Antiques - Forgotten Weapons

The Sure Defender: An O.G. Knuckleduster Knife Gun

December 8, 2021 Ian McCollum 12

One of the early combination self-defense guns was the “Sure Defender”, with a combination of brass knuckles, a small and finicky wavy-bladed dagger, and a single shot percussion pistol barrel. The rather complex process for […]

Dodge Patent Prototype Rolling Block Rifle

November 11, 2021 Ian McCollum 28

William Dodge and his brother were inventors in Washington DC who in the 1870s patented a bunch of different improvements to the Remington Rolling Block, among other guns. This particular one I cannot identify with […]

Unique Rotating Single-Shot Percussion Rifle

November 8, 2021 Ian McCollum 29

This is a very unusual single-shot muzzleloading rifle. It is devoid of markings that might identify it, but appears (to my eye, anyway) to have been built from what was originally intended to be a […]

Confederate Gillam & Miller Rolling Block Transformation

October 26, 2021 Ian McCollum 6

Most people think about the Remington Rolling Block as a purpose-built rifle, but it was also used as a way to transform muzzleloaders into more modern breechloaders. Remington did this commercially, and small gunsmiths did […]

Remington’s Revolving Rifle: Not Expensive, but not Successful

October 21, 2021 Ian McCollum 17

While Colt put significant effort into developing a revolving rifle design, Remington chose to simply use their existing New Model revolver architecture. Remington introduced it’s Revolving Rifle (it had no other model name) in 1865, […]

Daniels’ Seven-Shot Smoothbore Turret Musket

October 18, 2021 Ian McCollum 21

There were a surprising number of different revolving rifles produced in the United States in the mid 1800s, including a number of turret rifles like this one. Specifically, we have here a 7-shot, approximately .55 […]

Milanese 7mm Pinfire Saber-Revolver

September 23, 2021 Ian McCollum 21

Tacticool is not a modern creation – people have been making arms that are impractical but cool looking for centuries. As a case in point, I present this Model 1864 Milanese style saber-revolver. Several different […]

Collette Gravity Guns: A 60-Shot Rifle in 1854

September 21, 2021 Ian McCollum 18

What we today call the Collette Gravity Gun was actually designed by a gunsmith named Jean Nicolas Herman in Liege between 1850 and 1854. He was an employee of Victor Collette (note: spellings vary), and […]

Ethiopian Oddities – Single Shot French Mle 1878 Marine

September 9, 2021 Ian McCollum 9

Among all the standard rifles that are coming into the US from Ethiopia through InterOrdnance, there are a handful of really unusual oddballs, and we are going to look at several of them. We have […]

Marius Berger’s Ring-Trigger Tube-Magazine Pistol

August 18, 2021 Ian McCollum 21

The 1880s and 1890s were a fertile period of experimentation with repeating handguns. One such example is this design by Marius Berger, manufactured in France by St Etienne in 1880 and 1881. It uses a […]