Percussion Transition Revolvers
I am fascinated by 'transitional' weapons technology, including very early armored cars and tanks and also firearms. This post was 'triggered' by the Jecsan toy cowboys that have odd revolvers with the bullet chambers far forward.
What is interesting about revolvers is they existed hundreds of years before the 19th century and Colt's innovative revolvers. There were even matchlock revolvers, but those early revolvers had to have the chambers manually turned. The Colt mid nineteenth century revolver's chamber was turned by the cocking mechanism.
I wanted to find something like the Jecsan cowboys' revolvers Here is an English one.
Here is the link from Guns & Ammo
Counter-intuitively, many of these strange designs came out AFTER Colt's more familiar design.
It was, of course, revolvers with the revolving chamber further back that became the dominant design. However, it just shows that the Jecsan toy cowboys' revolvers were not totally wrong, although the revolving chambers on them are more chunky.
Speaking of 'transitional' firearms, you might be interested in the Austrian air rifles issued to their light troops in the late 18th century. Apparently they were very effective weapons, and of course, smokeless and relatively silent. The downside was the problem of maintaining them in the field, whereat the Austrians discontinued their use.
ReplyDeleteInteresting, and rather unusual topic. First I have heard of this very early revolvers (apart from the revolving six-barrel variety that features in CLUEDO...
Cheers,
Ion
Thanks for the info on the air rifles.
DeleteThanks for the information on the air rifles. James
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