Margaret Thatcher engraved shotgun to go on sale
AUCTIONEER Nicholas Holt displays a shotgun bearing an engraved portrait of Baroness Thatcher at a viewing in Edinburgh yesterday. The 20-bore single-trigger firearm is expected to fetch £30,000-£50,000 when it goes up for sale in June.
Seller John Parton, now 75, became a miner at the age of 18 in Staffordshire, but credits the former prime minister with enabling his success after he went on to establish a commercial cleaning firm in the City.
Mr Parton – whose fellow pit workers Lady Thatcher described as the “enemy within” during the 1980s strike – had her face engraved on the J Purdey & Sons shotgun in 1988 as a mark of gratitude. He said: “She was a remarkable lady.”
Picture: Ian Rutherford