Historic Colt Custer Revolver Discovery 7th Cavalry Relic in the Shop

An incredible historic encounter!

Early June, on a quiet day in the shop, an elderly gentleman walked in with an even older Colt revolver. After the pleasantries were over, he asked if I could reblue his revolver. "Yes, no problem," I replied and began entering it into the ledger. When it came to the serial # I commented on it being a low series and the client replied that he had documentation from the Colt factory in his truck. To cut to the chase, I'll quote from those pages:
"COLT M1873 SAA U.S. CAVALRY REVOLVER # 4995.
This revolver was possibly and with a high degree of probability, issued to Custer's 7th Cavalry in 1874 and perhaps lost at the Battle of the Little Bighorn on June 26, 1876."!!!!!!!!!

All the hair on my arms was standing at attention!

7th Cavalry Profile
"From the full extent of information available, it is quite apparent that Custer's troopers fought at the Little Bighorn with their original 1874 issue revolvers, with very few exceptions. Companies C, E, F, and L - the Custer Detachment, which was annihilated, appear to have been almost exclusively armed with the 1874 shipment forwarded from the Rock Island Arsenal. As such, these revolvers most probably reflected serial numbers from the fourth, fifth, and sixth production lots of 1000 revolvers(#3438 to #6530)" --
Custer Battle Guns by John S. Dumont.

An estimated 356 revolvers of the 7th's estimated 936 revolvers were lost in the battle. It seems this one was found. Some work had been done to it over the years and the Colt documentation describes it in detail.
I include pictures of the documentation and the revolver.

I'd learned many decades ago to never underestimate old weapons - or old people.

We all have our histories.

And the revolver itself? I very carefully cleaned it thoroughly and oiled it, wrapped it in a  clean oilcloth, and explained why it should never be refinished or reblued. The client will be keeping that piece of history very safely in the future.

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