EDIT: Please note that apparently the Priestel book I used as a major source for this video is partially incorrect, in that Pauly did create a traditional percussion system in France. The fire piston / diesel system was done slightly later after he moved to England, perhaps to avoid the Forsyth patent there.
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Samuel Pauly is the largely unrecognized father of the modern self-contained cartridge. In 1808 he patented a cartridge with a metal base that held a priming compound and attached to a paper or metal cartridge body holding powder and projectile. He followed this with an 1812 patent for a gun to fire the cartridges. What makes Pauly’s original system particularly interesting is that he did not use mechanical percussion (ie, hammer or striker) to ignite the primer compound, but rather a “fire pump”. A spring loaded plunger compressed air on top of the primer, heating it enough to detonate the compound in the same way that a diesel engine works. This was not a commercially successful system, though, and Pauly left Paris for London in 1814.
Pauly’s shop was taken over by Henri Roux, who continued making guns under the Pauly name while also improving the cartridges. These two pistols were made around 1820 and use a Roux cartridge with a mechanical striker hitting the primer compound in a Pauly-style cartridge case.
For more information, I recommend Georg Priestel’s free book “Jean Samuel Pauly, Henri Roux, and Successors – Their Inventions From 1812 to 1882” available here:
Jean Samuel Pauly, Henri Roux, and Successors by Georg Priestel
I grew up in Oklahoma and am old enough to have seen the Davis collection in the hotel that the Davis family run in the town of Claremore. I am quite shocked that the museum would sell these pistols that were highly significant in the development of modern firearms and ammunition. But over the years I heard rumors of poor management of the state run museum. So maybe there was a fire sale to get some money. But it feels like eating the seed corn.
Thanks for this video on one of the most significant milestones in firearms development.
Especially the integration of the cartridges and the firearms, as neither makes much sense without the other.
The linked book by Priestel is amazing, as is most of the material on the AaronNewcomer.com site largely devoted to early cartridge and firearm development, especially pinfires.
Maybe add that link on the video since many people will not visit the site and find it?
Looks like a early version of Marlin Micro-Grove rifling.
“(…)“fire pump”(…)plunger compressed air(…)heating it(…)same way that a diesel engine works(…)”
Note that in time and place that this fire-arm was invented, devices dubbed fire piston were used for fire staring, before felling into oblivion after matches become popular.
About 1800 a metal fire piston was(…)invented in Europe. In 1827 the English chemist John Walker invented the friction match containing phosphorous sulfate, essentially the same as that which is in use today.
from https://www.britannica.com/science/fire-piston
Fire piston are still made and marketed for outdoors see for example https://trueprepper.com/fire-piston/
Fire piston principle was later used in DAISY CASELESS RIFLE https://smallarmsreview.com/the-daisy-v-l-caseless-rifle-decades-ahead-of-its-time/