The Hanquets – Gun
Dynasty of Liège
The Hanquet Family Story:
For centuries the Liège area in Belgium was a center of gun making and
international gun trading. Today many of the smaller manufacturers were
absorbed or simply disappeared. Others like FN are now members of multinational
conglomerates specialized in weaponry for police or military. Well-known
companies like Francotte found their market niche and supply the high-end
customers with luxurious rifles. Famous Grimaud switched from manufacturing to import
and wholesale.
Let’s Reach Back Through Time to the 18th Century
to the roots of the gun maker dynasty Hanquet. The blacksmith Martin Hanquet (1738-1810) served local
farmers in a Liège suburb. He added ironmongery to his shop which son Martin
(1764-1837) diversified into making nails for the booming shipbuilding
industry. Thanks to his entrepreneurial attitude he smelled the down spiraling
of the latter and branched out to selling guns as early as 1796! But he started
another nails, copper, edged weapons and firearms business in 1809. Martin
retired at 62 and passed his enterprise to his children Jean Nicholas, Jean Baptiste
(1800-1877) and Jeanne Francoise.
The firm was renamed Martin Hanquet and
Cie. When the company was liquidated 1829 Martin took over the nail
business again, Jean Baptiste the warehouse and Jean Nicolas the guns.
Ferdinand Hanquet’s Vision: 1836 Jean Nicolas entered into a venture
with Ancion et Fils to become market
leader for military guns. Their new company named FABRIQUES D’ARMES DE LIÈGE
(FAL) was registeredas Ancion, Hanquet
et Cie. They were the most important gun makers of the time. Between 1849
and 1859 they made around 60,000 to 70,000 guns per year with a record high of
91,164 in1850. That equals more than 20 % of the total gun production of all
Liège gun makers combined. 1840 Jean Nicholas opened a branch office in
Rio de Janeiro 1840 to conquer the South American market for the family
business. Brother Jean Baptiste
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Rifle marked “H&Cie” for Hanquet & Cie |
Cased set of pistols was made by Jean Baptise
Hanquet 1850.
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merged warehouse and gun business in a new gun manufacturing company. While his
production output was lower than FAL in 1849 he was already number 4 in Liège,
after FAL, the Renkin brothers and the Pirlot brothers.
His son Ferdinand (1812-1909) grew the business further but first relocated the company within Liège to Rue du Laven. Of Ferdinand’s 6 sons Paul (1889-1938), Emmanuel (1881-1944) and Emiel (1888-1918) worked
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Ferdinand Hanquet 1865 |
Liège
made pinfire revolver marked “H“ for Ferdinand Hanquet their way up in the family company now
registered as Fand
Hanquet. Ferdinand Hanquet made
his business visions come true and
finally
merged with FABRIQUES D’ARMES RÉUNIES and FABRIQUE D’ARMES UNIES DE LIÈGE.
The name of the new company was FABRIQUES D’ARMES UNIES DE LIÈGE (FAUL).
After his death Paul took
helm, assisted by brother Emmanuel.
Paul was to be President and Emmanuel Chief Executive. 1938 Paul was succeeded
by another brother, Joseph. Paul
Hanquet Jr (1907- 1986), Paul’s son and cousin Albert (1915-2003), Emmanuel’s son were the successors. |
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Paul Hanquet Jr. |
Albert Hanquet |
|
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Albert’s
daughter Nadine, born in 1947, was
in charge from 1974 after Paul (1969/70) and her dad stepped down. The
corporate sign at Rue Trappé Nr. 22 reads
FABRIQUES
D’ARMES UNIES DE LIÈGE
SOCIÉTE
ANONYME
ANCIENNES
FIRMES
FABRIQUES
D’ARMES RÉUNIES
FABRIQUE
D’ARMES DE LIÈGE
FAND
HANQUET
Albert and Nadine Hanquet in front of FAUL’s at Rue
Trappé Nr. 22 (1992)
The
gun production at FAUL's was discontinued in 1976. When the Hanquet gun
business was sold in June 1992 the gun import and wholesale business were the
core activities during the later years.
Hanquet Guns in Historical Perspective:
Few gun manufacturers can live on the civilian market
from hunters and sport shooters alone. However, to survive a profitable
government business is mandatory. That is a gun business fact today and was
yesteryear. Many Liège gun makers made and still make great efforts to sell
their weaponry to the Americas. Military muzzle loading rifles were an
important financial backbone of Hanquet’s gun business during the 19th
and the 20th century.
·
During the American Civil
War Jean Baptiste supplied muzzle loading rifles to compete with Enfields and
Springfields. After the war these now obsolete muzzleloaders were replaced by
cartridge loaded rifles.
·
When US arsenals wanted to
get rid of their muzzle loader surplus many of the Hanquet rifles were brought
back to Belgium. Hanquet realized the emerging colonial markets and had them
altered for sale in Africa. Since natives there could not have modern cartridge
firing rifles this alteration meant fitting smooth bore barrels! Hanquet’s
muskets and shotguns had a reputation of excellent quality and were sold then
to markets like Congo, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and other colonies with vast
hunting grounds. For the English colonies this alteration had to be pushed even
further and a flintlock had to be fitted. Until the 1950s regular sales were
5,000 to 6,000 of such crude but shootable and functionally constructed hunting
rifles per year. They were made of composites of old and new parts.
·
With many former colonies
being released into independence and the following change of their gun
regulations Hanquet was left with a huge inventory of muzzle loaders and spares
in the late 1950s. The good news came from the other side of the Atlantic with
the hype of old firearms collecting, re-enacting, replicas and commemoratives.
Between 1960 and 1980 thousands of finished guns but also kits were sold into
the USA but also in Europe. Therefore, many of the Hanquet rifles made this
trip over the big pond now for the 3rd time. And the Centaure
C&B revolver certainly was a highlight in this endeavor! To this FAUL added
a line of replicas of flintlock and percussion rifles, shotguns and pistols.
|
FAUL
made Harpers Ferry M 1807 flintlock pistol |
View of
the flint lock |
But the Hanquets did not stop at muzzle loading
rifles. The end of the 19th and the early 20th century
was the hay market for their simple and little cartridge revolvers for
self-protection and concealed carry: the fat one was dubbed BULLDOG (.44
caliber), another one in 5,6 mm caliber called VELODOG targeted at the
cyclists, even another and smaller one named PUPPIE. Most of these revolvers
don’t sport a Hanquet manufacturer’s trademark but the Liège ELG proof mark
only. Their dealers worldwide would apply their own logo.
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FAUL’s early corporate logo |
During this time a line of pistols was launched
under FAUL’s trademark Centaure,
registered in 1913 to Emile Hanquet.
This stylized rampant centaur
closely resembles the rampant colt of Colt’s (rampant colt design registered
by Colt 1890). It is different from the colt but still close enough to signal
the close cooperation between the two companies. Under their centaur logo a wide variety of guns were
manufactured. This also explains why no percussion revolvers have surfaced
with the centaur logo before 1960: FAUL’s did not
produce such revolvers after 1913. |
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FAUL’s late corporate logo |
That is until the “1960 NEW MODEL ARMY” was launched 1960. |
·
When John Moses Browning
visited Belgium searching for a manufacturer and landed his deal with FN he had
also approached Hanquet. They settled for a Browning patent revolver named
CHARISMA.
·
During the period
1892-1907 Hanquet’s manufactured copies of the Colt New Army and Navy.
·
When FN introduced their
auto pistols model 1900 and 1903 this evolved into a real blow for Hanquet’s
little revolver sales. Answer to the threat was a revolver for the 6,35
Browning cartridge with folding trigger/without trigger guard, alternatively
with traditional trigger/trigger guard. The grip contained a little magazine
for spare rounds. However, this ended Hanquet’s success with pocket pistols.
·
During the Russian
Revolution FAUL copied the famous Nagant revolver in 7,62 Nagant cal.
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12
gauge hammerless shotgun from 1925 marked… |
LIEGE
UNITED ARMS CO LTD |
The USA always have been an important market for the
Hanquets. It is a little known fact that the Belgians
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.38
caliber DA/SA TEXAS RANGER |
made a repro of the Colt Lightning M 1877 revolver.
The mail order house Johnson Smith purchased quantities of the TEXAS RANGER
(pictured left) and POLICE POSITIVE during the 1930s. Then there was the lady’s revolver SATURDAY NIGHT
SPECIAL a pretty little gun with ivory grips available during World War I. |
·
When Germany occupied
Belgian during World War II FAUL was forced almost completely out of business.
Machinery and particularly their huge gun collection had to be surrendered to
the German Ortskommandantur headquartered near the citadel of Liège. The machinery
was transferred to Germany. The collection, however, disappeared when the
German troops had left Liège.
·
After the war FAUL had
some limited gun exports to neutral countries but were back in gun production
by 1948.
·
From 1950 to 1992 FAUL was
the official Colt distributor for
Belgium.
The Consortium of the 7 Liège Gun
Makers in the 1850s:
The first Belgian Colts were made during the early 1850s, licensed Colt Navy M
1851s marked COLT BREVETE. Through his then-representative Colt had licensed a
number of Liège gun makers to manufacture his percussion revolvers when his
London factory could not turn out enough pistols to meet the market demand. But
that is only half of the story. To protect his Belgian patent from August 21,
1849 there was this provision in the patent laws whereby the article patented
must be produced in that country within two years from the date of the patent,
or the patent would become void. Therefore, his British patent Counsel, Mr. W.
E. Newton, of 66 Chancery Lane, London, went to Liège, Belgium and employed a
local gun maker to make several revolvers of Colt’s design. While that move
saved the patent Newton also discovered that several gun makers were infringing
on Colt’s patent rights. Many such guns had passed through the Liège proof house,
many for export into other countries.
To
combat this problem Colt appointed a Belgian sales agent and lawyer by the name
Davos-Sera to look after his interest. Davos-Sera licensed other Belgian gun
makers to produce guns under Colt’s license AND to collect a license fee on all
such guns produced. But Davos-Sera’s way of doing business did not exactly
please the Colonel…and for reasons not known today the cooperation with
Davos-Sera was terminated. He was replaced by J. Sainthill, patent attorney of Brussels.
The Missing Link: The
story goes that during one of his regular trips to Europe Sam Colt came to
Liège in April 1953 to straighten things out, to negotiate a new agreement with
another group of Belgian gun makers. He stayed there at
hotel “Belle Vue” for the negotiations took several days. J. Sainthill was able
to arrange the meeting with the gun makers Ancion & Co., Collette, Dandoy,
Drisseur & Co., Hanquet, Petry, Brothers
Pirlot. As documented an agreement was reached and signed at the end of April
1853. And a couple of these gun makers or their succeeding companies rather
found their way into the Hanquet's
family business Fabriques d’Armes Unies de Liège!
These are the companies: Albert Simonis, Antoine Bertrand
& fils, Pirlot & Frésart, J. Ancion & fils, Joseph Tolet
& Cie, S.A. Fabrication des Armes à feu. There you have it
the missing link.
WDN/January 3, 2009
© 2007 Wolf D. Niederastroth