"At Sir Winston Churchill's death in February 1965, quite an armoury exsisted at Chartwell. There the weapons remained until 1974 when the ownership of all firearms in private collections in the U.K., especially semi-automatic and full auto weapons (the latter classed as prohibited weapons under Section 5 of the Firearms Act of 1968), was tightened up. The result was that the local police expressed concern for the security of the collection and instructed that the weapons should be deposited with an authorised gunsmith. Accordingly the weapons were transferred to the care of Cogswell and Harrison Ltd. of Piccadilly pending a decision on their ultimate disposal. With no possibility of retaining the collection at Chartwell, ten weapons were put up for auction at Sotheby's on July 15th 1975" (After the Battle. Number 22, 1975. pp. 46-48). This gun, lot 41 in the 1975 sale, was deactivated and mounted on its commemorative stand by the buyer and current vendor.

John Colville, Churchill's private secretary during the war, gives us an insight into the need for the armoury at Chartwell and Churchill's interest in weapons. In a diary entry for the 11th August 1940, Colville writes: "After tea I accompanied the P.M. to a rifle range nearby, where he fired with his Mannlicher rifle at targets 100, 200 and 300 yards away. He also fired with his revolver, still smoking his cigar, with commendable accuracy. Despite his age, size and lack of practice, he acquitted himself well. The whole time he talked ... Soft-nosed bullets were the thing to use and he must get some. But said Randolph, they are illegal in war, to which the P.M. replied that the Germans would make very short work of him if they caught him, and so he didn't see why he should have any mercy on them. He always seemed to visualise the possibility of having to defend himself against German troops!"