Chichester Pinfire Revolver
Chichester · Revolver · Out Of Production · 1859
Also known as: Chichester 9mm Pinfire, British-style 9mm Pinfire Revolver, 9mm Lefaucheux-pattern Pinfire Revolver, 9mm à broche revolver
Overview
The Chichester Pinfire Revolver is a mid-19th-century six-shot revolver of the Lefaucheux pinfire type, chambered for the 9mm Lefaucheux (9mm a broche) self-contained metallic cartridge. It belongs to the large family of British-styled, Belgian-made open- and closed-frame pinfire revolvers that flooded the European and American Civil War markets around 1859-1879. The hammer strikes a small pin protruding radially from the cartridge case, driving it into an internal primer to ignite the charge. Representative examples carry a 127mm (5-inch) round sighted barrel, a six-round cylinder, a flip-up loading gate and an ejector rod, with a flat-bottomed grip, top strap and lanyard loop in the British Adams idiom; most were proofed at Liege in Belgium and sold unmarked or under retailer names through the English gun trade. It represents the affordable personal-defence revolvers that briefly bridged cap-and-ball percussion and the later rimfire and centerfire systems.
Specifications
| Overall Length | 260 mm (10.24") |
| Barrel Length | 127 mm (5.00") |
| Action Type | Revolving |
| Firing Mechanism | Hammer Fired |
| Trigger Type | Double Action |
| Magazine Capacity | 6 rounds |
| Magazine Type | Revolving Cylinder |
| Effective Range | 20 m (22 yd) |
| Barrel Rifling | Right Hand |
| Frame Material | Steel |
| Barrel Material | Steel |
| Stock Material | Wood |
| Finish | Blued |
Calibers
- 9mm Pinfire · primary — also known as 9mm Lefaucheux, 9mm à broche
Features
- Firing modes: Repeating
- Feed systems: Revolving Cylinder
- Features: Pinfire Cartridge Ignition, Revolving Cylinder, Loading Gate, Ejector Rod, Self Contained Metallic Cartridge
Service history
Conflicts
- American Civil War (1861-1865)
Production
Production years: 1859-1879
No reliable production figures exist for this specific unmarked Belgian-trade pinfire revolver. For context, pinfire revolvers were made in enormous numbers across Europe (chiefly Liege and France) - roughly 400,000 had been produced by 1867 - so individual retailer- or unmarked patterns of this class cannot be quantified.
Origin
Country of origin: United Kingdom
Designer: Casimir Lefaucheux
Discontinued: 1880
Notes
The 'Chichester' attribution is unreliable and likely conflates two unrelated guns. Documented sources show no British pinfire revolver verifiably marked 'Chichester': the only firearm of that name is the American Chichester Rifle Company (Jersey City, NJ), a retail brand for Hopkins & Allen that fitted 28-gauge smoothbore 'pocket shotgun' barrels and rifle barrels to the .38 rimfire/centerfire XL No. 5 revolver frame circa 1880-1890 (per Forgotten Weapons) - not a pinfire and not British. This entry instead documents the class it was filed under: an unmarked British-style 9mm Lefaucheux-pattern pinfire revolver of circa 1859, Belgian (Liege) manufacture. The specifications (260mm overall, 127mm barrel, six-shot, double action) are taken from a representative IMA-USA example rather than a single catalogued 'Chichester' model. Weight, muzzle velocity and energy are left null because no source gives verified figures for this specific gun.
Background
Pinfire cartridges had to be loaded with each protruding pin aligned upward through the cylinder; a careless knock against an exposed pin could discharge a round outside the gun, a hazard that contributed to the system being superseded by rimfire and centerfire designs by the 1880s.