Schmidt and his partner Hugh Garden. According to one commentary, the pair demonstrated through this facility, “the aesthetic possibilities of the utilitarian building through the use of interior functions, fine brickwork and decorative terracotta.” In 1998 the building received a facelift as ornamental cornices and capitals removed in the 1950s were restored. The Chapin & Gore Building, has been designated a Chicago landmark, is on the National Register of Historic Places, and is an established part of the city's architectural heritage walking tour.
After Jim Gore died in 1891, Chapin carried on and the firm’s ads continued to claim that Old Jim Gore Sour Mash Whiskey was “the best in the world.” Chapin was forced to shut down all alcohol related aspects of the enterprise as a result of National Prohibition. As a brand name, however, Chapin and Gore was revived after Repeal in 1934. At first it was produced by the National Distillers Corporation of Louisville which had nearly 140 brand names under its control. Subsequently it was sold to one of the Bardstown distilleries which produced it under the somewhat misleading label: “Distilled by Chapin and Gore.”
Like the majority of Dickson owners, Chapin and Gore could not just own one and so returned to Edinburgh in 1878 to collect matching guns to the first guns they bought in 1874.