The Whitaker Special

(Don't you just hate it when somebody mentions something you have never heard of, be it a rifle, camera or car! )

After lunch I walked into Fultons at Bisley and started asking questions, a few days later I walked out with my first Whitaker Special which was fitted with a Swing rear sight, although I found out much later that both Wilkes & Swing sights were made by Churwick Engineering before the company became RPA makers of fine target rifles.

The Whitaker Special is one of the more unusual 7.62mm conversions of the No.4; it was the brainchild of Herbert (Bert) Whitaker who was a contemporary of Major EGB Reynolds and both had worked worked at the Royal Small Arms Factory at Enfield Lock. 

Bert Whitaker's previous work at Enfield had included working on the ill fated EM2 project and then afterwards on the FN designed FAL making it a more acceptable package for British troops, although I for one found it rather long for urban use as a young squaddie back when Bert was designing his "Special".

In essence Bert was not only a very good engineer he was also along with Major Reynolds one of the UK's top shots winning the Grand Aggregate at Bisley. 

The rifle features a one piece wood stock which was made in a furniture factory in Hackney London, the owner of the factory believes Bert was directed there by the owner of Sterling Armaments who had tries to sportify the AR18 rifle by fitting a wooden stock & butt to make it look less military to the UK police forces.

Bert wanted his rifle finished in walnut which was proving to be expensive, Victor Toogood the factory owner suggested Afromosa, an African hard wood with a reddish appearance which proved cheaper and equally as durable as walnut.

 

Out of a total number of 117 Whitaker's built, 8 had walnut stocks and 3 were made of Rosewood and the rest all had Afromosa stocks.

Two examples with differing stocks, note also the trigger guard from the donor No.4 fitted backwards, I had owned my first Whitaker for well over a year before I noticed this oddity, the engineers amongst you will probably think, if it works like that, it works! 

Bert sold his first Whitaker Special in July of 1973 and by the end of the year has sold almost thirty of them. Many examples bear the marks of being a former No.4 T, not only was Bert a good engineer he was also a first class salesman, who could resist not buying an ex sniper rifle! 

Although having virtually nothing left of the No.4 T after the barrel and woodwork were junked it was still an "ex sniper" in many peoples eyes so had to accurate.

And accurate they were....

1976 was to have it highs and lows, having come first and second in the Canadian Governor Generals prize (Bert was second to his friend Ray) they then travelled on to Camp Parry where Bert failed to emerge from his tent one morning and had died of heart failure during his sleep.

Bert's son Christopher told me that Bert was aware of his ill health but carried on regardless. 

After his death the rest of Bert's unfinished stock went to Geoff Hart a Cheltenham gunsmith who was also a winner of the Grand Aggregate at Bisley, Geoff was able to fit different stocks and also a Brindles trigger to make what I believe was probably overall the best conversion of a No.4 there has ever been.

I've always felt that life had robbed Bert of progressing with his design.

Foreend detail proclaiming to the world exactly what this rifle is. 

Swing sight (Churwick Engineering) on my first Whitaker, the one I use now has an AJ Parker 4/47 twin zero which is my favourite rear sight for these transitional rifle as we call them in Bisley's historic class system.

On a very trivial point, most of Bert's rifles were assembled in the gun room of the South London Rifle Club which is in the same building as Fultons being directly behind. 

And lastly, because the stock lugs were cut off during the conversion process Bert has had a number of detractors in recent years, it must be remembered that the UK gun trade was awash with No.4's during the 1970's and they could be purchased very cheaply, the No.4T receiver's that were used didn't have scopes on them as far as my research has revealed to date.   

We tease our good friend who it seemed would cross fire at least once every match.  So we renamed the cross fire to his last name with a “ed” extension. We only do this of course, because he is an exceptional shot and such a good friend.  We all try to get next to him on the line hoping we will be the beneficiary of one of his cross fire X’s.   The frustrating thing is he would still win the match even with loosing 10 points from cross firing!

As we have discussed, you may get better results with a longer (heavier) tangent ogive bullet, like the 175 SMK.  Those secant ogive and hybrids are tricky to get to shoot well, which I think the Scenar is.  Hopefully the availability of bullets in the UK will get better soon.