Original Item: Only One Available. This is an original U.S. Civil War Colt Model 1862 Pocket Navy .36 caliber percussion revolver with the desirable 6 1/2" octagonal barrel, very low serial No. 630, and an 1861 production date. It is a mostly matching example retaining its original numbered barrel, frame, trigger guard, grip frame, and cylinder, while showing honest service wear, period style sight modifications, and a strong surviving bore.

This is an antique black powder firearm manufactured before 1899. Under federal law, it may generally be owned within the United States without a special license or permit and does not require transfer through a Federal Firearms Licensee. However, state and local laws may vary. This firearm is sold solely as a historical collector’s item and has not been test fired or inspected for firing safety by a professional gunsmith. Any mechanical or bore observations provided below describe only its present condition and should not be interpreted as confirmation that the firearm is safe to load or fire. The purchaser is solely responsible for complying with all applicable federal, state, and local laws.

The Colt Pocket Navy was a five shot .36 caliber percussion revolver built on Colt's smaller pocket frame and combined with features associated with the larger Navy pattern, including an octagonal barrel and engraved cylinder scene. These compact revolvers were well suited to civilian carry and were also privately purchased during the Civil War period. Only bout 19,000 of these "Pocket Navy" revolvers were ever made, making them very rare and desirable.

This example is fitted with the longest commonly encountered barrel length for the model:

6 1/2"

The full serial number:

630

is stamped on the barrel, frame, trigger guard, grip frame, and cylinder.

The loading lever is unnumbered. The barrel wedge is an unmarked fabricated replacement, while the cylinder arbor is marked:

442

showing that it was replaced from another revolver. This example is therefore best described as mostly matching rather than fully matching.

Colt records place serial No. 630 in 1861, making this a very early production example from the beginning of Pocket Navy manufacture. Although the model designation is commonly associated with 1862, production began during 1861. The revolver was produced at the beginning of the Civil War period. Its individual wartime service history is not documented, so no specific military association can be assigned.

The metal surfaces show substantial honest service wear and have developed an overall gray patina with scattered evidence of older peppery oxidation. No major deep pitting or heavy scale corrosion is described. At some point in its working life, the original front sight was replaced by a nickel blade mounted in a dovetail. A second dovetail was cut into the rear portion of the barrel and fitted with a steel notch rear sight. These are clearly later modifications to the original Colt sighting arrangement.

The cylinder retains faint portions of the:

COLT'S PATENT

marking. The original stagecoach holdup cylinder scene is now largely worn away from service and handling.

The top barrel address remains partly legible, though some lettering was lost when the rear sight dovetail was installed:

ADDRESS COL. SAML COLT NEW-YORK U.S. A[MERI]CA

The left side of the frame retains the:

COLTS
PATENT

marking, while the left side of the trigger guard is stamped:

36 CAL

The one piece walnut grip remains in very good condition overall. It appears to have been varnished more recently and retains an attractive warm brown tone. Beneath the varnish is a repaired crack on the right side. Light wear is present around the bottom edge.

The revolver cycles correctly in its present condition, with strong hammer action, accurate indexing, and good cylinder lockup. The hammer requires a firm pull to reach full cock. The revolver disassembles normally when the barrel wedge is removed, and the barrel to frame connection has very little play. These observations describe only the revolver's present mechanical condition and should not be interpreted as confirmation that it is safe to load or fire.

The bore is in very good condition for a service used Civil War era percussion revolver. It remains mostly bright and retains clearly visible Colt progressive rifling. There is evidence of old oxidation and fouling that has been cleaned away. All five percussion nipples remain present and clear on the cylinder, with oxidation from powder residue visible around their exteriors. One percussion cap is crushed in place.

Overall condition is very good for an early, extensively used Colt Pocket Navy. The revolver retains much of its original numbered assembly, a strong bore, clear Colt markings, and a pleasing aged patina. The replacement wedge, mismatched arbor, later front and rear sights, worn cylinder scene, refinished grip with repaired crack, cleaned oxidation, and crushed percussion cap are all fully disclosed.

With its very low serial No. 630, 1861 production date, 6 1/2" octagonal barrel, mostly matching serialized components, surviving Colt markings, and strong progressive rifling, this is a particularly interesting early Colt Model 1862 Pocket Navy. It would display especially well in a U.S. Civil War handgun, Colt percussion revolver, Pocket Navy, early production Colt, or advanced antique firearms collection.

Specifications:

Year of Manufacture: 1861
Caliber: .36cal
Manufacturer: Colt’s Patent Fire Arms Manufacturing Company
Model: 1862 Pocket Navy
Serial No.: 630
Ammunition Type: Cap and Ball
Barrel Length: 6 inches
Overall Length: 11 1/2 inches
Action: Single Action
Feed System: 5 Shot Revolver
Federal Classification: Pre-1899 Antique

History of the Colt Pocket Percussion Pistols:

The family of Colt Pocket Percussion Revolvers evolved from the earlier commercial revolvers marketed by the Patent Arms Manufacturing Company of Paterson, N.J. The smaller versions of Colt's first revolvers are also called "Baby Patersons" by collectors and were produced first in .24 to .31 caliber, and later in .36 caliber, by means of rebating the frame and adding a "step" to the cylinder to increase diameter. The .31 caliber carried over into Samuel Colt's second venture in the arms trade in the form of the "Baby Dragoon"-a small revolver developed in 1847–48. The "Baby Dragoon" was in parallel development with Colt's other revolvers and, by 1850, it had evolved into the "Colt's Revolving Pocket Pistol" that collectors now name "The Pocket Model of 1849". It is a smaller brother of the more famous "Colt's Revolving Belt Pistol of Naval Caliber" introduced the same year and commonly designated by collectors as the "1851 Navy Model" (and which was a basically a larger, .36 caliber of the Pocket Model, "belt pistol" referring to a weapon sized to fit into a belt holster, as opposed to the saddle holsters generally called for by Colt's larger cavalry combat models). In 1855 Colt introduced another pocket percussion revolver, the Colt 1855 "Sidehammer", designed alongside engineer Elisha K. Root.

The Pocket Model revolvers all have a traditional "Colt-style" frame, generally with brass grip straps and trigger guard, and a case-hardened steel frame. In appearance, the frames are almost identical to the larger 1851 Navy and .44 caliber 1860 Army Models, with the exception of being smaller, and so having a proportionately larger trigger guard. Since they appear so similar to the larger weapons, without an object nearby to give them scale, the Pocket Revolvers tend to give an impression of being larger than they actually are; it is difficult to fit all four fingers onto the slender grip, even for a person with average-sized hands. Except for by noting the relative size of the trigger guard to the frame, it is easy for a casual observer to mistake a .31 caliber Model 1849 for an 1851 Navy (un-rebated frame, slab-sided webbing around a regular pivoting loading lever, octagonal barrel, unfluted cylinder); indeed, the Model 1851 Navy was basically no more than a scaled -up 1849 Pocket Model. Likewise, the larger .36 caliber Pocket Police Models are virtually identical to the 1860 Army Model, with rebated frame and stepped cylinder (to accommodate a size up from .31 to .36, instead of .36 to .44 as with the Army Model), a graceful, flowing webbing surrounding a new style "creeping" loading lever, and a round barrel. The most obvious difference is that the Pocket Police had a fluted 5-shot cylinder, while most Army Models were unfluted, and held six shots. The reason for this close similarity is that all four guns were closely related, and followed similar paths of development; the original .31 caliber Model 1849 was scaled up to create the .36 caliber 1851 Navy Model. Later, the Navy Model was increased in bore size by rebating the frame and enlarging the cylinder, and became the 1860 Army Model. With the success of this project, the .31 caliber of the 1849 Model was similarly increased to .36, using the same method, creating the Pocket Police and Pocket Navy models in 1860.

In 1860, the .36 caliber Police Pocket model was created, after lessons were learned from experimentation aimed at reducing the size of the .44 Colt Holster Pistols (i.e. large cavalry weapons), Colt took advantage of stronger mass-produced steel by rebating the frame of the Navy revolver to hold a larger-diameter 44/100-inch chambered cylinder, basically fitting the power of a large cavalry saddle holster-gun and fitting it into the .36 caliber Navy Model, a gun that could be carried in a belt holster. Previously, it wasn't thought that the smaller frame could handle the power of the .44 round, but the introduction of stronger metals made it possible. Learning the lessons from this, the Colt factory applied the same technology to the .31 caliber Model 1849 Pocket revolvers, using high-strength (for the time) steel for the frame, which allowed them to remove enough material to fit a larger-diameter .36 caliber cylinder which still had five shots (the alternative was to simply retain the original cylinder diameter, and create a 4-shot .36 caliber version. The stronger steels made this sacrifice unnecessary. Other changes including lightweight fluted cylinders, and a round barrel, to offset the added weight, and a "creeping" loading lever as used in the 1861 Army Model; the result was the "Police Pocket Model of 1862", even though production started in 1861. The Pocket Navy was a version similarly up-sized to .36 caliber, but which retained the octagonal barrel and traditional loading lever of the earlier pocket mode. Between 1862 and 1873, Colt records document production of 19,000 of the Pocket Navies and over 20,000 Pocket Police revolvers. Relative to the .31 Pocket Revolvers, the period of manufacture was short and overall numbers were further limited by a fire at the Colt Factory in 1862 and War production concerns.

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IMA considers all of our antique guns as non-firing, inoperable and/or inert. Title 18, U.S. Code, Section 921(a)(16) defines antique firearms as all guns made prior to 1899. This law exempts antique firearms from any form of gun control or special engineering because they are not legally considered firearms. No FFL, C&R or any license is required to possess, transport, sell or trade Antique guns. All rifles and muskets sold by IMA that were manufactured prior to 1899 are considered Antiques by the US BATF (United States Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms). Therefore, all of IMA's Antique guns may be shipped to all US States and most nations around the world.

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Pre-1899 Manufacture, no licenses required, allowed to ship to almost any deliverable address across the globe. Please note that for international shipping, these MUST be shipped using UPS WW Services. International customers should always consult their country's antique gun laws prior to ordering.