Colt .45 revolver owned by Patton fetches $75G at auction

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Colt .45 revolver owned by Patton fetches $75G at auction

A Colt .45 Single Action Model 1873 Revolver once owned by General George Patton sold for $75,000 at an auction in Los Angeles. This is the one with the Stag Horn Grip.



http://www.foxnews.com/science/2015/06/12/colt-45-revolver-owned-by-patton-fetches-75000-at-auction/


"The gun, owned by Patton until his death in 1945, is often considered to be a version of his famous ivory-handled Colt. 45, which is on display at The General George Patton Museum and Center of Leadership in Fort Knox, KY. The weapon’s $75,000 price tag includes the buyer’s premium."


PattonRevolver.jpg
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Is it just me?

Or do those stag grips look an awful lot like the old Fitz imitation stag grips from the 1950's??

Wonder what the providence linking it to G.S.P. actually is?

rc
 
No, it's not just you rc, the grips look plastic. The article did not state what auction house sold the revolver.
 
That is an odd price. It seems to me that it is too low for a gun owned by Patton, even though it is not one of his famous ones, and he owned many over the years. And too high for a plain Colt SAA with custom grips. I wonder if prospective buyers had qualms about its provenance.

Jim
 
Good to know that others think that those grips look like the plastic stag grips they made many years ago. Maybe someone screwed up with photo. Just doesn't look like something Patton would have owned.

I should add that I have been to the Patton Museum and have seen his guns on display. This latest one that was auctioned off would have really looked out of place there given the great condition his other guns were in.
 
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Hmmm, if it's not Fitz or some other fake stag, maybe jigged bone. Surely doesn't look like real Sambar stag.
 
Jeff White

Thanks for the link. Can't beat that kind of historical confirmation. Still think those grips look kind of out of place on a gun belonging to General George S. Patton.
 
The grips may be rare, and they may be really stag, but if I had owned the gun I would have replaced them because they look like cheap plastic grips. I also don't see how a picture by itself can be proof positive, the party gun could even be a cap gun. What about serial numbers, bill of sale etc. Don't know, if I was going to spend 90 ,000 dollars on a gun I would want more proof than just a picture of a costume party. Maybe that's just my way of thinking. I know, perhaps a letter from R. L. Wilson!
 
Ron James

I'm thinking the family probably had some other documentation, maybe a factory letter or original bill of sale, to go along with the photo. I do agree with you about the grips; they really do look like some cheap postwar plastic "stag" grips.

Something else occured to me while looking at the photo: even though it's a costume party I wonder if the Colt was loaded. I'm thinking it probably was.
 
Something else occured to me while looking at the photo: even though it's a costume party I wonder if the Colt was loaded. I'm thinking it probably was.
Click to expand...

According to Patton's biographers he carried a loaded handgun everywhere. It is alleged that he used a handgun he was carrying concealed to intervene in a situation where he thought a woman was being assaulted. Patton was in civilian clothes at the time. This allegedly happened before WWII.
 
Yeah, they look like the plastic grips my dad put on his old Colt Woodsman. The pictures in the link to the Daily Mail are more convincing as to actual stag. Just my opinion. More facts would be useful.
 
Jeff White

I remember reading that in a book about Patton. Apparently he was in New York City at the time and he thought some guys were trying to force a girl into a car. He confronted them and found out it was a young couple, along with their friends, trying to elope!
 
bannockburn said:
Jeff White

I remember reading that in a book about Patton. Apparently he was in New York City at the time and he thought some guys were trying to force a girl into a car. He confronted them and found out it was a young couple, along with their friends, trying to elope!
Click to expand...
I can just see the cops, "we got some nut with a cowboy gun, claims he's a general."
 
I don't believe Patton was a flag officer when this incident allegedly occurred. I say allegedly because even though it has been recounted in biographies of the General, there is no documentation that it ever really happened.

Patton's gunfight in Mexico in 1916 is documented. This incident is not and may just be a story people have related over the years.
 
I took and enlarged the grips from the webpage. They look like real bone to me in this. Actually a very high quality selection. To me, they look too good, that's why I suspected fake too at first but the grain looks just right.
I can't see a flaw in the flow at different depths. Fake stag or not, it's the provenance that makes it what it is, not the grips anyway. I wish I had a set of grips that looked that right tho.
 
Actually the grips on this gun are more practical than his famed Ivory ones.

The bark in this set of grips gives the shooters a more secure grip especially if the hands are wet and/or cold.

Patton was a showman and everything he wore was designed to impress his men and the enemy. Polished helmet with shiny stars on it, polished boots, necktie along with his Ivory handled SAA and S&W .357 Magnum "killing gun."

Does anyone know what gun Patton used to kill the pair of mules in Sicily?

It's a shame to see this gun leave the family and go into the hands of a private collector where it will never be seen by the gun and war buffs.
 
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To me there is a difference between "Once owned by" and used by. I once owned a Llama that I kept in the truck for about a year. It was a reliable, but not very accurate, pistol. Were I a Tom Clancy (dead and with millions from books, not alive and, well, less than that from current books), that could be sold as a pistol I once owned if it could be established (say, from a 4433). But I didn't care for it, didn't keep it long, passed it on in favor of an FEG GKK. I liked that pistol but found I liked the Tanfoglio designed .45's best and settled on a Springfield P9 in .45acp. I have used that Springfield, plus a Ruger Police Service Six, for the longest time (they are on the do no sell list). That Llama might have been owned by me, but not used for a long time by me.

I know that Patton owned this revolver makes things completely different. But it was documented to have been used at a costume party (for a man who liked history, you'd think he'd have an 1851 Navy or 1860 Army revolver). Did Patton like it, did he shoot it, did he carry it in WWII, or did he keep it in the back of the safe, forgotten? Those answers might be impossible to determine, but to me they establish the value.
 
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