Modern pepperbox?

[cluttonfred]

In the effort to make ever smaller and handier pocket pistols, why doesn't anyone take the snubnose revolver to it's logical conclusion and bring back the pepperbox?

Not the big, heavy Hopkins and Allen types, but something like a modern double action revolver (whether the cylinders revolve or not) that shoots directly from the chambers in the cylinder.

I wonder if there is some BATF rule that has legislated them out of existence?

Here's a bad illustration, with apologies to Smith & Wesson:

 

[Guillermo]

It is my understanding that a pepperbox is defined by having multiple barrels machined into the same assembly, much like an oversized revolver cylinder. They were often unrifled.

If you extend the “cylinder” so as to achieve any velocity and accuracy there would be unnecessary weight.

As the pepper box was the predecessor to the revolver I fail to see how this would be a logical conclusion. It seems more like the origin.

 

[rcmodel]

Each chamber would have to be rifled, an expensive proposition.

Otherwise, it would be a sawed-off "Street-Sweeper" type shotgun under the ever watchful eyes of the BATF.

And a single 2" rifled barrel is much lighter then 5 or 6 of them combined into the cylinder.

And sights might be a problem, what with needing a set on each "barrel".

rcmodel

 

[Hawk]

I wonder if there is some BATF rule that has legislated them out of existence?

As RC noted the revenoors would demand rifling.

The tactical crowd would require magnum chamberings - don't know if a modern open-top could pull that off.

There would appear to be no gain vis a vis weight or bulk as compared to an equvalent modern DA, but I may be missing something.

I wouldn't mind a refurbed original if the collector value had already taken it in the shorts - it'd be rather of an interesting novelty after Turnbull got done with it.

But Mark Twain probably said it best:

George Bemis . . . wore in his belt an old original "Allen" revolver, such as irreverent people called a "pepper-box." Simply drawing the trigger back, cocked and fired the pistol. As the trigger came back, the hammer would begin to rise and the barrel to turn over, and presently down would drop the hammer, and away would speed the ball. To aim along the turning barrel and hit the thing aimed at was a feat which was probably never done with an "Allen" in the world. But George's was a reliable weapon, nevertheless, because, as one of the stage-drivers afterward said, "If she didn't get what she went after, she would fetch something else." And so she did. She went after a deuce of spades nailed against a tree, once, and fetched a mule standing about thirty yards to the left of it. Bemis did not want the mule; but the owner came out with a double-barreled shotgun and persuaded him to buy it, anyhow. It was a cheerful weapon--the "Allen." Sometimes all its six barrels would go off at once, and then there was no safe place in all the region round about, but behind it.

 

[Jim Watson]

Once upon a time, I shot one of the 4-barrelled C.O.P. .357s. Rotating firing pin like a Sharps rather than rotating barrels like an Allen pepperbox. It was heavier than a revolver because of the barrel bundle, less accurate because of the multiple bores, and hard kicking because of the grip shape.

 

[mainmech48]

Dittoes to Jim. IMO the concept is a make-do holdover from the pre-Sam Colt/pre-cartidge days when it was about the only feasible way to make a repeater.

I've only fired three examples of this genre: A COP .357, which I thought to be clumsier, heavier and less accurate to shoot than a snubbie revolver without the rationale of significantly lower pricing; and an Italian repro of the old Sharps in .22 LR. That repro was an interesting novelty, which was about its only charm, IMO. The last was another novelty, an iteration of the Allen-type made by Star (IIRC). It fired .177 lead airgun pellets powered by percussion caps. It was very tough to hit much of anything twice in a row with, but an interesting, relatively inexpensive toy.

Lacking any singular advantage over a small revolver of the same chambering in size, cartridge capacity, concealability, accuracy, price or relative handling qualities I don't think that we'll see anyone revisit the concept for a "serious" SD weapon. Possibly another novelty item, but that's a very small niche, too IMO

 

[Jim K]

And DA firing when you have the weight of five or six barrels to get moving? Been there, done that with a real pepperbox. No thanks.

Jim

 

[DWFan]

Seems like the Taurus Judge would be an ideal candidate for someone to take off the barrel and fit it with a rifled-throat cylinder chambered in something like a .38 Super +P or maybe .357 SIG.

 

[Ash]

The Pepperbox was created to get around the Colt cylinder and S&W cylinder-bore patents, wasn't it? No cylinder, but rotating barrels. When the patents expired, the need for the pepperbox went with them, didn't it? I could be wrong on that one, though.

Of course, I think, probably like many people including the makers of Clue, that the pepperbox looks neat.

Ash

 

[Jim Watson]

Ethan Allen was making pepperboxes on his own patents in the 1830s, about the time Sam Colt was starting up, long before S&W came out with the Rollin White designs.

Main aim was simplicity and economy. Concealability, too. Pepperboxes were some of the first DA hammerless repeating pistols, and would be very handy to have at a card table.

 

[Ash]

Yeah, just looked it up myself. Scratch that long held but incorrect assumption.

Ash

 

[Moonclip]

I'm am currently waiting to take possession of a Italian 4 barreled derringer made on that principle made by EIG. I don't expect much though guns like the COP intrigue me. They are more of a novelty though it seems.

A company named HJS arms in Texas and Advantage Arms in AZ also made guns on this principle.

 

[Well-Armed Lamb]

I have a COP .357. I really like having it in the collection, but it's not a shooter or even a good defensive gun: too finicky, lousy sights, trigger pull like a dump truck on a bad road.

It is fun to shoot, though, especially if you enjoy a little recoil. .357 Magnum out of that little thing is a production, I tell you what.