The 1851 Navy soon found a ready market. Models exhibited at the Great Exhibition in London that year, alongside Dragoon and Pocket revolvers, were in such demand that Colt later established an ...

Sleek, balanced, and deadly accurate, the Colt Navy became one of the most popular revolvers of the 19th century. Its use in the Civil War and on the frontier made it a symbol of American grit ...

The “Colt Revolving Belt Pistol of Naval Caliber,” as the 1851 Navy was originally called, was Colt’s first practical revolver, coming after its 4-lb., 8-oz., .44-cal. Dragoon and the less ...

The Model 1851 Navy was one of Colt’s most popular cap-and-ball “belt pistols,” and more than 250,000 were produced between 1851 and 1873. But approximately 42,000, bearing their own set of ...

This lighter, smaller-caliber Navy model was popular with ranking army officers, including General George McClellan. The revolver was a present to McClellan from Samuel Colt, famed fire arms ...

-- A missing Civil War-era pistol is back in its owner's hands. An 1861 Navy Colt revolver that disappeared from the Stockton Center at Spring Grove, 720 Ann Arbor St., in March was returned ...