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back strap screws to allow the shoulder stock to fit, hand knurling on the stock clamp, and the combination of a brass buttplate and an iron yoke on the stock. Wilson indicates this revolver was displayed at The Buffalo Bill Historical Center’s Whitney Gallery of Western Art for over 15 years on loan from the collection of Texas Gun Collector Association President Larry Sheerin. The current owner noted that the shoulder stock is actually over an inch shorter than the standard shoulder stocks, a feature also noted on the Colonel May presentation stock. Interestingly, although the stock to pistol connections appear similar on 9191, the trial test Dragoon 16468 and the May set 16469 and 16470, and the later standard production, on close examination the three types are very similar but not interchangeable.
LOT 221
Documented Only Known Prototype “Tin” Finished Colt Second Model
Dragoon Percussion Revolver with Attachable Shoulder Stock, R.L. Wilson
Letter, and Research - Serial no. 9191, 44 cal., 7 1/2 inch part round bbl., tin/
nickel finish, walnut grips. Only an estimated 2,700 Second Model Dragoons
revolvers were manufactured around 1850 and 1851 compared to 7,000 of the First Model Dragoons and 10,500 Third Model Dragoons. They are thus by far the scarcest of the primary Colt Dragoon models that descended from the iconic Colt Walker, but this revolver is especially rare as the only known example with a “tinned” finish and shoulder stock,
and it is also the earliest known Colt Dragoon with an attachable stock. It features a German silver blade front sight, “-ADDRESS SAML COLT NEW YORK CITY-” on top of the barrel the Texas Rangers and Comanche fight scene along with “MODEL U.S.M.R.” and “COLTS/PATENT” on the cylinder, Second Model rectangular cylinder stops and squareback trigger guard, “4-screw” frame cut for a shoulder stock and corresponding notch at the heel, and all matching serial numbers. The shoulder stock features the same “tinned” finish on the iron yoke and brass buttplate and has a nicely figured piece of walnut for the stock itself. While tinning had been used for hundreds of years by the mid-19th century, the “tinned” finish noted by collectors over the years on a few other Colts and a small number of other firearms from the period
are likely all actually examples of early nickel plated firearms given the results of a few that have been tested.
This revolver was featured on the cover of
the January 1954 Issue No. 42 of “The Texas
Gun Collector,” and also featured in the October, November, and December issues that year and was also featured in “The Gun Report” in April 1987 in an advertisement from Ogan Antiques, Ltd. In a 1988 letter from Herb Glass, he indicates that
he acquired the revolver from a bank in
New York City, but the stock was
not with it at the time. He was
able to track down the prior
owner’s widow and
purchased the stock
from her.
Per the included letter from R.L. Wilson and page 90 of his book “The Book of Colt Firearms,”“A limited number of Second Dragoons were fitted with attachable shoulder stocks....One of the most unusual specimens is Serial #9191. The gun and
stock mounts are tin-plated. Stock is of the third type or pattern. These stocks were made, however, a year or so after the
guns themselves were manufactured.” Wilson in the letter adds: “The author had assumed that if Second Model #9191 had an attachable stock, there likely were others about as well. He had also assumed that since revolver #9191 had been made c. 1850, the stock had to be of somewhat later date. Though the possibility does exist that other Second Model Dragoons were made and fitted with the Third type stock, the fact is that #9191 is the only Second Model Dragoon of record complete with a shoulder stock.” Wilson concluded that this revolver was a factory prototype based on the lack of the “COLTS/PATENT” marking on the frame, the “tinned” finish on both the revolver and stock, the unmarked shoulder stock, the rounded hammer screw, filing of the