This is a very nice example of an early Factory Cased Massachusetts Arms Company Maynard Primed Belt Revolver. Although much better known for their later production Adams Patent revolvers and various military carbines like the Greene, Maynard, Smith and Warner, the early production pistols from the Massachusetts Arms Company are by far some of the most interesting guns that they produced. 

The Mass Arms Company was formed in Chicopee Falls, MA in 1849 and was incorporated in 1850. It counted among its incorporators such later luminaries in firearms history as Horace Smith and Daniel Wesson (who later founded Smith & Wesson), Joshua Stevens (who would go on to start the J. Stevens Arms Company), and gun designers Edwin Wesson and Benjamin F. Warner (of Warner Carbine fame). James T. Ames of the famous Ames Manufacturing Company was also one of the original incorporators and served as the Chairman of the Massachusetts Arms Company’s Board of Directors, as well as providing factory space at Ames for the initial production of Massachusetts Arms firearms. 

The first arms produced by Mass Arms were percussion revolvers designed by Edwin Wesson, brother of Daniel Wesson, and by Thomas Warner, who was the factory superintendent. The revolvers were produced under patents held by Edwin Wesson and Daniel Leavitt. On April 29, 1837, Leavitt had received US Patent #182 for a revolving pistol design. It is worth noting that this was the second revolving handgun design to receive a US patent, the first being Samuel Colt’s 1836 patent for what would become the Paterson revolver.

The first guns produced in 1850 were the larger “Dragoon” sized revolvers in .40 caliber. Later in 1850, the firm introduced a “Belt” size revolver in .31 caliber. Both revolvers utilized side-mounted, back action locks that operated in a “single action” fashion. They had a hinged top strap that connected the barrel to the rear portion of the frame where the lockwork was located. The barrel was held in a stationary and locked position by a swinging latch that secured the topstrap to the forward portion of the cylinder arbor pin. The guns had six-chambered cylinders with convex beveled fronts. This beveled cylinder face was one of the key features in Leavitt’s patent application, as he claimed the design would reduce the potential for the “chain fire” of adjacent cylinder chambers when the gun was fired. The cylinders also had oval recesses for the percussion cones, which entered the chambers at about a 30-degree angle. The cocking action of the hammer rotated a back plate in the frame of the revolver. This back plate rotated the cylinder by way of a pin, which extended from the plate and engaged an index hole on the rear face of the cylinder. A second, smaller pin would move in and out of the frame, engaging smaller holes on the rear of the cylinder that corresponded to each chamber, allowing for accurate indexing and lock up of the cylinder. The guns were manufactured with round blued barrels, color casehardened frames and silver-plated brass back straps and trigger guards. During the brief production run of Wesson & Leavitt revolvers from about 1850-1851, Mass Arms produced about 800 of the larger Dragoon revolvers and approximately 1,000 of the Belt revolvers. Production was ended during 1851 due to a successful patent infringement lawsuit that was filed by Samuel Colt. Colt’s suit noted that the Mass Arms revolver violated his patent on a mechanism that revolved the cylinder when the hammer was cocked. 

In an attempt to circumvent the Colt patent, and to stay in business, the revolver line was redesigned to have the cylinders rotated manually, and to include the Maynard patent automatic tape priming system. It was hoped that the “innovation” of automatic priming would create public interest in the guns, and that the elimination of individual cones (nipples) on the cylinder that required percussion caps for ignition, along with manual cylinder rotation, would help evade any more legal trouble with Colt. The newly designed revolver line debuted in 1851 and included a .31 caliber “Belt” sized revolver and a “Pocket” sized revolver available in .28 or .31 caliber. The guns were quite streamlined and retained the overall look of the earlier Edwin Wesson design with a hinged barrel that was easily removable from the frame, allowing barrels of different lengths to be easily exchanged on the frame. This same feature would later be an important selling point when the Massachusetts Arms Company added the 1^st Model Maynard carbines and rifles to their product line, whose interchangeable barrels allowed a single receiver to be used for a rifle, carbine or shotgun, in various calibers. 

Despite the “innovative” features, the manually rotated tape primed revolvers did not sell well, and the Massachusetts Arms teetered on the brink of disaster until the expiration of the Colt patent in 1857. At that time the Massachusetts Arms Company redesigned their Maynard primed pocket revolvers to rotate the cylinder automatically when the hammer was cocked. However, in 1857 they also introduced their licensed version of the Beaumont Adams patent revolver. This was quickly followed up by the introduction of Dr. Maynard’s “1^st Model” carbine, which was a successful product as well. The Adams patent revolvers were offered in both a large frame .36 caliber “belt size” as well as a small frame .31 caliber “pocket size”. These superior products reduced the popularity of the tape-primed revolvers and production of the tape-primed guns slowed until they were eliminated from the product line in 1860. A total of about 2,500 tape primed pocket revolvers were produced between 1851 and 1860, while some 4,500 of the pocket-sized Adams revolvers were produced between 1857 and 1861, showing the clear preference by the buying public for the Adams design. Of the tape-primed pocket revolvers, only about 900 or so were of the earlier, manually rotated variant, with the balance being the more conventional automatically rotated version, but even the improved version was not a commercial success. 

The “Pocket” sized manually rotated revolvers were typically manufactured with 2 ½” or 3 ½” round barrels, although a number of scarce variations like other barrel lengths and octagonal barrels have been noted. About 1,000 of the larger framed manually rotated “Belt” revolvers were produced with barrels from 3” to 7”. None of these were ever produced in a double action variant and all had manually rotated cylinders. These belt sized revolvers are known to collectors as the “John Brown Model” because the radical abolitionist purchased 200 of these revolvers in 1857 to help arm his followers for their planned attack on Harpers Ferry and for the uprising of enslaved people that he hoped to foment.

These interesting revolvers were not serial numbered in the typical way but were rather batch or assembly numbered on most of the major components, making it difficult to determine exact production figures. Additionally, like the later 1^stModel Maynard Carbines, the ease with which the barrels could be swapped to change lengths meant that “matching numbers” are the exception and not the rule. As it was easy to install different barrel lengths on frames, I have rarely found “John Brown Model” revolvers with barrel lug numbers that matched the frame numbers. It could be assumed that when orders came into the Massachusetts Arms Company, that parts were often exchanged on existing guns in an effort to provide the barrel lengths requested in the order. 

The Massachusetts Arms Company was doing quite well as 1860 came to a close, as they were producing a line of successful double action Adams’ patent percussion revolvers and Dr. Maynard’s carbine. With the American Civil War on the horizon and the potential for more military contracts, the company seemed poised on the brink of major success. However, in January of 1861 a fire closed the factory. Dr. Maynard acquired control of the company at this time, but the facility was not repaired, and the company was not reorganized until 1863. Despite the success of Maynards “2^ndModel” carbine which found favor with the US military and a successful line of sporting rifles introduced as the Civil War wound down, the company went out of business in 1866 only a year after the war ended.

The Factory Cased Massachusetts Arms Company Maynard Primed Belt Revolver offered here is in about VERY GOOD overall condition. This scarce manually rotated belt sized revolver is a six chambered, .31 caliber pistol with one of the more desirable longer barrel lengths, measuring 5” and having an overall length of about 10 ½”. Most of the revolvers in this line appear to have been made with barrels between 4” and 6”, with the 5” guns being somewhat more common, for a gun that is not particularly common in any configuration.

The revolver is clearly marked in two lines on the hinged topstrap:

MASS ARMS CO

CHICOPEE FALLS

The face of the cylinder arbor pin is numbered 452, and the face of the barrel catch is very weakly marked with traces of the date NOV. 26, 1850. This date references Joshua Stevens’ US Patent #7802 for the barrel locking catch design. The patent would later be disallowed as being a design already invented and in the public domain. The face of the recoil shield has no visible assembly number. The locking lug that projects from the bottom of the barrel is numbered452 on its rear face, matching the arbor pin assembly number. As noted, I have rarely encountered matching numbers on these Mass Arms Maynard Primed Belt Revolvers and have to wonder if the numbers are for matching parts of subassemblies. Sometimes the barrel lug and arbor numbers will match, as with this gun, and it has occurred to me that the recoil shield numbers might match internal mechanism numbers, but these guns are too well fit and difficult to disassemble to find out if there are internal numbers that explain the way they are marked. No other visible serial numbers are noted. Like most Mass Arms Maynard Primed Belt Revolvers, the reverse of the frame, lock of the gun and hammer are decorated with simple and elegant foliate scroll engraving. The swiveling tape primer magazine door is decorated with a {Spread-Winged American Eagle} with the arrows and olive branches in its talons, reminiscent of the Eagle stamped on the primer magazine doors of the US Model 1855 series of firearms. The door is additionally marked MAYNARD’S PATENT in a downward arc over the Eagle and SPET. 22, 1845 in an upward arc under the Eagle. The cylinder is decorated with a series of acid etched scenes, which include foliate themes and panoplies of arms. The sights of these revolvers are rudimentary at best and consist of a small, fixed notch rear sight on the rear of the topstrap, above the hinge pin, and a small, rounded brass blade front sight, near the muzzle.

As noted, the revolver remains in about VERY GOOD condition. The gun retains no finish to speak of and has a moderately oxidized and mottled brown and gray patina. The acid etched cylinder retains about 80%+ of the acid etched scenes remaining visible and intact. The majority of the scene loss is a thumb sized area where the metal shows some moderate, if shallow pitting. This appears to be the area which was in contact with the fabric lining of the revolver’s case for many years. The majority of the gun’s frame and cylinder have a smoky gray patina with freckles of scattered surface oxidation and discoloration. The barrel has a more brownish patina, toning towards plum. The metal of the revolver is mostly smooth with some scattered flecks and tiny patches of minor etching and pinpricking and some scattered areas of minor surface roughness. As noted, there is one notable patch of pitting on the cylinder. The interior of the primer compartment retains much of its faded blued finish. All of the markings and much of the engraving on the gun remain clear and crisp. The brass backstrap and gripstrap retain about 80% of their deeply and darkly tarnished silver plating with the triggerguard retaining about 50%+ of its heavily tarnished silver. The grip retains some minute traces of the original varnish and is in near VERY GOOD condition as well. The grip shows some scattered dings and dents from carry, handling, use and storage. The bore is about GOOD to NEAR VERY GOODcondition as well. It is dark and moderately oxidized with evenly distributed light to moderate pitting. Despite the age and wear in the bore, it retains very strong and fairly crisp six groove rifling. The revolver remains in FINEmechanical condition. The manually rotated cylinder works as it should when the release button under the frame is depressed and the spring and locking system remain strong and crisp. The barrel latch system also work as it should, crisp and correctly with it still being necessary to depress the small ball detent to release the catch to rotate it and allow the barrel to tilt up. The hammer functions correctly and crisply and cocking it still operates the tape primer feeding mechanism as it should.

The revolver is contained in its correct and original factory casing with the readily identifiable brass pins around located at the corners of the case’s top. The case has a traditional compartmentalized design with a form fitting recess for the powder flask and generic open top compartments for other accessories. The casing is lined with dark green velvet both in the bottom and for the padded pillow in the lid. The revolver is accompanied by a correct pattern copper powder flask that is properly embossed on its face with the Massachusetts Arms Company’s name and location and on the rear face with a spread-winged eagle. The flask is in VERY GOOD condition and has a dark copper patina. The flask shows some wear and minor dings, and the charging spring is very stiff and may be an old replacement. A correctly marked MASS ARMS COMPANY brass bullet mold is also included. This dual cavity mold casts both a .31 caliber round ball and a .31 caliber conical flat base bullet. The mold is in VERY GOOD condition as well, has a nice, uncleaned butterscotch patina and is nicely marked. An original brass loading tool is located in the case as well. This was for seating the bullets in the cylinder chambers, as the gun’s design does not include a loading lever. The brass loading tool also remains in VERY GOOD condition and shows some dings and dents as would expected as well as an untouched patina that matches the bullet mold. There is also a single .31 caliber lead round ball in the case, as well as a partial roll of Maynard’s tape primers.

The case remains in about GOOD+ to NEAR VERY GOOD condition and shows moderate wear. The lid components have separated at some point in time, and the top of the case and the lid’s rim sections show glued repairs and some minor gapping at their joints. The case shows a moderate number of dings, scuffs, scratches and mars, as would be expected. The interior shows moderate wear with some loss to the lining and with the dividers showing moderate looseness. Despite the wear and repairs to the case it remains quite attractive and original and correct casings for these revolvers are extremely rare.

Overall, this is a really attractive example of a fairly scarce pre-Civil War tape primed, manually rotated percussion revolver in its original factory casing. These guns were produced in limited numbers and were the second generation of some of the first somewhat successful percussion revolvers to be made and sold in the US. The revolvers that preceded these were a significant enough threat to Samuel Colt that he went after The Massachusetts Arms Company with all the force of law to end their production. These redesigned revolvers never gained much traction for many reasons but were very well made and have a somewhat dubious historical association with John Brown and his failed insurrection. This gun is very attractive and includes an equally attractive case with a number of correct accessories. The revolver remains mechanically fine and retains clear and crisp markings and nice engraving. For any advanced collector of Civil War era percussion revolvers, this would be a very nice addition to their collection. The revolver would also be a great addition to a collection of early Smith & Wesson revolvers, as the gun was produced by the founders of Smith & Wesson, prior to the establishment of that firm.