David Llewellyn Lloyd (1910-1996) was an English pilot, deer-stalker, ballistician and sporting rifle maker, of Northamptonshire, England and Glencassley Estate in Sutherland, Scotland. Although already an experienced pilot he was considered too old at 29, to be called up for service during the Battle of Britain in the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) an ...

in the Second World War, instead he became the senior flight controller based at Tangmere, Sussex during the Battle of Britain. Extensive deer stalking, and frequent rifle shooting visits to Bisley ranges, Lloyd established the David Lloyd & Co. riflemakers company (registered company 05202134) at Pipewell Hall in 1936, and in the early 1950s developed the .244 H&H Magnum rifle cartridge, later adopted by

Holland & Holland Holland & Holland is a British gunmaker and clothing retailer based in London, England, which offers handmade sporting rifles and shotguns. The company holds two royal warrants. History Holland & Holland was founded by Harris Holland (1806 ...

of London. Although Lloyd had no formal training as a riflemaker, he employed a team of craftsmen from the London & provincial trade to build the rifles in the workshops at Pipewell Hall. Lloyd developed the distinctive

Lloyd rifle The Lloyd Rifle was the 1950s brainchild of English deer-stalker, rifleman, metallurgist and engineer David Llewellyn Lloyd. His objective was to create a high-quality, scope-sighted, magazine-fed sporting rifle capable of dependably high ac ...

concept, and from the 1960s to the mid-1990s he built magazine-fed sporting rifles based on commercial Mauser 98 & Sako actions with distinctively integral scope sights, capable of dependably high accuracy at long ranges, and of handling modern high-intensity, flat shooting cartridges such as the .244 H&H, the

.264 Winchester Magnum The .264 Winchester Magnum is a belted, bottlenecked rifle cartridge. Except for the .244 H&H Magnum and .257 Weatherby Magnum, it is the smallest caliber factory cartridge derived from the Holland & Holland belted magnum case. It was introdu ...

and the

.25-06 Remington Considered by many as the most balanced of the "quarter bores" for hunting medium-sized game, the .25-06 Remington remained in obscurity as a wildcat cartridge for nearly half a century before being standardized by Remington in 1969. Its design ...

. Lloyd noted would that he ''attached a rifle to a scope'', rather than the more normal saying of ''attaching a scope to a rifle''. ''

Shooting Times ''Shooting Times and Country Magazine'', more commonly known as the ''Shooting Times'', is a British shooting, fieldsports, and conservation magazine, published by Future plc. The magazine also features articles on fishing, deer stalking, gamekee ...

'' voted the Lloyd rifle number 8 in its list of the top 12 Rifles of All Time, and '' Country Life'' magazine described Lloyd himself as “a National Living Treasure”. Lloyd rifles are owned by riflemakers Bill Ruger and

Roy Weatherby Roy Edward Weatherby (4 September 1910 — 4 April 1988), was the founder and owner of Weatherby, Inc., an American rifle, shotgun and cartridge manufacturing company founded 1945. Weatherby created an entire line of custom cartridges, and was ...

, and by several owners of Scottish

deer forest The deer forest (Gaelic: frìth) is a sporting estate which is kept and managed largely or solely for the purposes of maintaining a resident population of red deer for sporting ( deer stalking) purposes. It is an institution and phenomenon pecul ...

s. In his

deer-stalking Deer stalking, or simply stalking, is a British English, British term for the stealthy pursuit of deer on foot with the intention of hunting for meat, for leisure/Trophy hunting, trophy, or to Population control, control their numbers. As part ...

career of over 60 years, Lloyd killed more than 5,000 Scottish highland

red deer The red deer (''Cervus elaphus'') is one of the largest deer species. A male red deer is called a stag or hart, and a female is called a hind. The red deer inhabits most of Europe, the Caucasus Mountains region, Anatolia, Iran, and parts of we ...

stags, the vast majority of them with rifles built by his company. Lloyd's wife Evadne (“Bobby”, the longest-serving governor of the Royal Shakespeare Company in its history) keenly supported him in his business, and helped him to source fine walnut blanks for his rifle stocks from various European sources. On Lloyd's death in 1996 she took on the business, which by then was doing little trade, and ran it until her own death in 2003, when the company was sold to John Shirley, formerly Technical Manager with

James Purdey and Sons James Purdey & Sons, or simply Purdey, is a British gunmaker based in London, England specialising in high-end bespoke sporting shotguns and rifles. Purdey holds three Royal Warrants of appointment as gun and rifle makers to the British and oth ...

of London. He subsequently offered the business name, goodwill and records of the David Lloyd company for sale at auction in London in December 2006.

References

*http://www.auction-net.co.uk/viewAuction.php?id=300&offset=250&PHPSESSID=02dc66f39ebefeae5e80cb12b (Auction Sale Catalogue) {{DEFAULTSORT:Lloyd, David 1996 deaths Firearm designers 1910 births 20th-century English businesspeople