644 Ifcings of tbe 1Rofc, tttfle, anb Gun 



and all who love rifle-shooting the wide world over, 

 is that of Sir Henry St. John Halford, "the Father 

 of Rifle-shooting." The son of the famous Court 

 physician, whom Colonel Hawker, the greatest sportsman 

 of his time, dubbed " the Chesterfield of Physicians/' 

 Henry Halford was born at Maidwell, in Northampton- 

 shire, on August Qth, 1828. Among his contemporaries 

 at Oxford he had few superiors as an athlete and 

 all-round sportsman. He and three other Oxonians 

 rowed a four-oared boat six hundred miles on the 

 Rhine, the Maine, and the Moselle, to the wonder 

 and admiration of the natives. A bold rider to hounds, 

 a keen fisherman, an accomplished yachtsman, and a 

 dead shot with gun and rifle, Halford was the very 

 type and model of a fine English sportsman. As soon 

 as the Volunteer movement was started he went in 

 for it heart and soul. The First Volunteer Battalion 

 of the Leicestershire Regiment, of which he was Colonel 

 for many years, owed its origin to his zeal ; and when 

 he resigned the active command in 1891 he could point 

 to it with pride as one of the largest and most efficient 

 corps in the kingdom 1,100 strong. 



As a practical expert in the science of rifle-shooting 

 and riflemaking Sir Henry Halford had no equal. 

 He had, attached to the conservatory at Wistow Hall, 

 a workshop elaborately fitted with every appliance for 

 gunmaking, and he was frequently hard at work 

 experimenting in this shop from eight o'clock in the 

 morning to eleven o'clock at night. 



As a marksman he was always in the very front 

 rank. In 1862 he was first in the competition for 



