Here is a Baby Dragoon up for my consideration. As what appears to be with the earliest variants of the Pocket pistols, this was crudely made and fragile. I would need to take good care of this one.
The Baby Dragoon is from the about first 200 ever produced. It has one seviceable safety pin, no roller for the hammer to rotate on, and no grooves on the arbor. This is correct for its serial number range. This is at a time when the knurling on the hammer was still hand chisled on. The cylinder stops are circular, before Colt started to elongate the stops for better fitting of the cylider stop pin into the cylinder. I suspect some of the pistols in this serial number range had to be hand fitted for this reason. There is some pitting on a couple very small spots of the cylinder, and mild pitting in a couple of the grooves of the barrel.
However, the cylinder scene is about 80%, mechanically very good, and has at least 90% of the silver on the trigger guard and the straps of the revolver. It has all matching serial numbers, but the arbor is not numbered. This is also valid for its serial number range. The cylinder does move just a bit. There is a fair amount of bluing coverage on the barrel, but still faded. The case colors are still on the frame. Almost all the original varnish is on the grip with a nick where one side of the grip meets the frame. The grip is in very good condition.
What do all of you think of this particular example of the Baby Dragoon? I would prefer most of the original finish to be intact. But that would probaby increase the price quite a bit. This one does come with a case and its accessories, of which are in very mediocre condition. The case is soiled.
PS Some peoople cannot see any bluing on the cylinder. I believe it is there, just a has faded. The bluing is a bit easier to see on the barrel.
April 9, 2016, 11:51 AM
