CHINAMAN TARGET CAST IRON about 1909 to 1930

Alfa Catalogue from 1911

Quote from Slug-gun

There are at least 2 versions of the pre 1st World war 'Chinaman' cast iron target. One is 13" tall and has the 'bobble' on his hat that is shot at, the other is 11 3/4" tall and lacks this bobble, and no it is not

because the bobble has been shot off, that is the way some were cast. I guess with those you just shot the poor old Chinaman in the face which then caused, not surprisingly, his head to fly backwards - ouch! He was then shot at through the guts, this area being painted in the form of a flower, the centre of which represented the aiming point. A 'hit' here would release the head to pop up again for the next round. Both types are 5 1/2" wide, and are heavy, solid cast iron items, which would be screwed to a heavy piece of timber. Each is painted differently, I would imagine the person painting them had more or less carte blanche to do as they saw fit? These targets originally cost between 4/6 and 6/9 and were the product of the early owner of the 'Southern Armoury' in South London, a Mr B. Webster who was apparently interested in shooting booths at fairgrounds. He supplied the targets for these booths and one of his 'inventions' was the Chinamen target which were supplied to the owners of the booths. The later owner of the Southern Armoury, (now defunct) was said to still have the original drawings for the targets, though that was back in 1988, so where they are now is anyone's guess, as that particular individual is now dead. There appeared after the first war another resetting target, which was in the figure of a smiling clown. This and the earlier Chinamen are often confused as being one and the same, they are not. The Clown was of similar height and width but was made of steel sheet, but again painted most attractively, and worked in a similar manner. It was well advertised throughout the 1930's, but like the the Chinamen is almost never encountered. These old targets would have survived a considerable beating as they were well made, but I can only surmise that most were simply thrown away after all the paint came off and interest in them was lost, or they were melted down for the war effort? Who knows? The later target introduced by Gerald Cardew in 1980 was a smaller and lighter affair altogether, cast in 2 part aluminium. It was designed to be used with "lower powered" air rifles, if high velocity rifles were used the aluminium would pockmark. The Cardew target was produced "in a strong cardboard box complete with wooded base and screws" and cost 9.00 plus 1 for postage. It was available direct from either (Gerald) Cardew or Manchester Air Guns, hence why some think that MAG produced it, they did not, merely retailed it. I suppose a fair few may have been made and some may still be about in their boxes unused I daresay? One like this is well worth having and probably exist; the earlier iron and steel targets are like hen's teeth, I have seen only 5 of either in 35 years and I have been looking! (end quote from Slug-gun)

The Chinaman dropdown target was made from 2mm steel plate. All supporting brackets

were also of 2mm steel with the exception of the head mechanism bracket which is alloy channel.

I cut out head , body and lever with a Junior hacksaw using cutting paste. The drawing in the write up was used for the shape of the head and body. Only one half of the body was drawn so both sides would be the same . The image was made from a inversed copy of the one side and joined , thats why there is a line down the middle.

Then I painted the target with model enamel paints like Testors , Humbrol and enamel sprayed the lever and brackets.

The colour images of a 1930 target are called a Clown Target and the face was changed I assume by this stage it was not politicaly correct to shoot at Chinaman .

CHINAMAN TARGET CAST IRON about 1909 to 1930