You have got to be kidding me.
Someone needs to brush up on his British history.
British people lived in a libertarian society
That word does not mean what you think it does.
good point. To carry a gun pre 1914 required the purchase of a gun license, which cost 10 shilling at your local post office (per year). As the typical wage in Edwardian England was around 22 shilling a week, it was half a weeks wages for men who, after food and shelter, had very little left to spend.
I seem to recall that the cost of a pistol and the license were pretty much above the income of anyone earning less than 110 pounds per year (20 schillings /pound). That was the salary of a engineer
Essentially only the shopkeepers, professional and above men could afford to carry a gun.
The idea that the UK was libertarian is kind of comical. The society was very caste and class oriented and the upper middle class would be considered very poor by todays standards. Not a lot of social mobility, not free to anyone not considered a gentlemen. Go ahead and insult the sovereign in 1887 as a worker, not a good outcome.