The First Big Bore Sixguns Part 2

As we saw in the first installment when Sam Walker approached Sam Colt with the idea of improving and enlarging the Paterson, Colt had no money, no working model, no machinery and no factory. This was soon to change. As the first contract for Walkers was filled Colt no longer needed Eli Whitney Jr. and the machinery went to Colt as per previous agreement.

In July 1847 Sam Colt informed the government, “The encouragement I feel from the recommendation and acquisitions of the officers in Mexico for my new model pistols that a large number of them may be required for our troops, has introduced me to establish an armory at Hartford sufficiently extensive to supply from four to five thousand a year, and I shall hereafter be in better condition to enter orders on short notice.”

It apparently took Colt awhile to get everything established in his new factory as one year later he had only delivered 260 revolvers, however the full order of 1,000 was filled by late summer and Colt was well-established. The first Walkers had been built in someone else’s factory on someone else’s machinery and with someone else in charge. Now Colt had his own factory, the perfected machinery was his and he was totally in charge. Parts were now built uniformly making it much easier to interchange parts and make repairs resulting in a marked improvement in quality.

Colt the man and Colt the factory were both well on their way to the reputation of producing high-quality single-action revolvers right up to the eve of World War II. From 1836 to 1940 Sam Colt and the subsequent Colt factory at Hartford produced some of the finest revolvers, both single action and double action, the world has ever seen.

Morphing The Walker

The order for the original Walkers had been filled and they had proven their worth but it was time to improve the mighty Walker, which was actually too much of a good thing. By 1935 the power of the .357 Magnum would be contained in a sixgun weighing just a little more than half of the original Walker; however this did not happen overnight and Colt and Smith & Wesson history is a long line of continuous improvements.

Several changes were made in the Walker. The barrel length was shortened to 71/2″, the cylinder shortened to accept a lighter charge of black powder and the weight was now slightly over four pounds. To keep things from getting too complicated as far as change of machinery goes, the original frame size was maintained, so with the shorter cylinder there was more room between the front of the cylinder and the barrel assembly with the barrel extending backward to meet the cylinder. These first Transitional Walker Dragoons maintained the standard Walker grip frame but it was soon time for more changes.

The grip was also changed and now had the familiar 90-degree cut at the top of the grip frame found on virtually all single-action sixguns produced since 1848. The working mechanism was also changed drastically since the days of the Paterson, from 17 parts to five parts; the same basic parts used in currently produced traditional single actions.

The first of the improved design sixguns became known as the Dragoons. The greatest improvement in going from the Walker to the Dragoon was found in the loading lever. All Dragoons had a spring-loaded catch at the end of the loading lever, latching into a lug under the barrel. The problem of the loading lever releasing and falling when the Colt was fired had now been solved.

Dragoons, as Walkers, were issued in pairs, and by 1850, with one shoulder stock. Army regulations of 1858 proclaimed, “Two pistols and one stock for each man; one pistol in holster on belt, one pistol in holster on saddle and stock on left rear side of saddle.” This is a little different than the normally accepted idea of both Dragoons being carried in pommel holsters. The regulation way certainly makes sense for if a soldier was separated from his mount he was not left unarmed. Some of the Dragoons issued with shoulder stocks also had a folding three-leaf rear sight on top of the back end of the barrel, instead of relying on the V-notch mated up with the front sight when the hammer was cocked. One of my replica 3rd Model Dragoons is set up this way.

Legend Makers

Legend tells us Rangers terrified the Comanches by charging them on horseback, screaming like banshees, all the while shooting a pair of .44 Colts. Now this is hard to believe. It took a man with two very strong arms and deadly aim, a great rider, an even greater horse and an overabundance of guts. Yes, very hard to believe, but then again Rangers were not ordinary men. They were always stretched to the limit and beyond on the frontier but they persevered mightily. My mind may rebel, but my spirit, heart and soul believes the legend.

The original Walker and the Transitional Model had a somewhat U-shaped mainspring. With the arrival of these 1st Model Dragoons this was changed to the flat spring found on all traditional single actions ever since. When Bill Ruger introduced his Single-Six in 1953 he went with a coil mainspring and then when the Super Blackhawk came out in 1959 he went back to the 1st Model Dragoon grip frame. Dragoons would be produced from 1848 right up to the advent of the next improved .44 in 1860.

There are basically three models of Dragoons, with some overlapping due to availability of parts. Colt was never one to waste parts. The First Model had a square-back trigger guard, round cylinder stop notches, no pins between the nipples on the back of the cylinder and there was no roller on the hammer where it made contact with the mainspring.

With the arrival of the Second Model Dragoon in 1849, the trigger guard had been changed to the now familiar round shape, however some were also made with the square-backed trigger guard. Cylinder stop notches also gained the familiar and traditional rectangular shape, a roller was placed on the hammer to contact the mainspring allowing it to slide easily as the hammer was cocked, and pins were placed on the back of the cylinder between the nipples. These pins matched up with a hole in the hammer to allow carrying of the Dragoon with all six chambers loaded without having to let the hammer down on a percussion cap.

I feel much better with the Remington and Ruger Old Army solution which is a notch between chambers to accept the hammer and lock it in place. ALL traditional single actions without a transfer-bar safety and made to accept fixed ammunition should always be carried with the hammer down on an empty chamber. This is the only safe way to carry the traditional single-action sixgun.

Third Model

The Third Model Dragoons all have round trigger guards and were made to accept a shoulder stock. They had notches on both sides of the recoil shield and at the back bottom of the butt along with protruding screw-heads on both sides of the frame. The shoulder stock was locked into this affair and then tightened with a large circular nut on the top of the shoulder stock behind the grip frame. Dragoons would be produced slightly over 10 years or until 1860, when the last improved .44 percussion Colt revolver arrived.

It’s a rare individual who has an original Dragoon at his disposal for shooting, however quality replicas have been available for several decades now. Using the Uberti 1851 Third Model Dragoon with 0.454″ Speer round balls and CCI Speer #11 caps, my best results have been obtained by pushing the Dragoon a little using 50 grains instead of 40 grains of powder.

With 50 grains of Goex FFFg and Crisco placed over the seated ball to fill out the cylinder, muzzle velocity is right at 990 fps with five shots grouping into 11/4″ at 50 feet. Switching to Pyrodex P using the same charge and lubing with Crisco also, muzzle velocity is 955 fps with five shots grouping into 13/8″ at 50 feet. So basically the results are the same with black powder or Pyrodex. Charges below 50 grains resulted in groups in the 21/2″ to 3″ neighborhood.

I have been shooting a Pair and a Spare — three in all — Third Model Dragoons for well over 20 years. Just recently I decided to round out the shooting collection so I added four more Uberti .44 Dragoons. I found a Whitneyville Walker Transitional Model at Cabela’s, a 1st Model Dragoon at Dixie Gun Works and then contacted Uberti for both a 1st Model and 2nd Model Dragoon.

For the 1st Model Dragoon I tried charges of 30, 35, 40 and 45 grains of Pyrodex P from Hodgdon’s as well as 35 and 40 grains of Goex FFFg. Groups averaged just barely over 1″ for five shots at 20 yards, with the 45 grain charge of Pyrodex averaging right at 1,050 fps. All these were assembled by volume not by weight with 0.454″ round balls and #11 CCI Magnum percussion caps. With FFFg black powder using the same size round balls, muzzle velocities run just under 1,000 fps. I have no personal experience as to how the original Dragoons shot, however replicas are exceptionally accurate, as are most replicas, and will actually outshoot some of our more modern designs.

The 1851 Navy

In 1851 the Dragoon was seriously downsized. The barrel length remained at 71/2″ and it was still a true 6-shot sixgun but by chambering it in .36 caliber the weight could be reduced to about 21/2 pounds. Now a trained pistolero was nearly as dangerous, maybe more so, with his sixgun holstered. This landmark revolver was the 1851 Navy. It was available with both a square-back trigger guard as well as the rounded trigger guard of the 3rd Model Dragoon. The grip frame, which originally appeared on the Colt Navy, was then used on the Colt Single Action Army beginning in 1873, and the .22 Ruger Single-Six as well as the Flat-Top Three-Screw Ruger .357 Magnum and .44 Magnum Blackhawks. It’s still in use on the Colt SAA and the Flat-Top New Model Blackhawks and the New Vaquero from Ruger.

Although the Colt Navy was much easier to handle and certainly easier to pack all day in a holster than the Dragoons, it was also an exceptionally large step backward as far as power goes. The .36 round ball at less than 100 grains in weight with a muzzle velocity of 850–950 feet per second lags well behind the .38 Special.

However, it was about to open the door for the next Colt development. By now Colt had learned more about steel, making it possible to put the .44 in a much smaller sixgun than the Dragoons. The .36 Navy was about to evolve into the .44 Army.

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