Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Military use of Colt 1876 revolvers cal. .44-40 ????

I am searching informations, if the Colt 1876 (Frontier) in .44-40 was used as an official military handgun (maybe in South America).
Sincere thanks for all your efforts and help!

Now there�s a good question. I�d have to research that one just a bit. I know that Winchester made 1873 rifles in musket form, chambered in .44-40, but I don�t remember who bought them. You can bet if they had rifles so chambered, they bought some Peacemakers chambered the same. I�ll have to do some digging.

I'm a little puzzled by the question. None of my references show a patent date of 1876. 44-40 Colt Frontier six shooters were in the SN range from 21000 to approx. 130000. IIR all us martial side arms were 45 colt. There are a LOT of frontier six shooters that are fakes, well done fakes in the 44-40 and 45. If it is a 44-40 and is US martially marked then I'd be very suspicious.

Checking in Maddis' book on Winchesters, it makes mention of 1873 Winchester Muskets being used in Spain, Thailand and Nicaragua. Again, I would suspect the presence of the SAA anywhere the .44-40 served.

Thank's for your efforts. I found a picture of a supposed military .44-40 Colt SAA (the 1873 model I talked about 1876 because .44-40 starts at that point) in the book from Graham Smith "Military Handguns". The revolver seems to be nickel plated too. I am very skeptic about this picture and I found nothing to verify the official military use of .44-40 SAA revolvers. Spain used some .44-40 M1892 Spanish Winchester copies (called "El Tigre", I have one in my collection) in the Spanish civil war. I read some .44-40 Colt SAA were exported to South America but if they saw official military is doubtful. I even tried to get some information about Mexican handguns from 1876 to about 1890 but there �s little information about this time. So maybe somebody find further helpful informations for me.
Please excuse my rough English, because I am a gun collector from Europe but I am a fan of this forum!

Maddis makes reference to the Winchester '73 being used in many countries including Africa, India, Morocco, British territories etc. This does not imply martial use by all of theese countries. The best hint that I can find that perhaps there was indeed martial use of the 44-40 Colt SAA is that Flayderman mentions many high quality martially marked fakes in 44-40 have appeared since the early 80's with the etched barrel panel. One might surmise unless there were origionals a con artist might not take the trouble to create a spurious example. I would expect an authentic 44-40 SAA with appropriate martial markings and cartouches to reveal it's authenticity to a small degree based on price. I would not think over 15k to be a minimum.

Here is how I'd approach this problem. I guess it wouldn't worry me much unless I was buying the gun. If I were, and it seems here that we are just talking speculation...but if I were buying the gun, I would first start by a thorough regular examination. Are the corners crisp indicating no polishing. What does the frame gauge say? Do the numbers all match? Are there irregularities in the barrel? Are there holes that are not supposed to be there? What do the screws look like? Do the features match Sutherland?

Most of your questions will be answered by a thorough exam such as above. A martially-marked example from another country would additionally have, well...martial markings, of course. These could then be looked up. They would at least be in the right language, etc.

As Stetson alludes, if you have a pistol with all the above features displayed correctly, and it is of high percentage finish, then you will have a high-dollar specimen anyway. There is simply no way to fake originality. Or should I say, there is no way to fake it well enough to fool most serious students of SAA's. You will then have a high-dollar gun that will probably be worth very little more faked up as a foreign martial piece-so why would somebody do it? Logic dictates that if the pieces of the puzzle fit and the picture looks right, then what you have is real.

Ethan has good points. Also worth considering is the fact that most European nations have proof houses and any firearm sold in those nation will have a proof mark

There were plenty of 1873 Winchesters sold commercially in .44-40. Also, in the black powder days, firearms were difficult to maintain, and were sent back to the factory to be rebarreled, sleeved, and refinished. There were also a lot of odd firearms submitted to the military and even used in small quantities, such as Winchester 1895 lever actions and Savage 99s.

If you care to send me some information privately, I have access to all the Colt and military SN records. I am an assistant curator at a military museum as a volunteer and a consultant to other military museums.

What about Canadian use ? Didn't the RCMP make heavy use of .44-40 in both carbines and handguns ? Would that be considered martial use ?

It takes a real con ARTIST to pull this off but IMO Norm Flayderman was not talking about copies. We are not talking about faking origionality 100% but rather embellishing the real deal making the ID process next to impossible even for those who may claim to be experts. Recently even some of the big auction houses have been fooled. If you take a genuine SAA that may be worth 3-5k and re-set it with the panel etchings and create fake cartouches you now have a gun that would start at 12k and reach very high figures very quickly. They are out there and there are people pulling it off. That is why some one would do it. It's profitable.

Martial use is use by any military. I have no idea about the caliber or SAA's but the RCMP did have Winchesters and authenticated properly stamped RCMP Winnies are as rare as hens teeth and worth a bundle. Like any military item if the firearm is ID to a specefic individual the price goes up. If you can document specefic battles or if the owner had a colorfull or famous military history the sky can be the limit on price.

If you think you have a really collectible Colt, my recommendation is to send it to Kevin Cherry, former president of the Colt Collector's Society, and a very straight individual who will tell you what is what.

http://www.cherrys.com

After digging in serveral books and magazines I found some useful information about the military use of .44-40 SAA revolvers (even I learned the first Colt SAA revolvers cal. 44-40 were introduced 1878 not 1876). The US - Government bought 1883 some (I can't find out how many) Colt .44-40 SAA revolvers for test trials. Unfortunately I can't find information about military use of .44-40 Colts outside the US (but I'll be happy to get information about this theme). I would agree with "Flayderman" that there are a lot of fakes around.
Greetings and thanks for all answers!!