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The Remington Pistols

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Zonie

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Although I've written about this before, I thought some of the newcomers might find this interesting.

Everyone calls their Remington C&B revolver a "1858" but many don't know exactly why.
Most think that their pistol reproduction represents a gun that was manufactured in 1858 but that isn't true.

Remington did make a pistol in 1858 but it is a far cry from what we today think of as a Remington.
Their first revolver was actually made in 1857 and was called the "Remington-Beals 1st Model".
Beals by the way was Remingtons top designer.
It was a .31 caliber, 5 shot pocket pistol with a 3 inch barrel. Unlike the Colts of this era, these Remingtons had a closed top frame like all of the Remingtons that were to follow.
This little gun was made in 3 different models, the first with a full trigger guard while the 2nd and 3rd model had a projecting "spur" style trigger. There was no loading lever incorporated into these guns. These small pistols were made from 1857 thru 1859. There are no reproductions of this gun made.

The pistol we think of as a "1858" style was first made using the name "Remington-Beals Army Model Revolver" but it was first made in 1861.
Remington stamped "BEALS PATENT SEPT. 14 1858/MANUFACURED BY REMINGTONS ILION, N.Y." on the barrel.

This gun was a .44 caliber 6 shot pistol with a 8 inch barrel. It had a number of little things the Army didn't like, the lack of "safety notches" on the cylinder being one of them and only about 1900 of them were made.
There was also a .36 caliber Remington-Beals Navy made. The Navy had a slightly smaller frame than the Army and this smaller frame carried on thru all of Remingtons different Navy models.

Remington redesigned the Remington-Beals Army Model and called it the "Remington 1861 Army Revolver". It carried a PATENTED DEC 17, 1861 barrel marking.
While this improved several small items, it added a "feature" that was the cause of great concern.
This feature was a clearance cut in the top of the loading lever. This allowed the shooter to remove the cylinder without dropping the loading lever.
It also allowed the cylinder pin to work its way out while the gun was holstered.
Imagine the surprise of the user when he whipped out his trusty pistol only to have the cylinder fall out.
Many of these pistols were returned to Remington where a small button head screw was added to the loading lever to block the cylinder pin while the lever was in the "up" position.

One of the design faults with all of these early Remington-Beals Army and Navy pistols was that the frame extended almost to the front of the cylinder.
Because of the closeness of the frame, the fouling that built up on the front of the cylinder and re rear of the frame caused the guns to "bind up" after only a few shots and unlike the Colt that could be "adjusted" by tapping the barrel wedge out a bit to move the barrel away from the cylinder, nothing could be done in the field to the Remington 1861 models to improve the situation.


Remington went back to the drafting board and made some changes to improve this situation.
What they came up with was the "Remington New Model Army Revolver". Interestingly, Remington marked this guns barrel with PATENTED SEPT 14 1858/E. REMINGTON & SONS, ILION, NEW YORK. USA/NEW MODEL. The "1858" date referring to Beals old patent is the reason we call this model a "1858 Remington".
This is the model that most of you folks have a reproduction of.

The big improvement was to cut the frame back so that it cleared the front of the cylinder leaving the threaded rear of the barrel as the only projection that comes close to the front of the cylinder.
The barrel and its sharp threads improved things quite a bit because its smaller area couldn't collect as much fouling and it tended to scrape the fouling that occurred on the cylinder off as the cylinder revolved during cocking.
The difference can be seen in this picture.
REMINGTON.jpg


The New Model Army (and Navy) Revolver was manufactured from 1863 thru 1875.
About 122,000 Army models and 28,000 Navy were manufactured during those years.

I should mention that the Remington-Beals 1861 in the photo above is not an original. For a number of years the Italian makers manufactured a reproduction of it and there are many of them out there. They have the close fitting frame and the rear of the barrel only sticks out about 1/16 of an inch to the face of the cylinder.
That is the reason when I see a post which describes the gun as "locking up" after only a few shots are fired to look at the way the frame and barrel meets the cylinder. I suspect that many of them have bought a copy of the 1861 rather than the New Army (or Navy) and they are enjoying a bit of 'history' first hand.

I mentioned that the Remington Navys were smaller than the Army pistols. Unfortunately the Italian manufactures versions of the Navy uses the same frame as their Army so the smaller Navys aren't to be had.

Some of you folks have reported seeing a really small .36 caliber "Remington Navy" that has a 5 shot cylinder.
This much smaller pistol is the "Remington New Model Police Revolver" and it was manufactured from 1865 thru 1873.
It was direct competition for the "Colt 1862 Police" pistol. About 18,000 of them were made.
Unfortunately, there are no reproductions made of this fine little gun.

So what is that small little Remington with a spur trigger that looks like its bigger brother the "New Army"?
This is the "Remington New Model Pocket Pistol", a .31 caliber 5 shot gun that was made in both brass framed and steel framed versions.
There were actually three models of this little gun made.
The First Model was a brass framed gun with a brass spur trigger sheath.
The Second Model was a steel framed gun with a brass spur trigger sheath and the Third Model was all steel.
These pistols were made from 1865 thru 1873 with about 25,000 total production.
The Italian companies have reproduced this little gun in both the brass and the steel versions.

I have heard that in some of the foreign countries there is a law that all legal reproduction revolvers must be copies of guns that were first produced in 1858 or before. Obviously the "1858 Remington" doesn't meet that requirement based on the history of the gun.
For those of you who are subject to this law, I would suggest that you keep calling your pistol a "1858 Remington" and hope the authorities in your area are ignorant of the true history of this fine gun. :grin:
 
I have a Beals and a new army. I had an original 61 army, wish I still had it.
 
I had understood that the Uberti replica of the 1858 New Navy accurately reproduced the smaller frame of the original design, unlike Pietta, who made both the New Army and New Navy with the same size frame. Is that incorrect?
 
Mykeal, I looked at a few sites and I haven't seen any advertised as such except for a shorter barrel. One on gunsamerica said they were called Navy because of the smaller caliber, didn't say anything about frame size. :confused: Uberti's site doesn't list them so I presume they don't make them anymore.
 
Thanks for that info, Zonie. I found it very interesting. Pertains to several I own, too.

Out of curiosity, is there any historical basis for the "Remington 1858 Belt pistol" with the shorter barrel?
 
Homesteader said:
Thanks for that info, Zonie. I found it very interesting. Pertains to several I own, too.

Out of curiosity, is there any historical basis for the "Remington 1858 Belt pistol" with the shorter barrel?

According to Flayderman's Guide to Antique American Firearms (9th Ed.) Remington made a "New Model S/A Belt Revolver in percussion was made from 1865 thru 1873.
It was a .36 caliber 6 shot pistol with a 6 1/2 inch barrel.
Flyderman describes it as "A smaller version of the New Model Navy...".
A cartridge version was made following 1873.

Remington also made a Double action percussion pistol described as a "Remington-Rider D/A New Model Belt Revolver" which was made in 1863-1873 followed by a cartridge version of it.
This .36 cal 6 shot pistol looks a great deal like a smaller version of the New Model style pistols except the trigger guard is larger to accommodate the increased travel required by the trigger and the location of the trigger was moved forward. Of course, the inner workings of the double action was quite different from the single action. The gun was designed by a man named Rider.
This was also a 6 1/2 inched barreled gun.
 
Thanks for that bit of firearms history; very concise and informative. Emery
 
Some of you folks have reported seeing a really small .36 caliber "Remington Navy" that has a 5 shot cylinder.
This much smaller pistol is the "Remington New Model Police Revolver" and it was manufactured from 1865 thru 1873.
It was direct competition for the "Colt 1862 Police" pistol. About 18,000 of them were made.
Unfortunately, there are no reproductions made of this fine little gun.





Just got back from Cabela's in WV. and purchased
a Pietta 1858 New Army Police .36 cal. It does exist as a replica,although not a 5 shot or the smaller frame version. Page 104 of their 2007
shooting catalog.
 
Zonie said:
Their first revolver was actually made in 1857 and was called the "Remington-Beals 1st Model".
Beals by the way was Remingtons top designer.
It was a .31 caliber, 5 shot pocket pistol with a 3 inch barrel. Unlike the Colts of this era, these Remingtons had a closed top frame like all of the Remingtons that were to follow.

Is it possible that Beals copied the closed top frame from the Colt Root revolver M1855 pattern?

Despite the different hammer design of the Root, the Remington-Beals enclosed top strap bears an uncannily strong resemblance to the Root frame.
Were there any other closed top frame revolvers before the Colt M1855 that Root (or Beals) could have copied?

Do you suppose that both enclosed top strap pistols were designed independently?



The Model of 1855 Revolvers

....They are distinguished by a solid frame with top strap, spur trigger and the hammer which is mounted on the right side of the frame. These models are relatively rare and no one makes reproduction, so you are unlike to see one outside of a book or a very complete museum collection. They were small and bored in .265 and .36 calibers.

The 1855 Colt's were based on the patent of E.K. Root, Colt's factory foreman, and are often called "Root Revolvers."
http://home.comcast.net/~dsmjd/tux/dsmjd/tech/coltperc.htm[/quote]

root2.jpg


The Colt made "Root patent" revolver of 1855.
http://julianwinston.com/guns/revolvers.php[/quote]
 
Last edited by a moderator:
bo said:
zonie said:
Some of you folks have reported seeing a really small .36 caliber "Remington Navy" that has a 5 shot cylinder.
This much smaller pistol is the "Remington New Model Police Revolver" and it was manufactured from 1865 thru 1873.
It was direct competition for the "Colt 1862 Police" pistol. About 18,000 of them were made.
Unfortunately, there are no reproductions made of this fine little gun.

Just got back from Cabela's in WV. and purchased
a Pietta 1858 New Army Police .36 cal. It does exist as a replica,although not a 5 shot or the smaller frame version. Page 104 of their 2007
shooting catalog.

Pietta's offering does not qualify as a replica, regardless of the name they give it. They have been known to market guns that are not authentic reproductions of the guns they claim to represent.
 
Pietta isn't the only major manufacturer of historical replicas who markets guns that are not true "replicas."

Dan
 
I would agree that alot of liberties are taken
with replicas in the name of profit.None of Pietta's nor Uberti's or Taylor have exact replicas. I think Pedersoli comes about the closest. It is a mute point really. Since 99%
of the so-called replicas either come from Italy
or Spain,that alone makes all replicas voided in my opinion. At the very least the replica needs
to be made in the US. This may actually happen
if the dollar continues to crash,no one will
be buying the Euro so-called replicas with their prices increases on a weekly basis. For example my
New Model Police was 199.00$, now 220.00$ .Up 20.00$ here up 20.00$ there! down down down goes the dollar,you get the point.
 
I am curious did remington hire Beals away from Whitney because I believe the Whitney Navy was also a Beals design. Whitney started producing these in the late 1850s.
Bruce
 
My information on Whitney is pretty limited but I see where they made a "Two trigger Pocket revolver" in 1852. It was a solid frame .32 cal. 5 shot pistol. It had a "trigger" forward of the trigger guard that was used to manually lock the hand rotated cylinder. This got around Colts Patent on auto rotated and locked cylinders.

In 1854 Whitney also made a solid frame "Ring Trigger Pocket Revolver" which was a .31 cal 6 shot. 1854 also had Whitney producing another solid frame pistol called the "Whitney-Beals' Patent Pocket Revolver" in .28 and .31 cal.
This was also a ring trigger gun.

Flayderman doesn't mention Beals when writing about the Whitney Navy & Eagle Co. Revolvers so I don't know what Beals envolvment was.
The Whitney Navy was first made in 1858 after Colts Patent on self revolving cylinders and cylinder locks expired.

That was about the same time that Beals was working for Remington.

The Whitney Navy .36 by the way was the gun Spiller & Burr copied for the Confederacy but their pistol had a brass frame rather than the steel frame used by Whitney.

There are reproduction guns made of both the Whitney Navy (steel frame) and the Spiller & Burr (brass frame).
I own both of them and my only criticism of them is the loading ram system looks fairly flimsy. I've never had a problem with them but they look like they could shear off the screw if they had to ram a hard seating ball.
 
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