

With some initial help from Eli Whitney, Colt developed molds at his armory in Hartford, Connecticut, that could forge metal pieces comprising the revolver. 45 revolver is sometimes referred to as “the gun that won the West,” though other firearms, including the 1873 Winchester repeater rifle, also claim that title. Soon Colt’s name would become synonymous with the revolver, especially the Colt Single Action Army revolver, often called a Colt. patent for a handheld pistol that featured a multi-firing system based on a rotating barrel with multiple chambers that could fire bullets through a lock and spring design. Today the name Deringer is commonly associated with small, concealable handguns.Īnd Eli Whitney, originally famous for inventing the cotton gin in the 1790s, later developed a system to produce interchangeable rifle parts. Deringer produced flintlock rifles for the U.S. Also getting his start during this period was Henry Deringer. Remington Arms Company has persisted to current times (although the company filed for bankruptcy in February 2018 due to sluggish sales). gun makers got their start then, including Eliphalet Remington, who began producing flintlock rifles in 1816. government and some states began hiring smaller gun-making outfits to produce guns or gun parts, based on the weapons being produced at the U.S.


Remington ArmsĪround the same time, the U.S. At first the armory stored ammunition and gun carriages, but by the 1790s the armory began to manufacture muskets and eventually other guns.įollowing the Revolutionary War, Congress also established Harpers Ferry Armory in West Virginia in 1798 to boost weapon and ammunition production. In order to boost the fledgling nation’s home-grown arsenal, General George Washington ordered the establishment of the Springfield Armory in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1776. A well-trained soldier could generally fire and reload a flintlock weapon three times a minute, whereas the American long rifle required a more tightly loaded bullet and generally took a minute to load and fire a single shot. The spark used to ignite gun powder in early American-made smoothbore weapons was usually generated by a piece of flint striking a metal plate or “pan” coated in gun powder.
