Cased Smith & Wesson No. 1, Third Issue revolver
with mahogany case and a empty carton of .22 caliber cartridges sold for
$4312.50 in a Rock Island Auction. It goes to show that antique .22 caliber
revolvers run the gamut from the common affordable variety to exquisite high
end custom.
Cased Smith & Wesson No. 1, Third Issue revolver
with mahogany case and a empty carton of .22 caliber cartridges sold for
$4312.50 in a Rock Island Auction. It goes to show that antique .22 caliber
revolvers run the gamut from the common affordable variety to exquisite high
end custom. Photos Courtesy of Rock Island Auction Company.
A Colt 1861 Navy revolver at a $700 asking price is a
fine gun, and a worthwhile addition to any gun collection. But what does the
gun enthusiast who doesn’t have that kind of money to spend on one gun do?
Consider the affordable antique .22 caliber revolver.
Editor’s Note: “This article is excerpted from the
1973 edition of the Gun Digest annual and prices expressed do not represent
modern gun values. You can read eight decades of good gun writing with the
3-disc set of all Gun Digest editions from 1944 – 2013. Order here at
gundigeststore.com.
The percussion purist may laugh, but consider the
antique .22-cartridge revolver. In that field, $700 will buy 20 or more guns,
these covering the period from the first American cartridge revolver, made in
1857, through the 1890 models that have most of today’s modern revolver
features.
The typical .22 antique cartridge revolver is a
compact seven-shot arm with a 2- or 3-inch barrel and hardwood, bird’s-head
grips. They’ll weigh about 10 ounces, their length a little over 6 inches. Most
were made to fire a .22-caliber Short, but not the .22 Short we know now. The
smokeless powder of today is too powerful for your antique .22 so don’t ever
try it.
The .22-Rimfire History
The story of the small revolvers began in 1854 with
the patent of a metallic cartridge by Horace Smith and Daniel B. Wesson. To
enable them to manufacture a revolver for this cartridge they had to acquire
the patent of Rollin White, a former Colt employee, who held a patent issued
April 3, 1855, for a bored-through cylinder to accommodate the breech loading
of cartridges.
Rollin White had tried unsuccessfully to sell the
rights to Colt. These patents and subsequent improvement patents gave Smith
& Wesson (S&W) the sole right to the breech-loading cartridge revolver
market for 12 years, until the expiration of those rights in 1869. During this
period, S&W produced some 126,000 .22-caliber revolvers in three variations
of the model No. 1, plus .32-caliber types as well.
Other makers were not unwilling to try to circumvent
these patent rights. White, as part of his contract with S&W, defended the
patent vigorously through many court cases. Many well-known names were ordered
to cease manufacture, among them Allen & Wheelock, Moore Patent Firearms Co.,
L. W. Pond Co. and E. A. Prescott. A few companies became licensees, and their
revolvers were thereafter marked “Made for Smith & Wesson.” These
infringing guns, which usually show a marked resemblance to the S&W
original, provide an interesting comparison.
Early S&W .22 revolvers were carried by Civil War
soldiers as personal pocket weapons. Their use or effectiveness was minimal but
they provided some feeling of protection. Following the Civil War, the little
.22 was the traveler’s companion by stagecoach and train. The homeowner and
shopkeeper had one in the drawer for protection against itinerants. Despite the
publicity given to the two-shot Derringer, ladies of the evening and gamblers
often preferred the compact seven-shot revolver. Young boys found them a must
for July Fourth celebrations, with blanks of course.
In 1870, the S&W patent expired. Renewal was
denied, some say, because President Ulysses S. Grant was still irked about poor
Northern ordnance supply during the Civil War. The gates were opened and some
50 manufacturers began turning out .22-caliber revolvers of varying quality.
Some were priced as low as $6, and the quality reflected this price. Possibly
because the maker didn’t care to share responsibility for malfunction or
accident, numerous guns carried only a pet name for identity.
Mail order houses that contracted with a manufacturer
sold these for their production. Most often, the mail order firm name did not
appear on the gun. Such names on the barrel as Protector, Tramps Terror, Little
Giant, ad infinitum, were the only markings.
One manufacturer might produce 25 to 50 variations of
the same model with only a name change and a slightly different grip or finish.
Many of these “name-only” revolvers can be traced to a
maker, but the process is often difficult. In the more specific area of known
manufacturer’s models, the author has compiled a table of some 50 makers,
including brief specifications of their early .22 models and the range of their
current values to collectors.
Prices and Value
It is worthwhile to remember Oscar Wilde’s definition
of a cynic, quoted also by C. E. Chapel in his handbook, as one who “knows the
price of everything and the value of nothing.” You may value a revolver in very
good condition that fills a void in your collection beyond any book value.
Finding such a piece is an exciting discovery and a thrill that cannot be
calculated in dollars.
Interest in the small .22-caliber revolver field is
increasing, but fortunately prices have not gone upward quite as rapidly as
have many others of makes and types.
If you select this area as your specialty, you will
find prices range from $20 to $50 for most makes, with such better-known and
higher-quality names as Colt, Remington and S&W bringing $75 dollars or
more. First models, obviously, are worth more, but few values have gone over
$200.
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