This is a gun built for the shooter who wants one stock, one action, and the flexibility to switch disciplines without switching guns.

01One Gun, Two Personalities

The headline feature here is versatility. No. 31743 ships with a 30-inch set of barrels and an additional 32-inch set — both regulated to the same trigger-plate action, both London proofed for steel shot, and both fitted with a full complement of Teague chokes for lead and steel: Improved Cylinder, Quarter, two Half, two Three-Quarter, and Full, doubled up across both shot types for fourteen chokes in total.

Swap barrel length and you shift the gun's balance and swing — shorter for close, fast driven birds or clays off a stand where handling speed matters; longer for the steadier, more deliberate swing that suits high pheasants or a round of sporting clays with longer presentations. It's the kind of decision most shooters make once, at the point of purchase, and live with forever. Here, it's a decision you get to make on the day.

No. 31743 in the rack — the slim taper forend and pistol grip stock built for fast, upright handling.

Chambered at 3 inches (76mm) throughout, with a solid game rib finished in a stippled matte to kill glare on a bright day, this is a gun equally at home on a driven day in the Highlands or on the peg at a sporting clays ground.

02The Action

Beneath the engraving sits a Sporter trigger-plate action — a detachable, non-selective single trigger unit married to a flat trigger guard, an extended trigger tang for a more secure hand position, and an automatic safety. It's a serious, purpose-built platform, not a game gun pressed into Sporter duty. The action body and furniture are finished in traditional cyanide-hardened colour, giving that deep, mottled case-colour that only improves with age and handling.

03The Engraving

The showpiece, though, is the metalwork. Fully hand-engraved by Stefano Pedretti, the ultra-round action body is dressed in Purdey's Sporter large scroll pattern — dense, flowing scrollwork that wraps the fences, the top strap, and the trigger guard bow. Turn the gun over and the underside of the action carries a vignette that stops most people mid-conversation: a pheasant caught mid-flush, wings thrown wide against a stippled field background, rendered with the kind of depth and movement that separates a decorative panel from a genuine engraved scene.

Left: Stefano Pedretti's pheasant vignette, engraved on the action underside. Right: the Sporter large scroll pattern and Purdey signature on the action body.

Scrollwork this dense doesn't photograph its full detail — it's worth seeing in hand.

04Stock and Handling

The stock is cut from a single exceptionally figured blank, with dramatic contrasting grain running through the butt — the kind of timber Purdey reserves for guns exactly like this one. It's finished in a full pistol grip with a metal grip cap (itself scroll-engraved to match the action), a chequered butt end, and a slim taper forend that suits the Sporter's more upright, faster-handling profile compared with a traditional game stock.

The figured walnut butt, cut from a single exceptional blank.

Dimensions are set for a right-handed shot with neutral cast — a stock built specifically to the intended shooter's measurements rather than an off-the-shelf configuration:

05What's in the Case

No. 31743 travels in a fitted plastic case that includes a choke key, spare striker and return springs, spare mainsprings with mainspring tool, and a stock draw bolt key — everything needed to keep the gun running and to make the barrel swap a genuine field-ready option rather than a workshop job.

06The Bottom Line

A two-barrel-set Purdey Sporter, hand-engraved by Stefano Pedretti with a pheasant vignette, cut from standout figured walnut, and fitted for steel shot with a full Teague choke set for both loads — this is a gun that covers driven game and competition clays from the same case, without compromise on either side.

The Purdey Sporter's natural habitat.