Scarce Bacon Conversion Revolver

Thomas K Bacon established his arms company in 1859 in Norwich, Connecticut and started manufacturing what were ostensibly copies of the Manhattan percussion revolver.

All the revolver manufacturers at this time were frustrated by the Rolling White breech loading cylinder patent which restricted the use of metal cartridges to the patent holder.

At the expiration of the Rollin White patent, Bacon Anns began the transition from percussion revolvers to what was to become their first full-production cartridge revolver. The first conversions to leave the factory were standard second model revolvers with the loading levers intact, only the cylinder being replaced with a bored-through round cylinder.

The second step in the evolution was removal of the loading lever assembly and its replacement with an extractor pin, with the cylinder remaining round. Step 3 introduced the semi-fluted cylinder.

The final step was the changing of the grips from a square butt to the bird's head shape; the final step also included nickel plating. Production of the .32 calibre bird’s head grip revolver became standard, with only minor variations in barrel markings. Approximately no more than 1,000 of these .32 calibre revolvers were produced. This revolver is a variant that has used the frame of a percussion revolver and simply dropping in a breech loading cylinder and omitting the loading lever rammer. The holes for the rammer are still extant.

This is a fairly large revolver for its genre and mechanically perfect, cocking, locking and indexing nicely.

The transition from percussion ball and cap revolver is a massive field of study with literally hundreds of variations to collect. Some are high quality such as this one with superlative nickel plating and others not such high quality. All have a story to tell, however.

Code: 50697