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Is This A Better 1911?
Here is a pair of classic African cartridges, both fully capable of taking any and all game on earth, one having been the workhorse of the African game departments and the other has attained unparalleled glory through the writings of an American on his first safari.
Both are designed to function in a bolt-action rifle, both are (relatively) easy on the shoulder, and can be built in a rifle that’s easy to carry. Both came on to the scene before the World War I, when the smokeless powder revolution had changed the course of cartridge development.
Starting with the elder of the two, the .404 Jeffery came onto the scene in either 1906 or 1907 (this date has been the topic of debate, but my friend Phil Shoemaker has a certified 1907 .404 Jeffery rifle), and was designed to be a rimless variant of the .450/400 Nitro Express, also known as the .400 Jeffery.
Instead of simply maintaining the .410-inch diameter bullet of the .450/400, the .404 Jeffery utilized a .423-inch diameter bullet of 400 grains, at the same muzzle velocity of 2150 fps, generating 4,100 ft.-lbs. of energy. A 300-grain load at 2600 fps was also offered, but was not very effective against dangerous game.
With a slight shoulder of 8˚-30′, the Jeffery case feeds like it was greased, and was an undeniable blend of striking power and low recoil. It was chambered in Vickers rifles, and was issued to the game scouts of Rhodesia, Tanganyika and Uganda for dangerous game control work.
Some feel that the initial loadings of the .404 Jeffery—the 400-grain/2150 fps combo—are a bit anemic, but for over a century it has worked and worked well. Though it isn’t among the most popular cartridges in the safari world—yet it has earned a place of reverence among professional hunters and those in the know—it has received a facelift as of late, with modern loads sending those 400-grain slugs at 2325 fps, for 4,800 ft.-lbs. of muzzle energy.
My own favorite handloads drive the 400-grain bullets at 2280 fps, mainly because that’s where I found the best accuracy; my Heym Express .404 Jeffery will put three shots into 0.75-inch at 100 yards. That load has taken elephant, buffalo and a good number of species of plains game.
In 1911, London’s John Rigby & Co. released what would become one of their most famous proprietary cartridges: the .416 Rigby. Bearing marked similarities to the earlier .350 Rigby Magnum—they share the same 45-degree shoulder—the .416 Rigby used a unique bore diameter and a case large enough to prevent extraction problems in the heat of Africa and India.
The .416 Rigby was advertized as driving a 410-grain bullet at 2370 fps, for just over 5,100 ft.-lbs. of energy. This formula—well, actually a 400-grain 416” bullet at 2400 fps—would go on to become an undeniable classic, with the .416 Hoffman and .416 Remington Magnum replicating the recipe, albeit at a higher pressure.
Though the number of rifles produced prior to World War II was actually quite low—a whopping total of 169 rifles—it was the writing of experienced African hunters like John ‘Pondoro’ Taylor who sang its praises; but the 1953 release of Robert Ruark’s Horn of the Hunter, in which he idolized his PH Harry Selby and his .416 Rigby, that sealed the cartridge’s fate.
Selby’s .470 double rifle had been accidently run over and damaged, and the only suitable rifle he could find in Nairobi was a “dirty, rusty-looking .416 Rigby.” Though there were so few produced, the reputation of the .416 Rigby inspired writers like Jack O’Connor, who also sang its praises.
The 400-grain .416-inch bullet has a sectional density of 0.330, and that plays a big part in the penetration for which it is so famous. Federal and Ruger helped make the cartridge and rifle available, when both announced that ammunition from Federal would feed the new Ruger Safari Magnum, chambered in .416 Rigby in 1989. There are plenty of factory loads, as well as component bullets available for the .416.
So, while both of these cartridges have a rather impeccable reputation, which one makes a better choice for the dangerous game hunter? This is a tough one for me personally, as logic would dictate that the wider availability of the .416 Rigby—including the resurgence of the Rigby Big Game rifle—coupled with the slight velocity advantage would give it the edge.
However, having spent a considerable amount of time with both cartridges—in a few different rifles—I will admit that the Rigby recoils harder than does the Jeffery. It’s also easier to get an extra cartridge in the magazine with the narrower Jeffery case than with the big Rigby case.
I don’t think the modern Jeffery load—the 400-grain bullet at 2350 fps—gives up much to the Rigby, though the higher sectional density of the Rigby bullet might influence a choice, but the greater frontal diameter—.423-inch v. .416-inch—might offset that concept. In the Norma PH line of ammunition, which uses heavier-than-normal bullet weights, both the Rigby and the Jeffery drive a 450-grain Woodleigh softpoint or FMJ to the same muzzle velocity of 2150 fps.
Both kill very well, both have proven to be very accurate (I have sub-MOA loads for both) and both are wonderfully nostalgic.
I wouldn’t find fault with a hunter for choosing one way or the other, so I’ll settle the argument with my own personal decision: I own two .404 Jeffery rifles—a Heym Express and a Bansner Custom—and I don’t own a .416 Rigby.
That said, you can’t go wrong with either. Though the Rigby is capable of higher velocities via handloading, I don’t really feel it’s necessary in a dangerous game situation. Dead heat here.
Jack Mann during wartime: the LRDG ranged over huge distances, travelling behind enemy lines to gather intelligence for the 8th Army – Courtesy of family
Jack Mann, who has died aged 100, served with the SAS and the Special Boat Service (SBS) and was believed to be the last surviving member of the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG).
Mann volunteered to join the LRDG as a radio operator in January 1943. The unit was born of the expertise of a small number of prewar desert explorers. It ranged over huge distances in North Africa, travelling behind enemy lines and navigating with the aid of the stars and a sun compass – a primitive but effective device – to gather intelligence for the 8th Army.
Primarily a reconnaissance unit, the LRDG did not seek confrontation, but if it ran into trouble its vehicle-mounted machine guns proved highly effective. Mann was responsible for receiving and deciphering the double-coded messages that directed operations over great distances.
Using modified No 11 sets, housed in cabinets on Chevrolet and Ford trucks, he had to contend with high desert temperatures and sandstorms which degraded equipment and disrupted incoming signals. As the enemy’s range-finding equipment became more sophisticated, transmissions became increasingly hazardous.
The LRDG made the desert their accomplice. Their patrols believed that they could always outwit the Axis forces on the ground. Mann, however, hated the desert. “Don’t talk to me about sand,” he used to say. “I’ve had it in my eyes, my mouth, up my nose, in my food, everywhere.”
He served with the SAS in North Africa and Italy before moving to the RAF Ramat David camp in Palestine, then under British administration, where he took a parachute course. The training included jumping out of a truck at 20mph and leaping from the top of a 15ft ladder without a harness.
As a radio operator he had to contend with high desert temperatures and sandstorms which degraded equipment and disrupted incoming signals – Courtesy of family
Mann subsequently moved to Nahariya, the base camp of the Special Raiding Forces, and transferred to the newly formed Special Boat Service as a radio operator – one of its original members. It was commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel George Jellicoe, the son and heir of the 1st Earl Jellicoe, a naval commander at the Battle of Jutland and Admiral of the Fleet in the First World War.
Mann was seconded to the Greek Sacred Squadron, which had trained with the SAS and seen action in North Africa. The Squadron used small boats and took part in hit-and-run amphibious operations against German garrisons in the Eastern Mediterranean, the Aegean Sea and the Dodecanese islands.
These islands off the coast of Turkey were controlled by the Italians up to Italy’s surrender in September 1943; Turkey then claimed sovereignty over them. Churchill, who hoped to bring Turkey into the war on the Allied side, committed substantial forces in an attempt to seize the islands as a springboard for an attack on mainland Greece. The Dodecanese operation failed primarily because of lack of air cover.
Mann was involved in reconnaissance missions using kayaks and a camouflaged hide-out near Bodrum on the Turkish coast. On other raids, Royal Navy motor torpedo boats and launches took members of the squadron to Turkey, where they were transferred to fishing caiques. Their rations were sometimes supplemented by wild boar, and fish dynamited in the sea.
On one occasion, Mann had just finished preparing a meal when an officer pushed his way to the front. When Mann told him to get back in the queue, he was arrested and marched off to a military prison.
In his paybook, however, he had given his nationality as Russian Orthodox instead of Jewish and, using his language skills, he persuaded his jailers that he was a Russian and insisted that he be allowed to appeal to the Soviet authorities. They decided that he was too much trouble and returned him to his unit.
One night, Mann was asleep in his hide-out on the island of Chios when he and a comrade were awakened by a German “E” Boat, a fast motor torpedo boat, approaching the shore. The two men, armed with rifles but in their underwear, greeted the German crew in Greek.
Mann, middle row, fourth from the right, with his LRDG comrades in 1943 – Courtesy of family
The crew surrendered but they tried to be friendly, claiming that they were all Anglo-Saxons. Mann retorted that he was a Jew, ordered them to cut off their swastika badges and had them placed in the local prison. There they were made to clean a local building of faeces left by the occupying German forces.
Jack Mann was born Zacharia Zuckerman in Cairo on September 23 1925. His father, Zachary, who had died two days earlier, was an eminent dental surgeon from Bucharest in Romania who had gained his degree in dentistry in France.
His mother, Victoria, née Warshawsky, from Odessa, was Russian, spoke French and came from a well-to-do family. Mann’s uncle, Henry, was also a dental surgeon and treated members of the Egyptian royal family.
Mann spent the first years of his life living in Paris before returning to Cairo. He was educated at the Cairo Lycée Français, where he learnt Arabic, English, French and Italian. By 1942 he was learning from his relations in Europe that fellow Jews were being rounded up and sent to concentration camps.
He falsified his age in order to enlist in the British Army to fight the Nazis and joined the Royal Corps of Signals as a radio operator. He was subsequently recruited by the Intelligence Corps and tasked with infiltrating a POW camp to glean intelligence from captured Italians. He decided, however, that his Italian was not fluent enough to maintain his cover.
In 1945, after several more months liberating islands from German control, the Aegean Raiding Forces were disbanded. Mann moved to a naval base near Alexandria in Egypt, where he rejoined the Royal Signals. After the end of the war, he resigned from the Army.
Jack and Helga Mann at Cannes in the 1960s – Courtesy of family
As a Jew, he had been determined to fight the Nazis, and then to help the Jewish diaspora and displaced Jews of Europe when the war ended. In November 1947, the UN passed a resolution to divide British-ruled Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states.
Israel declared independence in May 1948. Arab armies invaded in what became known as the Arab-Israeli War and Mann joined the conflict to help establish a state of Israel. He was given the rank of major and put in charge of communications on the Southern Front.
During a crisis in which he had to get to HQ urgently, he commandeered Moshe Dayan’s jeep. Ignoring the fact that the commander of the important Jerusalem Front was sitting in it, he ordered the driver to take him straight to HQ. The war ended in 1949 with an armistice agreement.
Mann moved to Britain and worked in a shipping business based at Southampton. He subsequently became European sales manager for two leading chemical companies, a job which involved him in extensive travel. In his spare time he enjoyed swimming; he also had a passion for music and played the piano by ear. He also worked as a Samaritan and supported a number of charitable causes.
He remained closely involved with the veteran associations of the Special Forces in which he had served, and at his funeral his coffin was escorted by standard-bearers from the SAS Regimental Association, the SBS Association and the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen and Women.
Mann had a host of friends and a fund of amusing stories and was the best of company. On his 100th birthday last year he received a handwritten letter from the King, together with a bottle of champagne.
Jack Mann married first, in 1950, Elizabeth Fine. When the marriage came to an end, he married, in 1965, Helga Jorgas. She survives him with two daughters from his first marriage and two daughters from his second.
Jack Mann, born September 23 1925, died August 13 2026