The Colt Single Action Army Revolver: The Gun that Won the West

Still waiting on that Red Dead DLC that includes this revolver.
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[@SkylerKing]

"In 1961, Patton..." Holy crap, such a legendary badass that he invaded Mexico 16 years after his own death... and he still won.

[@Werebears]

Hahah I thought I grossly misremembered history for a moment!

[@JPMadden]

He meant 1916

[@SkylerKing]

@@JPMadden uh huh... But he said (very clearly) "1961" which is not 1916. See, that's the joke.

[@JPMadden]

@@SkylerKing I'm not the one missing the point. I just thought that I would supplement your wonderful joke with what was intended to be said, for the betterment of those who did not know. Sheesh.

[@XYGamingRemedyG]

😂😂 "SIXTEEN YEARS after this death. AND STILL WON" oh my god

[@grandadmiralzaarin4962]

"This is the greatest handgun ever made. The Colt Single Action Army. Six bullets. More than enough to kill anything that moves."- Revolver Ocelot

[@kevintheweedman]

Ran into a Colt .32 once owned by Pretty Boy Floyd. Its in my house right now

[@zen.mn.]

Revolver (Revolver Ocelot) Ocelot Revolver Ocelot

[@chriservin5975]

He was extremely difficult to kill in front of that ravine lol

[@IAmBushid0]

You're pretty good!

[@perniciouspete4986]

5 bullets For safety reasons the Colt was carried with the hammer on an empty chamber.

[@thesteve580]

"God created man, Samuel Colt made them equal. "

[@o_mondi1274]

Nuf sed

[@seanbrazell6147]

Then nukes made both irrelevant.

[@stlchucko]

I always hear that line being spoke by Tom Selleck as Matthew Quigley.

[@kevinfreeman3098]

@@seanbrazell6147 can't exactly push that button when someone with a .50bmg takes your head off your shoulders... Now can ya?

[@GankbotShuk]

@@kevinfreeman3098 The enemy can't push a button, if you disable his hand. ....MEDIC!

[@beowulfsrevenge4369]

You need to do a video on John Moses Browning and his effect on the firearm world and the world in general. Love you videos!

[@willywonka4340]

just covering 1911 pistol alone would need 3 parts to it, if it's going to do it justice, 😆

[@professormetal4411]

@@willywonka4340 Or all of the winchester rifles he had a hand in, then there's the M1919 and the M2 Browning... and the list goes on.

[@beowulfsrevenge4369]

@@willywonka4340 He could do a series of videos. A biographics, a mega projects and a couple of side project videos.

[@willywonka4340]

@@beowulfsrevenge4369 Simon, hope you're listening... 😛😁

[@mclew1234]

I don't think 1 video would do justice to JM Browing, literally where do you start, many of his guns are still manufactured 100 years later

[@aroneaton2639]

I know it's just a slip of the tongue, but the US excursion into Mexico to chase Pancho Villa was in 1916, not 1961.

[@deantheot7296]

nice catch

[@vinak963]

Would have been far more interesting if it was in 1961. lol

[@Shadow__133]

@@vinak963 I would imagine the cartels wouldnt make it any easier.

[@youtube2snoopy820]

I was wondering about that.

[@mikepette4422]

maybe it should have been?

[@williewilliams6571]

While many of the "Rough Riders" may have carried Colt Single actions, Theodore Roosevelt actually carried a double action .38 caliber Colt that had been salvaged from the wreck of the USS Maine.

[@rusoviettovarich9221]

That film starring Don Berenger as Teddy Roosevelt has him saying, when they overrun the Spanish machine guns nests with '3rd party' German advisers, "Kill the Hun."

[@williewilliams6571]

@@rusoviettovarich9221 I LOVE that film, have it on DVD.

[@christopherfisher128]

I was under the impression that Roosevelt carried a Smith & Wesson chambered in .38 colt.

[@williewilliams6571]

@@christopherfisher128 It was a Colt. It is on display at the Sagamore Hill National Historic Site. And it was stolen from there TWICE in the 20th century before the Parks service FINALLY secured it.

[@christopherfisher128]

@@williewilliams6571 This is where I got that information. Interesting if nothing else. Cheers www.nramuseum.org/guns/the-galleries/theodore-roosevelt-and-elegant-arms-1880s-to-1920s/case-27-theodore-roosevelt/theodore-roosevelt's-smith-wesson-new-model-no-3-revolver.aspx

[@TomKeown]

While your description on how to load the revolver is correct, the way you describe the unloading procedure is incorrect. As loading a cartridge was accomplished one at a time via the loading gate, so is ejecting a spend casing. The hammer is pulled to half cock, the loading gate opened, and the cylinder is manually rotated to align the casing with the gate opening. Then the ejector rod is pulled back (not up) to push the spend casing out the opening. The ejector rod is returned to its original position, the cylinder turned, and the process repeats. Also, cartridges in revolvers are not "chambered" as they are in a semi-auto pistol. In a revolver, all the rounds are chambered (the cylinder contains the chambers). Cocking the hammer only rotates the cylinder to place the chamber in parallel with the bore axis (could be called "in battery").

[@datasailor8132]

OK, Next Quibble. The SAA was notorious for negligent firing if the hammer was left over a loaded chamber. The firing pin was a permanent part of the hammer. Therefore one always carried your six shooter as a five shooter by loading it thus. On a completely empty cylinder pull the hammer back to the first notch. This is not half-cock. Half-cock is longer back and had a much deeper notch. Load one round. Skip the next chamber and continue to load four more rounds in sequence. Close the loading gate. Pull the hammer back ever so slightly, depress the trigger, and let the hammer gently down on what is now an empty chamber. This problem was not corrected until the third generation. Early Ruger Blackhawks with three screws also tended to do this. The firearm in the final sequence was of the later model.

[@hazcat640]

@@datasailor8132 Actually it is not 'notorious' for this and most people back in the day carried them fully loaded. Just as they did the cap and ball revolvers. What you are referring to, also known as the 'cowboy load' only really came about in the modern era for safety due to competitions and range rules.

[@batesvillbilly368]

This is what happens every time a liberal makes a video on a gun. Normal people have to correct all the errors in the comments. He also calls it a single shot instead of single action. I doubt he understands his error.

[@kl0wnkiller912]

Ok another small note of interest: Three are recorded cases of people carrying multiple loaded cylinders for both the SAA and the Walker and others. By carrying a fully loaded cylinder in a fit pouch it was slightly faster to pull the cylinder pin and replace the entire cylinder than to unload and reload one at a time. I actually did this myself with an old Ruger 22SA that I used to have and it does work.

[@shawnwells5719]

@@hazcat640 Cap and ball revolvers can be carried fully loaded by resting the hammer between the cap nipples. A SAA can't be safely carried that way because the hammer doesn't interface with the cylinder, and the cylinder will just rotate until the bolt locks it with a round under the firing pin. There is no safe way to carry an original SAA or replica with a live round under the hammer. Drop it with six rounds in the cylinder, and you run a good chance of blowing your balls off.

[@rodchallis8031]

"My very first pistol was a cap and ball Colt Shoots as fast as lightnin' but it loads a might slow It loads a might slow, and soon I found out It'll get you into trouble but it can't get you out So then I went and bought myself a Colt 45 Called a peacemaker but I never knew why I never knew why, I didn't understand Mama says the pistol is the devil's right hand" -- "Devil's Right Hand", Steve Earl.

[@chickenlampbrent]

I live in British Columbia Canada and in the 1980s I used to work in a gun shop. In the safe we used to have an old rusted-out Peacemaker that was found in a Farmer's field in southern Saskatchewan. We sent the serial number to Colt and heard back that this gun had been issued to the 7th Cavalry. Since it was discovered just over the Canadian border north of Little Bighorn there's no doubt that this was a battlefield pickup which was then discarded because it would have gotten the new owner into a lot more trouble than he was already in. Holding that thing always gave me the Shivers knowing it was with Custer's men when Galls Warriors over ran them.

[@lordpumpkinhead265]

Did your store ever attempt to restore it to its former glory?

[@chickenlampbrent]

@@lordpumpkinhead265 we were storing it for the original owner and by the time I left it was still in there. I don't believe that thing could have been restored it was a hunk of junk. Rusted solid.

[@shawnhalter2219]

It wasn't a "single shot weapon", rather, it was a "single action".

[@Tommy2shoe811]

That was referring to the other gun

[@transtubular]

@@Tommy2shoe811 No, he was describing the Peacemaker, which is the SAA. And for your information, a single shot gun can only fire a single shot before needing to be reloaded. The SAA can fire six. So no, it's not a single shot pistol but rather as Shawn pointed out, it's trigger performs the single action of releasing the cocked hammer. If it's not cocked, pulling the trigger does nothing.

[@talljoe3359]

@@transtubular You are right of course. Presenter also says," And after the shot the cylinder would click around loading a fresh cartridge into the chamber"...........Incorrect two times. An interesting video, but obviously not by a 'gun guy'.

[@elweasel2010]

@@talljoe3359 Well you know what Simon would say " I did it on purpose just like all the mispronounced words."

[@yankee2666]

No shit, Sparky.

[@Avalon_1991]

Well, Revolver Ocelot from Metal Gear Solid certainly liked this weapon.

[@larryhoover789]

Shalashaska

[@attehosiasluoma3127]

@@larryhoover789 its major Ocelot.

[@theredcomet4301]

you’re pretty good

[@arcturionblade1077]

That's why they call him... Revolver. Draw!!!

[@kennedyshits9840]

6 bullets.. more than enough to kill anything that moves

[@samuelgunnarsson1983]

"the cylinder would clink around one stop, loading a fresh cartridge into the chamber"... The cylinder has 6 chambers, a more correct wording would be "the cylinder would clink around one stop, ALIGNING a fresh cartridge with the BARREL"

[@V0idFace]

6:56 “this was a single shot weapon, meaning that the hammer needed to be cocked back before every shot.” Single *action weapon. Single shot means it’s a gun that fired once before needing to be reloaded, like a musket or most derringers. This is a single action weapon, meaning the hammer being cocked and trigger being pulled are two separate motions. A double action would both cock the hammer and fire with the squeeze of the trigger. Also: the Single Action Army was not rimfire, as you implied, it was center-fire.

[@davidgardner863]

It was also made in .22, .32, and .44 rimfire.

[@timsoutherly6820]

In original form, it was a rimfire.

[@transtubular]

@@timsoutherly6820 It was chambered in .44 Henry during production. Obviously it was chambered in several cartridges during it's time so as to meet the desires of all the folks buying them but the VERY first (serial number 1) SAAs were chambered in .45 Colt, which was a centerfire brass cartridge.

[@maxskullic9879]

Something about a single action, the loading and unloading, the way it feels in the hand... Just a damn good Gun!

[@kimarykorlumiose7728]

"This... is the greatest handgun ever made." "The Colt Single Action Army..." "Six bullets." "More than enough to kill anything that moves." "Now I'll show you why they call me 'Revolver.'" "Draw!"

[@nikolashanks7058]

Cartridges

[@MNewton]

I came to the comments just for this. The other guy didn't get it I think.

[@FinalLugiaGuardian]

@@nikolashanks7058 Damn it Otukan!

[@grandadmiralzaarin4962]

I don't think you're cut out for an automatic, you tend to twist your elbow to absorb the recoil...that's more of a Revolver technique. Still that was some fancy shooting...You're pretty good

[@xeviousrex7491]

Ah, a man of culture I see.

[@bryangonzalez1398]

You could add that Colt had to wait to make the SAA until 1873 because of the patent for the bored through cylinder had been rejected by Samuel Colt and instead Smith & Wesson bought the patent from Rollin White. Samuel Colt was also against double action revolvers and it was really with his death that the company was able to innovate a bit more.

[@mzaite]

If you ever owned a colt Lighting revolver, you'd know why Colt had no love of double action.

[@RobotDCLXVI]

​@@mzaite I'm curious now. What was the issue with the Lightning?

[@mzaite]

@@RobotDCLXVI It was built optimistically about 10 years before manufacturing techniques were ready for it at its size. The trigger mechanism would shake out of alignment the timing would go out, break the fine leaf springs and the mechanism would basically lock up. No Double Action or Single action. As a hand built and fitted custom prototype it probably worked fine, but production wasn't there yet.

[@thateffinguy2422]

The revolvers are Single Action, not Single Shot

[@danchristopher7957]

A Brit...

[@lillyanneserrelio2187]

Who cares? ~ sincerely A Human...

[@danchristopher7957]

A Brit....

[@danchristopher7957]

@@lillyanneserrelio2187 ....easy.there, Karen

[@_wanted_outlaw3007]

@@lillyanneserrelio2187 55 people apparently care as 55 people liked the comment..

[@paulsimmons5726]

Simon, The SAA is an American firearm. When you give barrel lengths, please use inches, not mm's... The most common lengths were/are 7.5", 5.5", and 4.75". Great video! I have two SAA's, totally reliable and too much fun at the range!

[@bellenber]

Got to love Firearm Culture in America, where we measure barrel lengths in inches, but bullets in both caliber and metric.

[@justinantonius2823]

Most people don't know but in even the most restrictive states you can still have a antique revolver made before 1899 sent directly to your front door with no background check. Also even if it is newly manufactured as long as it copies a design before 1899 and does not shoot cartridges as in it uses black powder and ball that you manually load into the cylinder it also is unregulated

[@youtube2snoopy820]

"...of course, a Colt peacemaker" Image lovingly holds on a gun whose barrel is stamped ".44 S&W". @ 12:38

[@EricDaMAJ]

It's a marking to designate it fires the .44 S&W cartridge. Just like today, it's easier to make a gun that fires a popular cartridge type than make your own. .44 S&W was pretty popular back then. But it was very important to say so, otherwise you might buy ammo that wouldn't fit or worse, ammo that would fit but would blow up the gun.

[@derekp2674]

​ That .44 looks like a Colt Bisley Target model: See kzbin.info/www/bejne/bHyXeYaoiL2Xmas

[@youtube2snoopy820]

@@EricDaMAJ Thanks for the info! News to me.

[@JoeHaynie_VJ]

Great episode and interesting. Nit to pick: What you describe as "single shot" is actually "single action". More modern revolvers which are capable of firing without first cocking the firearm (it was cocked by pulling on the trigger) are "double action". I.e. the trigger pull performed two actions: the cocking and firing of the weapon. "Single shot" is just that. A weapon which has one one chamber and carries one shot which must be reloaded each time it is fired.

[@firstnamelastname6216]

There were actually many mistakes and inaccuracies in this episode...

[@PaulRudd1941]

@@firstnamelastname6216 probably since Brits don't know shit about guns anymore 😂

[@JoeHaynie_VJ]

I'd also add that the "wild west" in the late 1800's wasn't nearly as wild be as the movies made them out to be.

[@owenshebbeare2999]

@@PaulRudd1941 You do realise this channel is American, as are the researchers and editors, and we Brits did a lot of the groundwork for modern firearms. Not mentioned here is the rotating cylinder if the Puckle Gun was certainly Colt's inspuration, given he had seen it before his trip to India where legend claims he was inspired to design such a device. You Yanks might be gun obsessed, but you neither invented them, nor many of the innovztions that occured.

[@PaulRudd1941]

@@owenshebbeare2999 nice try but I'm a Canadian bucko. I'm very well aware of the historic production of excellent firearms. They failed to proof read and fact-check. I was taking a jab at how much the firearms industry in the UK has fallen. At least you gave me a good laugh at your expense. 👍

[@benzomanic2972]

Yes finally!!! Thanks Simon&Co!!! I could see Simon dressing up like a cowboy for a party... Sixshooter Simon

[@willywonka4340]

his full faced beard definitely made the cut as an outlaw bandit! Yee-Haw!

[@badluck5647]

Sounds like another Simon clone

[@willywonka4340]

@Gwyn and Gold 😆

[@aidancarkeek3044]

Love my colt single action in 357! One of the most entertaining fire arms to handle.

[@disruptfulninja9188]

All I can say is MAGNUM!

[@TheWolfsnack]

@@disruptfulninja9188 ....to which I reply.......45 Colt

[@mzaite]

@@TheWolfsnack I've shot them both. I prefer the .357 Magnum personally. Cheaper, Easier to Find, and for plinking you can go even cheaper and shoot .38 Special.

[@TheWolfsnack]

@@mzaite Agreed....which is why I like 45 Colt...I can load them light for plinking, or heavy for my carbine....

[@dogsoldier8187]

I will stick to my 72 navy open tops in .44-40

[@professormetal4411]

I've always heard the Winchester 73 referred to as the gun that won the west. Maybe you could do a video on the evolution of lever action guns starting with some of the failures like the volcanic pistol, leading into the first successful lever gun the 1860 Henry repeater, up on into the winchester model 95?

[@choughed3072]

Amazon prime has some great forgotten weapons episodes, one is about the guns of the wild west. Worth a look if you can.

[@danielcurtis1434]

Why would you want an explanation from Simon???? Go watch forgotten weapons. Or try in range TV they did a lever gun series. Simon has been caught spewing a lot of BS. I would avoid his gun content

[@justme-ij2qy]

You would be correct. That was literally winchesters sales slogan at the time. While it was colts actual slogan that "God created men, Col. Colt made them equal."

[@MW-bi1pi]

My vote for guns that won the West are the Winchester Model 1866 Lever action, and the Smith and Wesson Model 3 in 44 also.

[@OutnBacker]

No. The gun that won the west was a 10 gauge shotgun or a surplus Springfield musket, or a breechloader carbine. More of those went west than any other type, and fed and protected more people than any other type. All others are myths from Hollywood, and sales BS. The Winchesters, Colt SAA's, and other great guns were too expensive for the average guy. ALL of them were designed for the military, and exported in great numbers to other militaries. Yes, lots of people owned the lever action rifles, but by far, the most prevalent utility weapon was the shotgun. One of the reasons why there are so few original examples is because they wore them out by the use of black powder. Same with the original rifled musket and early breechloaders. They just corroded away, but lasted well into the 1920's.

[@zerentheunskilled]

I inherited one of these from my dad. It's not an original run, but the design hasn't changes all that much since the beginning. It's a really satisfying gun to shoot! It's also incredibly simple and reliable. It's no wonder that it became as popular as it was and still is!

[@OutnBacker]

While the Colt SAA is definitely the most iconic revolver in a large and excellent line-up, it is actually not the Gun That Won The West....except in Hollywood depictions. That - depending on one's view - honor goes to the lowly shotgun. Second up goes to the Civil War ex-military rifled muskets and the early military breechloading rifles and carbines. All three types were owned and travelled in very large numbers as people migrated west after the War Between The States. They are the primary weapons that simple everyday people would be able to own and afford, and they were the types that put food on the table and kept the lawless elsewhere. The revolvers were too expensive for most folks and were carried mostly by lawmen, soldiers (if they were issued or gambled for), many "cowboys", and criminals. I'll toss in the gamblers, too. Even with the availability of revolvers, some still preferred the shotgun - for obvious reasons. It should be noted that - again, except in the imagination of Hollywood - the Wild West didn't really exist. Only a few towns and crossroads were that violent. Most people wanted peace and quiet, law and order, so they secured it themselves. It was the shotgun and a few good citizens that mostly kept things on an even keel - not the arrival of some marshal. The marshals did not regularly set up an office in smaller towns because there was no need. The violent reputation of some towns was noted by out of work dime store novelists from back east, who sold lies and BS to gullible city slickers about the howlin' savages and wild outlaws that ravaged the poor settler and townsfolk. It was a myth. If an outlaw tried to rob a bank or harass a town, he would very likely run the risk of being shot to pieces by the town Vigilantes. Never the less, the myth stuck and the Feds sent an army of lawmen out west to keep things copasetic. In a few years, towns like Tombstone were quiet and civil, just like the rest of them. Kept that way by the 10 gauge shotgun.

[@normanbraslow7902]

You know your history. I see no errors. Very good.

[@OutnBacker]

@@normanbraslow7902 Thank you. I will add that the Law arrived to quell the vigilantes, too. Some were gaining a reputation for ex-judicial hangings that were an embarrassment to some back east. So, the Law came to town from time to time to get to know folks and to show the badge. All in all, it wasn't a bad idea. Also, the argument about gun control isn't new. It raged from very early on in the Republic. There were lots of towns and cities where there was a No Guns law or ordinance. People obeyed or didn't, but it was a fact. The Supreme Court eventually sided with the 2nd Amendment til this day. We will see whether it survives this current generation of fools.

[@glutenfreegam3r177]

the Winchester lever action 30-30 disagrees.

[@OutnBacker]

@@glutenfreegam3r177 The Model 94 was introduced at least 15 years after the west was "won" and settled, so although it is probably the best of all the Winchester lever actions in some ways, it does not qualify as having won the west. It is a modern lever action.

[@patrickscalia5088]

@@OutnBacker What I didn't know until just a few years ago, after having owned and loved several 94'a over the span of my life, is that the Winchester 1894 was designed by the American Einstein of gun design, John Moses Browning. Yes, that John Browning. It was one of his earliest successful designs. Of course he went on to design the BAR, the M1911,which would be the issue sidearm of the US military for some 70 years, the 1919 .30 machinegun, the M2 Browning .50 'heavy" machinegun which is still in use in improved form with the US and the military of numerous other countries, the Auto 5 shotgun (the first successful semiautomatic shotgun)...and, need I go on? Given the sheer excellence of the 1894 rifle it's not a surprise that Browning designed it.

[@douglassauvageau7262]

Patton would thank you for accurately describing his sidearm as gripped with ivory. "Only a pimp would use pearl-handles". 🤭

[@theliberalrepublican5910]

No single action army revolver manufactured by Colt EVER had a barrel that was measured in millimeters.

[@blueduck9409]

Ugh, i know. Its like finger nails on a chalk board.

[@mzaite]

No, but these days saying the word "Inch" causes an unwholy hell spawn of "What's that in Metric!?"

[@theweppe27]

But the real question is: Does he carry The Big Iron on his hip?

[@willywonka4340]

... and that hog leg somewhere hidden from view 🤷‍♂️

[@admiraltiberius1989]

BIG IRON

[@mgweible8162]

Marty robbins would be proud

[@kiwi_comanche]

BIG IRON.

[@ComaDave]

Patrolling the Mojave almost makes you wish for a nuclear revolver.

[@nealhoffman7518]

Patton was an Olympic silver medalist (an argument has been made he should have gotten gold) for pistol sharpshooting. If he says he shot them... he probably did

[@taggartlawfirm]

Patton was the silver medalist in Sabre.

[@BogeyTheBear]

Something about using a .45 and telling the judges the reason there was less marks on the target than expected was because he put shots through the same hole.

[@joshkamp7499]

For a channel that is definitely not firearms focused, a rather hearty "well done'! Also, massive props to you and your writers for always doing a fantastic job of portraying historical events surrounding a video subject in an extremely tactful and factual manner, without descending into sociopolitical commentary. It's a refreshing throwback to a journalistic integrity and commitment to facts that's all but dead in the internet era.

[@brianleabo6295]

Well, Ashley, the H&R was a close copy of the Smith & Wesson Schofield. Made popular cause the ease of loading you could pop it open any dejected all the routes. Where is the single action army had to have one checked in and replace to the time or have the whole cylinder dropped out and replaced. Either which way it was much harder. If you need examples of such ones, I can send you pictures.

[@dereklufkin6371]

The Winchester rifle is also referred to as the gun that won the west.

[@christopherfisher128]

That title would rightfully belong to the Henry making it's debut in 1860. The "Winchester" versions came out in 1866 & 1873. That is a purely semantic answer though because they were all the same company.

[@glutenfreegam3r177]

THIS! Finally someone else in the comments with half a brain. and to be more specific it was the Winchester lever action 30-30

[@aapex1]

1800s, Sam Colt: "The Gun that WON the West" Future historians: 2000s, Gene Stoner: "The gun that SAVED the WEST". MOLON LABE

[@falkwulf3842]

Winchester rifles were among the earliest repeaters. The Model 1873 was particularly successful, being marketed by the manufacturer as "The Gun That Won the West." Not COlt but Winchester. Colt's slogan was God made men, Colt made them equal.

[@monteharrison1478]

Mολὼν λαβέ!

[@David-bf6bz]

FN FAL right arm of free world has entered the chat

[@MrPh30]

The Turks bought many Winchesters for their millitary. Russians at 3 battles around Plevna noticed that. Within the 80 yard line Turks switched to levers and thumped off the .44s on the remaining forces . Also many of the Pioneer columns from South Africa up through Matabele land carried Winchesters also, 73, 92 and many more.

[@mzaite]

Not sure how, Stoner's complex little chamber fouler has only ever been involved in Boondoggles, failed proxies, and sloppy multi-decade meanderings. One could say the AK-47 was the gun that saved the west, since it's ruggedness and simplicity meant it kept offensive forces just complacent and lazy enough to only at best manage a costly stalemate, since they had nothing driving them to build a real supply and support infrastructure, and only managed the barest of success when their "big scary" red benefactors had to start shifting their weight around.

[@unr74]

I have a second generation SSA - 1964 - Nevada Centennial- .45 Long Colt. I had a cowboy action job on it. It’s a pleasure to shoot. I used it to qualify for my last CCW, which if you think about it is pretty ridiculous. But it was in Carson City. That . 45 Colt round is amazing.

[@Rickinvegas]

Did you notice that a couple of the paintings used showed Remington revolvers and not Colt SAAs

[@jimklapperich]

A couple big mistakes; Patton was dead in 1961. It was center fire, not rim fire.

[@Rickinvegas]

@Robert Seasrs absolutely! Top breaks are definitely the way to go

[@swrennie]

Maybe they were Frederic Remington paintings...

[@johnortmann3098]

Some of them actually showed cap-and-balls. A lot of those were converted to fire cartridges.

[@hagerty1952]

@@swrennie - Beat me to it!

[@mtevilone]

I know it was devastating to my Comanche ancestors. For a long time after whites started settling east Texas, they stayed out of the rest of it. Even Texas Rangers rarely went out into west Texas. Comanches raided at will, driving out the tribes native to the area. Mexico made a truce with the Apache to work together against the Comanche, and gave up. The Comanche lived to fight, to raid towns and villages. They took many slaves, native and white. They stole horses, and would ride for days to avoid any pursuit. Losses of population and the revolver in the hands of Walker's Rangers forced Comanches into Oklahoma where other tribes were.

[@kurtbjorn3841]

Comanche warriors were bad-assed, and the history of West Texas and the panhandle were colorful, to say the least.

[@jgranger3532]

The Comanche pushed back the line of Mexican/White settlement in a war that went on for 65 years. This, not Afghanistan or Vietnam, was the longest war the US Army ever fought. There wasn't a tougher enemy on this continent in the 19th century.

[@dubuyajay9964]

@@kurtbjorn3841 Hello from the Bandera area. On the edge of what was once the outskirts of Comanche Territory.

[@danielcurtis1434]

Yeah the first .44 revolver with self contained cartridge was the Remington-Beals new model army. And yes the colt SAA was a .44 not a .45!!! It uses a .440” bore that becomes.450-.456” ounce rifling is cut. The Remington is one of the great forgotten weapons of the West.

[@DisHammerhand]

My favorite type of handgun. Various companies are still building renditions them. The SAA is to America what the Samurai sword is to Japan.

[@rogersheddy6414]

Fan firing was first done in the mining towns like Leadville and Virginia City. This was using the old percussion pistols like the Colt model 1849 and 1851 the calipers were usually small compared to what we use today. 28 caliber, and 36 caliber. The idea behind the fan firing was that you had your fingers stiff and spread out. You would thumb back the Hammer with the right hand, pull the trigger why old bringing the left hand down and cocking the Hammer with the index finger. When you would pull the trigger you would keep that trigger down the whole time after. The next finger, the next finger, then the next, would go through until the gun was empty. This was usually done to an enemy close up. The idea was to fill him full of as much in the way of lead pellets as possible as quickly as possible. It would sound about like a short burst of machine-gun Fire. That last comparison would be unintelligible to them, because there were no machine guns at that time. That sound however, has been described by people riding home in letters or writing in journals at the time. The Ripping sound of the gunfire when people were Fanning their guns at one or another adversary.

[@dcpack]

I never heard of the border actions against Pancho Villa in 1961.

[@jeremycash1990]

Even weirder that Patton did this 16 years after he died!

[@buchanap]

@@jeremycash1990 Old blood and guts Patton was so tough even the laws of time couldn't slow him down! lol

[@Mbartel500]

Patton died in 1945, so could not have been part of the hunt for Pancho Villa in 1961. However he could have been part of that expedition in 1916. Yes I know it was a juxtaposition of the “1” and “6”.

[@iamnotpaulavery]

I have a "Single Action Army New Frontier", but in .22 LR. My father bought it when he was 18. Even after literally thousands of rounds through it, it is still very accurate and sturdy as a rock with no sloppiness in the cylinder. It has hardly any play at all. But, then again, the .22LR is not a very high pressure round.

[@tyeikenberg8938]

"God made man. Colt made them equal."

[@captainz9]

"I said I didn't have much use for one... I never said I didn't know how to use it". :P

[@Rolandbadger]

@@captainz9 Matthew Quigley.:)

[@RossOneEyed]

And then, Saint John Moses Browning came forth from the wilderness and gave the world the M1911 .45ACP pistol, the epitome of handgun design. And the Lord looked at it, and saw that it was good.

[@CM-ve1bz]

The only problem with that ol saying is I don't believe I'm equal to Miculek, Hickok or Harrell on their worst day. But that's just me

[@tyeikenberg8938]

@@CM-ve1bz I agree 100% but aces and 8s is called the dead man's hand for a reason...

[@ComUnSas]

General Patton, so awesome a soldier he was able to invade Mexico in 1961, 16 years after he died

[@naturalstupidity]

Probably he meant 1916. I'm sure the assistant who teleprompted the script has been sacked.

[@ComUnSas]

@@naturalstupidity 😄

[@ComUnSas]

Yes, it should have been 1916. Am not criticizing a small mistake. Simon reads through a crazy number of scripts.

[@HeyMJ.]

Very Good MGAPRJ. SideNote: Native American lands were encroached when the *1st Non-Native* arrived. Norse, Spanish, Port’gse, English, Flemish, French, Texan, Mexican, Canadian & USAmerican.

[@nettles89]

And by other native Americans, for that matter. The woke, paternalistic notion of a bunch of hippie communes is disgustingly condescending. These were real people, with real problems and real conflicts, and they bickered and fought over land ownership like everyone else throughout history.

[@HeyMJ.]

@@nettles89 Very good points. Thank you for add’l comments re tribal raids & the extreme violence perpetrated by some throughout history.

[@guyh.4553]

Great job! Learned more than I already knew.

[@vonclark6344]

That was straight forward. Good job. No crazy extras.

[@loke6664]

While this is certainly interesting, I feel that the Colt SAA is for the sideprojects and not megaprojects. It was a relatively quick and cheap development after all. It isn't exactly a similar project to the SR-71 or the Tsar bomba. Even if you compare the development cost in today's money I think you find that Pentagon spends more money developing a new field toilette then Colt did for the SAA. Sure, it was a solid piece of engineering but you can say the same thing of Phillips screwdriver.

[@johnderoy916]

And the reason you have to hold it in your left hand to reload, which might seem odd to the majority of people, is because the US Cavalry held the reins to the horse in the left hand. So, they could hold the gun, reload, and control the horse all at the same time.

[@mzaite]

Same too the Winchester Lever guns. Although that's more intuitive since you already are holding the front of the rifle with your left hand.

[@davidbenner2289]

Great-grampa didn't carry a sidearm. He used a ten-gauge double barrel shotgun when he was a town marshal in Montana. Later a deputy sheriff and Indian agent on a flathead "Indian" reservation in Idaho he used what was available. His six year old son, my grampa, hunted with a .22 Short rifle. Grampa often did what he wanted, his mother drowning in the Snake River in a flood years earlier. Nope, great-grampa used shotguns most of the time. In town he would wait for the drunk cowboys to use up their ammunition then he would step in and use a heavy cane as cudgel to subdue them. Guns are a part of my family for over 414 years in America, now. Dad used Colt Python's and 1911's as a gurilla leader and special operations asset in Southeast Asia for decades. My boys used various firearms in Afghanistan.

[@foxtrotunit1269]

3:53 YES very good, thank you for mentioning that. As far as i know, he was the in introducing the idea of standardized parts in manufacturing.

[@mikeblair2594]

Nope, it was an old idea, but Eli Whitney did it first.

[@JaelaOrdo]

Awesome video idea 👍🏽 There are definitely a lot of other firearms you could do too

[@SpacePatrollerLaser]

The 'shootout at the OK Corral", like most western gunfights, was fought with rifles and shotguns by the Earps, Bat Masterson and Doc Holiday

[@hazcat640]

One shotgun, no rifles.

[@dtaylor10chuckufarle]

Yeah, I remember a shotgun as well.

[@SpacePatrollerLaser]

@@dtaylor10chuckufarle Before it became the BS&C (BullShit and Crackpot) Chennel, The History Channel did a series on the American West. It shattereed may myths. The 'iconoc" quick-draw duels only accorred once in records; It was between Wild Bill Hikock and Billy Tutt, and was more an accident of circumstances than a deliberate event. The overwhelming majority of gunfights were with rifles and shotguns rather than pistols. As to the vaunted lawlessness, the cities and towns of the East had higher murder rates than that of the western counterparts. Do you think people would uproot and go through all that trouble to move into a high-risk zone?

[@Rafferty1968]

@@hazcat640 It was reported that Tom McLaury used a lever action rifle. Virgil Earp probably used his favourite S&W #3 in .44 Russian. Wyatt was notorious for preferring a shotgun.

[@mrxcman9272]

9:56 After watching this for a second time I remembered to mention that General Custer *may* have actually had a pair of *Webly RIC double action revolvers* on him at the Battle of Little Bighorn (AKA The Battle of the Greasy Grass).

[@garybailey2367]

I was only trying to read into this last week, thanks!

[@Erevos85]

legend has it that only 5 creatures cannot be killed by the Colt.

[@mbpaintballa]

i get that reference

[@dubuyajay9964]

Which 5?

[@redswift31]

Not to be that guy but its said that during the gunfight at the OK Corral Wyatt Earp used a schofield revolver not a SAA.

[@transtubular]

It's okay, I wanted to be that guy too...you just beat me to it.

[@eugenevictortooms4174]

Revolver Ocelot introduced me to this gun back in the 90s.

[@luissantiago5163]

Oh awesome! Love the uploads

[@admiraltiberius1989]

When you remember a great many of the settlers of the West were Civil War veterans, you'd realize why law enforcement wasn't needed all that much. Once you've been on a battlefield like Shiloh, Gettysburg or the Wilderness. You won't be bothered or intimidated by some yahoo waving a gun at you.

[@TurnStyleGames]

It goes deeper than that though, honestly. Requiring the police to be on hand to "protect" people is a relatively new phenomenon. It was simply common sense/normal life for people to defend themselves with firearms or anything else at their disposal. Shoot someone stealing your horse? The Sheriff would just nod and say "okay, we'll bury him", etc. There was not the modern stigma of protecting yourself, etc. Sheriffs and Marshals spent more time dealing with cattle thieves, drunkards and actual federal warrants than they did responding to simple crimes, etc. A criminal was 10x more likely to be run out of town by the people than by law enforcement. Just a very different time.

[@admiraltiberius1989]

@@TurnStyleGames very much so and as someone who has been in law enforcement on different levels, I wish it was still like that. Makes things much easier.

[@ianmiller6707]

Wait this isn't Ian McCollum

[@davidlium9338]

Are you sure? It sure sounds like Ian!

[@charliemills6955]

Thank you Simon

[@LowenKM]

Very nicely done, thx. And there are actually a surprising range of 'replicas' also available even today, from the inexpensive Heritage Rough Rider, to the Italian handcrafted Uberti Cattleman featuring polished walnut and brass. BTW, always fun to check the comments section on these kinda firearms-related videos just to see how many gun nuts felt compelled to post the inevitable 'corrections'! ;-p

[@torjones1701]

"no surprises as doing this is surprisingly inaccurate" And that's why doing it that way isn't the way it's done. You don't fan the hammer with the heel of your palm, you do it with your fingers. With the proper technique, it is just as accurate as aimed shooting, only faster. I've seen folks clear leather with the hammer already cocked, and lock the revolver to their hip giving them very good accuracy, fire as their fingers come down, and while the trigger is still squeezed, the fingers pass over the hammer, and all shots landed within the torso area of a silhouette target. No, we're not talking MOA accuracy here, and "Inaccurate" is a relative term... a Battleship could "Hit" the target by being 100 yards off after all... your gun hand doesn't move. it stays welded to your side providing a very stable anchoring point for your other hand to SMOOTHLY operate the hammer, there's no smacking, no jerking, nothing like your spastic motions reminiscent of someone suffering a seizure...

[@RebelCowboysRVs]

The late Bob Munden comes to mind.

[@josephledux8598]

Well, accuracy notwithstanding fanning a traditional revolver from the era is still a stupendously bad idea unless you have a professional machinist on staff making new parts for you. It was never considered a proper way to use any revolver, and would break parts in no time at all. Fanning is an invention of the movie industry. No 19th century soldier or lawman ever used his weapon in that way. It would have been considered both reckless and the very height of incompetence. It simply breaks things too quickly. In fact, the weapons you see being fanned in cowboy shooting events and in movies today are usually Rugers, revolvers of modern design and internals that cosmetically look a lot like traditional Colts. And even Rugers break like crazy if you fan them. They just don't break as quickly as the original Colts. I acknowledge that some 20th century exhibition shooters could do wonders with fanning Western style revolvers. But those people were literally professional athletes with custom weapons that, like a top fuel dragster, needed an hour in the shop for repair for every few seconds actually being used. In the 19th century, any man who wanted to shoot his pistol faster than a single-action allowed, he did the same thing a modern shooter would do--he used a double-action revolver instead. The double-actions, like the H&R shown early in this video, or the Colt 1878 "Double Action Army" which was purchased in huge numbers by the US Army in that era, could be operated more quickly than fanning a single action, and without breaking the damned thing. I have several western-style single action revolvers made by Uberti, Pietta, and Ruger. Since to the average dumbass they _look_ like "cowboy revolvers" guess what's the first thing these dumbasses want to do when you actually let them shoot one? Yep. If the person is a novice before I even hand them the weapon to shoot I tell them that if they try to fan it or -- God forbid -- try to twirl it around I will take it from them and beat them about the head and neck with it. Anyone who has ever read factual accounts of gun battles from the era knows that gunfights back then were won with marksmanship, not speed. That business of quick-drawing and shooting straight from the holster almost never happened. And practicing it (and other equally stupid stuff like twirling or spinning the revolver) was considered a great way to shoot yourself in the leg or foot, NOT a way to become deadlier with a pistol. A competent lawman or gunfighter from the era had his pistol in his hand BEFORE the shooting started. Not WHEN. If you want to watch magnificence in how to draw a weapon and attack straight from the scabbard, you need to avoid cowboy movies and take up studying iaido. That's the Japanese style of attacking someone straight from the scabbard as you draw your sword. As opposed to kendo, which always starts with the sword already drawn and held at the ready.

[@torjones1701]

@@josephledux8598 Huh... I wonder why mine hasn't broken then. Sure, it's a modern reproduction of the SAA, but it's nothing special. I didn't even spend a lot on it. I know I'm nowhere near as fast as Jerry or Bob, but not many people are. If fanning the hammer were as hard on revolvers as you seem to think, surely mine would have had some kind of problem by now. About the only thing you've said that I agree with is that a competent lawman or gunfighter would have started the fight with the gun already in their hand, that Iaido is pretty cool shit, and the average dumbass thinks that anything that looks like a revolver with wooden grips is a cowboy gun. There exists plenty of videos on the internet, especially on youtube, of people doing exactly what you call utterly stupid without a single broken revolver anywhere to be seen. Surely, if you were correct, there would be videos of people like Jerry Miculek who have talked about those feats of shooting and taught people to do them and have made those videos available online for any and all to see, they would have mentioned SOMETHING about how rough it is on their guns and how they are always breaking and costing them competitions, or about how much time they spent rebuilding their revolvers between shooting events. You know, kind of like how that happens in automotive sports, like how that happens in air racing, like how that happens in boat racing, like how that happens in bicycle racing, like how that happens in motorcycle racing, like how that happens in nearly any other sport with complicated equipment. But some how, miraculously, it doesn't happen in SASS? We hear about other problems shooters have with their guns, but somehow, we never hear about fanning the hammer breaking guns. Utterly amazing. On the other hand, there exists actual film footage of THE Colonel William F "Buffalo Bill" Cody's Wild West Show of him and Annie Oakley fanning the hammer. So, yeah, it's historically accurate. It wasn't invented by the movie industry. I have been shooting for nearly 40 years. I have won State level competitions in both junior and adult divisions. I highly suspect that it was just another trick shot, that normal gunfighters didn't do it, but it was something that was actually filmed from that era. Buffalo Bill, Annie Oakley, The Fabulous Topperweins, Ed McGivern, practically everyone in the SASS, and hundreds of other exhibition shooters, a great many of whom are/were also instructors, and NONE of them think to mention anything about any of your claims? Nope. Sorry. Don't believe it. Not even a little bit.

[@josephledux8598]

@@torjones1701 "as you seem to think" huh? You think I just arrived at that knowledge with my own imagination? I don't know how many historical accounts of things lie this you've ever seen, but you clearly haven't been doing much of it. You should just google "fanning single action revolver" and of the results you will get about 2/3 of them historical accounts on why fanning is such a bad idea. And the reason it's a bad idea is that it is 1) hell on the gun and 2) is an utterly useless technique in a real gun battle. Don't want to take my word for it? Will you take Wyatt Earp's word for it? “In all my life as a frontier peace officer, I did not know a really proficient gunfighter who had anything but contempt for the gun fanner, or the man who literally shot from the hip.…From my experience…I can only support the opinion advanced by the men who gave me my most valuable instruction in fast and accurate shooting-which was that the gun fanner and the hip shooter stood small chance to live against a man who…took his time and pulled the trigger once." Note the word Earp used: _contempt._ athletes And here's a quote from Ryan Hodges, a historian with the Buffalo Bill Cody Center of the West, the very same place where this film of Cody is probably archived. "When you fan the hammer on a revolver that is not properly modified for such usage, it can be very hard on the gun. Such issues with fanning are the speed of the technique, which could bend or break the hand that turns the cylinder and potentially wear down the bolt and notches in the cylinder. This messes up the timing of the gun, potentially causing misfires. There is also the hazard of getting cut on the firing pin. More often than not, it does not provide stable or accurate shooting. While it looks like a lot of fun, leave it to Hollywood and the professionals." And what do you know, it only took me about 40 seconds to find those two references. You should do a little research. You need it. If you had an even rudimentary knowledge of how guns work, you'd know without having to be told that hitting the hammer and causing the cylinder to spin at a velocity it was never designed for will play havoc on the timing and lockup of the revolver. Especially given the heat treating of the era which left the parts much softer than in modern gun manufacturing. Let's be real about this. Some of the biggest movers behind the introduction of the Ruger Vaquero revolver were professional cowboy exhibition shooters who until the Vaquero came out used to spend fortunes getting Blackhawk revolvers cosmetically altered to where they were visually indistinguishable from the traditional 1873 Colt. Because the kind of shooting they do, when done with the original Colt design BREAKS THEM. You can ruin even a Ruger revolver by fanning it. I know this because I've actually done gunsmithing on a Ruger Blackhawk that was owned by a guy who watched too many cowboy movies and had no sense. This was in a fairly new revolver that had not had even two boxes of cartridges run through it yet. I ended up having to replace the trigger, the hammer, the cylinder bolt, and the pawl or hand. Even at that it still had sloppy lockup and would occasionally spit lead out of the barrel/cylinder gap because of the damage done to the bolt notches in the cylinder. The owner was too cheap to pay for a new cylinder with intact bolt notches. That gun would never be the same again and probably spent the next 30 years in a box in the top of the man's closet. With ANY single action revolver, and especially an original Colt 1873, or modern reproductions of the same, fanning is the mark of a rank amateur who should have never been handed the revolver to begin with. You can fan your own revolvers all you like. I wouldn't allow to even touch one of mine.

[@torjones1701]

@@josephledux8598 Yes, "As you seem to think" on the grounds that I'm not a mind reader and have no idea what you actually think, only what you're writing. You could be trying to troll me for all I know. I assume nothing. That it was looked down on was never a point of disagreement. That it wasn't (or at least very rarely) used in actual gun fights (outside of Hollywood) was never a point of disagreement. I took exception to your statement that it was INVENTED by Hollywood, when clearly, even your own quotations from people from the era make it abundantly clear that you are aware that it was a technique from the era and NOT an invention of Hollywood. I also take exception to the assertion that it's hard on the gun. It's myth and legend. It's that oft repeated old yarn of supposed wisdom from the old timers but never actually proven that many people take for granted even after it's been disproved for a hundred years. 40 years of personal shooting history, and my grandfather's entire lifetime, with hundreds upon hundreds of other shooters, and not one of them has ever had a broken gun due to fanning the hammer and not one of those guns was anything special, some kind of specially built hammer fanning special. Maybe a little less "research" on your part, and some actual experience with guns wouldn't be amiss. Books and the internet do not have all the answers. Maybe a few lessons on reading comprehension would also be appropriate. Your ONE piece of evidence is that one guy who you admit didn't know what he was doing and had no training damaged his gun. Yup. That there's proof that anyone who ever fanned a hammer either had a specially made gun or broke it. Yup. Couldn't possibly be the idiot did something stupid he didn't want to fess up to... Nope. Not at all. Never happened in the history of idiots going into gun shops...

[@slcpunk2740]

Patton wasn't alive in 1961 or even 1861 so what year did that actually happen? Wonder how they got that so wrong.

[@GMoneyGonz]

I think he meant 1916.

[@slcpunk2740]

@@GMoneyGonz yeah that makes sense since Villa died in '23, I wonder if they printed it wrong or read it wrong - they're usually pretty good with the details on this channel (maybe a little too good since every measure is provided in feet and metres ... plus parsecs, lightyears and nautical miles for gits 'n shiggles)

[@richardkluesek4301]

Just a few days ago at auction the SAA .45 with 7 and a half inch barrel used by Sheriff Pat Garrett to kill outlaw Billy the Kid was sold at auction for an astronomical amount. As iconic as the Colt Single Action is and as many as were made, youtuber Mike Venturo, aka duelist, cites production figures of handguns to be found in the old West by 1900. There were less than 200,000 SAAs made by then. But 5 times as many of the discontinued percussion and cartridge converted Civil War service sidearms of Colt, as well as their civilian small carry guns were in circulation. And there were competitors as Megaprojects points out from S&W, Remington, H&R, Merwin & Hubert, and some forgotten others. So the Sheriff and Marshall and the US Cavalry certainly had the SAAs but the Deputies, possie riders and cowpokes and city slickers would have had many more different varieties and smaller sized sidearms. Hollywood prop men are not renowned to be accurate or correct.

[@DocPeril]

A side story I learned from one of my father's college books (and share here from memory) deals with why the revolver was pivotal in shaping the U.S. West in the 19th century the the clash with the Native Peoples and with anarchic criminals. Most "law enforcement" was merely self-defense ... and revenge/retribution by civilians, and the revolver (especially the Colts) elevated the chances of any common person to deal with lesser-armed adversaries. Before the revolver, most colonists/invaders used single-shot, flint-fired firearms, pistol and long arm. The Natives found, stole, looted and bought some of these weapons as well. In the largest expanses of the U.S. frontier that would become known as the Wild West, horses were ubiquitous and a great deal of combat occurred on and from horseback, not unlike the use of horses among knights in Europe. Before the revolver (notably among these the Colts mentioned in this excellent video), persons on horseback had one or two rounds they could fire at others fleeing on horseback ... or giving pursuit on horseback. In contrast, during the earliest days of Wild West conflict, the Natives used bows and arrows to tremendous advantage. A rider with the typical flintlock(s) would have two chances to stop or slow pursuers before being at the mercy of the speed and agility of their horse and their own riding skills, while Native combatants would still have "ammunition" (arrows) available. It should be recalled that Natives had fought other tribes from horseback and, notoriously, hunted and killed bison as well with just the humble short bow. With the advent of the revolver, a person armed with the weapon could fire one-handed (unlike those using a long arm "rifle", or a bow), and had five more rounds from the first shot fired. The range was mightier than the bow and the weapon could be drawn, fired, and holstered again for later use with far greater speed than the other weapons of the early days of the deployment of revolvers. The earliest users of the Colt and other pistols were vastly more likely to win, or at least survive, in combat with bandits, law officers, opposing military and Natives when those adversaries were using bows or flintlocks. Archers had to be relatively close where the handgun was more accurate and had the superior fire rate, and flintlock users had one shot before reloading. This was true regardless of use on horseback, but the revolver was particularly suited to mounted combat in chases across huge swaths of land in the contested U.S. West. When I read about this aspect of the Wild West I was stricken by the understanding that many of the most thrilling elements of early movie Westerns happened to be relatively true to history, and appeared in film precisely because they certainly did happen, and not rarely, and because some of the earliest audiences experienced such action, or were closely related to and descended from those who participated.

[@jgranger3532]

A percussion shotgun was used more than any handgun in the West. It put food in a pot.

[@michaelpipkin9942]

My dad traded a unique old car for one of these. I was surprised of how heavy the gun was.

[@TurnStyleGames]

The weight is fortunately what makes many of these single-action revolvers accurate. Single action normally lends itself to a light/crisp trigger (with no modern safety mechanisms), and a heavy gun with no reciprocating parts, etc. Modern reproductions are very easy to shoot to 100+ yards with ease.

[@fancyultrafresh3264]

Highly encourage anyone capable to shoot one if able. They are beautiful tools, and feel great in the hand.

[@EricDaMAJ]

Totally agree. I've fired Berettas, Glocks, and other pistols and nothing feels as comfy as a Colt SAA. I wouldn't substitute a modern auto pistol for it, but I could see a person well practiced with a Colt would have little to fear in a modern gunfight vs. mere criminals.

[@Mbartel500]

The lever action repeating rifle did more to “win the west” than the 1873 colt. The winchester 1873 rifle in particular enabled indian warfare to take place at beyond bow and arrow distances.

[@bstrang6]

8:42, you’re showing a center fire cartridge while describing a rim fire cartridge, nit picking but I know you’re a perfectionist

[@edl617]

There were ten revolvers that were used in the west. From the Patterson. The cartridge conversion of the 1851. Even a double action revolver

[@morenofranco9235]

Great how, Simon. As Always!

[@janeteholmes]

If I’m not mistaken, the gun shown at 12.35 is in fact a Smith and Wesson 44. Or at least, that’s what it says on the barrel.

[@samcampbell6887]

.44 S & W is the caliber. It is a Colt SAA modified with target sights.

[@TomOostenrijk]

God created man, Colt made them equal.

[@gooner72]

Hey Simon, obviously we've enjoyed this as we're hugely into military hardware, so......... could you please do a video on the timeless Browning .50 cal heavy machine gun??? It's been around for decades and doesn't seem like it's going to be on the chopping block yet........ It's an absolute Legend!!!!!!

[@Ratkill9000]

It turned 100 this year.

[@Idahoguy10157]

The Winchester model 1873 rifle was called the Gun that one the West. Great advertising! Worthy of an episode

[@rogersheddy6414]

A very fun fact. Most of the western shootouts occurred in the course of disarming people because of local gun regulations. No one was allowed to carry a gun in town and had to surrender it to the local law officer. Big cities, like New York City, were wide open. Anyone could have a gun, and carry it anywhere. The only reason the Sullivan Act (1896), which required a carry permit, came into being was because of a few widely publicized incidents in which children were playing with loaded guns in public and accidentally shot people. This is an example of where lawyer culture did not catch up with crime until Generations later... For had this been handled correctly, the parents of said children would have been sued into Oblivion by anyone shot.

[@blairpenny1526]

The name peacemaker isn't ironic at all in my mind. It let anyone quickly and easily fire multiple rounds accurately and reliability. When everyone is armed you are a lot more reluctant to attack them

[@farmboy5129]

Wasn't there an ICBM called the peace maker?

[@TurnStyleGames]

'An armed society is a polite society".

[@truthsayers8725]

as a firearm historian, i knew most all of this but i love your videos... you ruined this one by discussing barrel lengths in millimeters. MMs were never used in the US for the measurement of barrel lengths by Colt's, that I KNOW OF...

[@shawnwells5719]

A couple of inaccuracies. The 4 5/8 inch (120mm) barrel model is described as the 5.5 inch (140mm) Artillery model is shown - the 'gunfighter' length has no barrel extending past the ejector rod housing. The SAA is not a single shot gun, it is a single action repeater. It does not have a chamber per se - each cartridge resides in its own chamber within the cylinder, and cocking the hammer rotates each chamber in alignment with the barrel for firing. A First Generation SAA will certainly be worth $15K, if it is in excellent condition and a desirable variant. If it is in poor condition and needed parts replacement like mine did, it is worth far less than that.

[@alpha2foxtrotnunya880]

Awesome video thank you 🙏

[@gypsyjr1371]

Movies and books have hyped the "Wild West" far beyond its reality. There weren't daily gun fights, there weren't a lot of bank robberies, that needed to wait for Bonnie and Clyde and cars to happen. And most of the big famous names of the time are also hyped and fictionalized beyond the actual reality.

[@joseruiz4026]

No different than today really, super exaggerated

[@fredericrike5974]

Mark Twain commented on it too- in the 1870s!

[@timinwsac]

I find it odd that in the eighteen hundreds Colt would be using the metric system for the units of measurement.

[@oldenweery7510]

I wondered about that, too. Not only did he use the metric measurements, he didn't translate them into the more correct "English" inches, to boot. (Should've done the inches first, then translated to the metrics.)

[@TheWolfsnack]

.....makes one wonder why the US changed to Imperial.....

[@CM-ve1bz]

He was a closet commie sympathizer

[@josephledux8598]

I was so happy to see the subject of this one. I enjoyed it. If I had 4 hands I'd give it 4 thumbs up and I will be sharing it on social media. Unfortunately such an interesting subject is going to attract the interest of obnoxious know-it-alls like me. Here's a few details that anyone interested in this subject might find interesting. In other words, here comes the TL:DR version. You've been warned about how long it's going to be, so if you read it please act like a grown-up and don't gripe about how long it is. For those of us who don't understand all them funny European units, here's the traditional barrel lengths of the Colt SAA in 'Murica-loving Freedom Units: The standard lengths that were available throughout the entire manufacturing run were 4 3/4", 5 1/5 ", and 7 1/2 inches. As correctly noted the 7 1/2 model was the standard military issue. For retail sale the 5 1/2 barrel was the most popular model. The 4 3/4 version was popular as a civilian self-defense weapon for the same reason snub nosed revolvers became popular in the following century: the short barrel simply made it more convenient to tote around. The 3" barrel (without the ejector assembly) was popular as a special-order gun for law enforcement and the like but was never a standard production run item. The 12" barreled "Buntline" model was never popular even as a special order item because for just a little more weight and length you could instead be toting a rifle that was a hell of a lot easier to carry and shoot. Ned Buntline was a popular writer of western novels in the latter half of the 19th century and it was he who started ordering the 12 " model and primarily used them as a sales gimmick, by presenting them to popular gunfighting and law enforcement personalities as a way of drawing attention to his fictionalized accounts of their exploits. Too long to carry in a conventional holster, too short to put a rifle stock on, the Buntline version was, as we like to say in good old "Murica, "useless as teats on a boar hog." Most of them probably ended up hanging on walls, or re-gifted to someone else in need of a useless but expensive revolver. Probably the last military conflict where the Colt SAA was an issue military weapon was actually WW2. When the UK finally realized they were going to be involved in a shooting war with the Nazis whether they wanted to or not, there was much angst and gnashing of teeth that the British had allowed themselves to be turned into a nation of disarmed herbivores. There simply weren't enough weapons available in the UK to fight the Nazis on the beaches had they decided on an early invasion. Guess who came to the rescue? Yup. I don't even need to say it. Every gun manufacturer in the US, every arsenal holding obsolete but still-inventoried weapons from the frontier days, they were all emptied and the weapons shipped en masse to the UK along with all the ammunition that could be scraped up. That included a large number of Colt SAA revolvers. I've read one account from those scary days at the dawn of WW2 where a British soldier writes of patrolling the beaches "with a pony Colt and a pocket full of cartridges." One thing that you didn't touch on at all is that the popular renaissance of the Colt revolver starting in the 1950s owed everything to...Italy. Colt had not actually manufactured a SAA revolver since the very earliest part of the century. As you DID correctly note, by the middle of the century every Colt SAA shipped was made from an inventory of parts going back into the 19th century. The modern Western movie, that Americans still love so much, is an Italian invention. Without the so-called Spaghetti Western and directors like Sergio Leone, you'd have no Clint Eastwood and no Unforgiven. That sparked a few Italian gun manufacturers (Italians have always, but always, built beautiful guns) like Uberti, Pietta, and Armi San Marco to start making reproductions of US Western style handguns primarily, at first, for the movie market in that country. They soon proved to be so popular that a market for them was created where none had existed. The modern western reproduction market was born. Uberti, in particular, was so good at it that when Colt decided to reintroduce their traditional 19th century revolvers to the US market in the 1970s, they actually no longer had the tooling or the expertise to make them anymore. Just about every single reintroduced antique revolver sold by Colt ever since has been manufactured by Uberti in Italy. Not as reproductions, but as a continuation of the original product line, licensed by Colt, and using the same sort of serial numbering convention as the original line. They are literally "Colts" and are so marked. Only built under contract by Uberti in Italy. Italy is the ONLY country making reproductions of the weapons from this era now. And to the last one the craftsmanship and authenticity is spot on. What does that mean? For anyone who has a hankering to own a repro revolver from this period, you can find an original Colt still in firing condition. And it will be so valuable you'll never want to take it out of the safe to shoot it. You can find one of the later generation Colts as manufactured by Uberti. Again, just the fact that they're branded Colt (and that they're so beautiful) means people don't usually actually shoot them. They display them. Or you can do what I do: simply buy a Uberti that's not one of the Colt branded ones. Same exquisite construction, same beauty and authenticity, at a price much less than half what the identical pistol with the Colt trademark on it would go for. Between Uberti and Pietta, literally every single rifle and pistol that was popular in that historical era can be purchased as a new revolver from either of those companies. All those reproduction Colts you see under glass at every Cabela's in the USA? Every one is a Uberti or Pietta. Including multiple versions of the very revolver that's the subject of this excellent video. They retail in a range from about $400 to over $1000, depending on what it is. Want a "Buntline Special" with a too-long barrel? Want the 3" so-called Sheriff's Model? Yep they got all that, and all are exquisite. If I sound like a fanboy for these Italian revolvers, um yep. As I type this I have two identical Uberti-made Walker Colts on my desk either side of my keyboard. That's what happens when you make too much money and watch "The Outlaw Josey Wales" too many times. They're as beautiful as a lethal weapon can possibly be. And about the Walker Colt.... They're also referred to as Whitneyville Walkers because Colt didn't even have a factory to build them, so he contracted the entire 3000 pistol run to Eli Whitney, he of industrial-revolution mass-production assembly line fame. The Walker is the largest military issue revolver in the history of the world. The original Patterson Colts, the very first of the modern revolvers, had two drawbacks: it only held 5 rounds, and it was so anemic that it had only about as much killing power as a modern .22 rifle. The original specification of the Walker was that it had to be able to kill a man, "or a horse," at 100 yards. The resulting behemoth takes a larger powder charge than many of the military rifles of the era. I can confirm from experience that if a soldier shot at an enemy at close range, even if he missed the muzzle blast would probably burn them to death. Even though Clint Eastwood carried two of them in one of his movies they're really too enormous to carry even just one of them on a belt unless you've got a serious set of suspenders. It only weighs a couple of pounds less than the modern M4 carbine. The Walker was the original "assault weapon" in that it gave powerful, rapid-fire firepower to a man on the move. While the Colt SAA was issued in much greater numbers, the Walker held the distinction of being the most powerful revolver in the world from 1847 until 1935 when Smith and Wesson introduced the .357 magnum. A weapon that rivaled, but did not surpass the power of the Walker. The Single Action Army, or Peacemaker if you prefer, was more important to American history than any other handgun, no doubt. But the Walker Colt was the first firearm in history to make the multi-shot revolver a viable and reliable battlefield weapon. It's as important to world history as the first genuine automatic machinegun as invented by the American, Hiram Maxim. It created an entirely new class of weapon that heretofore had not existed, one that would change battlefields everywhere they appeared. And...okay I'm done. Remember children, if you read the whole thing you should pull up your big-boy pants and not bitch about the length. I gave you plenty of warning.

[@derekp2674]

Thanks Joseph that was a nice read. I once owned a beat up Uberti SAA chambered for .44 Magnum but traded it for a Redhawk.

[@michaelmcchesney6645]

I went back and listened again twice more, but I kept hearing that Patton went into Mexico in 1961. That didn't make sense to me since Patton died in 1945. However, according to Wikipedia, the Pancho Villa expedition was in 1916. That leads me to believe I did hear 1961, and Simon had the digits reversed in his script or had a dyslexic moment. That happens to the best of us.

[@TheOneFreeMan77]

12:00 Definitely not in 1961 considering Patton died in 1945.

[@monitor1862]

Thinking he meant 1916

[@TurnStyleGames]

That's just what the government wants you to think! Patton didn't actually die after WW2...he became a secret agent, operating in foreign nations, hunting down baddies.

[@RiverRatWA57]

I'm glad to that I'm not the only one to catch that, whomsoever is doing the closed captions Really needs to be Fired(IMHO), I think Colt was typed out two or more different ways.

[@jgranger3532]

I would have taken a Smith and Wesson Schofield over an 1873. Faster break action loading and star ejection, worth the extra money.

[@TightwadTodd]

And if S&W had made it chambered in 45 colt,it would have been the gun people talk about and more familiar with as a "Cowboy Gun"...I hate that term..

[@jevinday]

I can't believe I never realized how fascinating the history of firearms is. Good stuff

[@k1lluachan]

i like the 1851 Navy and 1860 Army cartridge conversions they are esthetic more pleasing

[@opencarry3860]

I love the SAA and I own many of them along with other 19th century firearm designs.

[@parkerottoackley5587]

Samuel Colt, made all men equal.

[@longfellow7271]

Awesome video!

[@k_enn]

Two of the key features of the Colt Single Action Army were the bored-through cylinder allowing for the insertion of metallic cartridges from the rear, and the top-strap over the cylinder giving it the strength for the more powerful cartridges. The bored-through cylinder was invented by Rollin White (and licensed to Smith and Wesson) and Remington developed the top-strap over the cylinder.

[@mikeyoung9810]

Simon, do you have a channel that could deal with the myth of the old west versus the reality of it? ie for example, the myth of standing in the street and drawing guns as fast as possible. It's entrenched in western movies and books and basically didn't exist. And there are many more things.

[@calibmatlock]

Sounds like a topic for Today I Found Out.

[@christopherfisher128]

Most of the ridiculous myths about the "old west" actually came out during that time via the dime novels that were basically eastern urban propaganda.

[@calibmatlock]

@@christopherfisher128 Robert Ford actually grew up reading pulp magazines about Jesse James in Missouri before he joined the James gang. The propaganda was ubiquities.

[@christopherfisher128]

@@calibmatlock I have a suspicion that a great deal of our history is urbanites telling tall tale so foreign lands and rural people for fun and profit.

[@calibmatlock]

@@christopherfisher128 there is actually evidence of this even on a federal level. Newspapers and periodicals would often prop up the potential of westward expansion to the poor even before the completion of the transcontinental railroad. Hence the Oregon Trail. Having cowboy heroes ala Robin Hood helped sell the myth was just another part of the culture.

[@ms.debourghofrosings6829]

If you’re an American like me, take the millimeter figures offered for barrel lengths, divide them by 25.4, and you’ll know how long the barrel actually is. 😉

[@nzkshatriya6298]

Cept if you were to be milling one...... As an American I'd be using Metric (just...more accuracy)

[@kingjellybean9795]

Math is for commies lol

[@kingjellybean9795]

@@nzkshatriya6298 you mean as a zeon rebel!? Get out of the earth sphere EFF FOR LIFE

[@ms.debourghofrosings6829]

@@nzkshatriya6298 Well, 1/32 of an inch would be more accurate than millimeters, 😉 but that would be awkward to reckon.

[@44hawk28]

My diatribe on the misgivings of how much criminal activity was occurring and where, aside now. It might be worthy of note to understand that the most popular caliber that the gun was made in in the late 1800s was actually the 3840. Which was a 40 caliber cartridge with 180 grain bullet traveling at about a thousand feet per second. Made it as easily effective as the 45 Colt. And it was also chambered in several of the lever action rifles of 1866 and 1892. Allowing you even further range and deadly effect with a 12-shot rifle in most instances. Along with the 4440 which was also quite popular. Which was a 44 caliber cartridge with 44 grains of powder where is the 3840 was actually a 40 caliber cartridge with 38 grains of powder. Don't ask me why they inverted the numbers. They were probably more varied calibers in the old west as Easley exists to this day. So you didn't just walk into a gun shop and say hand me a box of cartridges. Even though that makes for a really short scene in a TV or movie. It never happened. You had to know precisely what caliber your firearm was. At least in most instances. Kohl's card never been measured in millimeters. Please stop that crap. It's four and three quarter inch. Five and a half inch, and seven and a half inch. But the millimeter bullshit. It doesn't apply to that firearm. I like your videos, but sometimes you can be irritating as hell.

[@warwolf383]

Fun fact, fan firing is also extremely rough on the gun due to alignment issues... usually when it's done in movies it's with blanks, and in competitions, with wax bullets... doing it with real lead on the other hand is just asking to fuck up your gun...