The Colt Paterson was Samuel Colt’s first production revolver, Colt received his U.S. patent for the revolver in February 1836 and founded the Patent Arms Company in Paterson, New Jersey later that year. The early Paterson pistols were single-action percussion revolvers with a five-shot cylinder and no fixed trigger guard; the trigger was a folding spur that drops out only when the hammer is cocked.

These revolvers had octagonal rifled barrels (commonly 7½″–9″ long in Holster models) and were chambered initially in small calibers (.28 and .31 bore, later .36 bore). Notably, no loading lever was fitted on the first Paterson pistols, meaning that to reload the gun the shooter had to partially disassemble it.

Historically, the Colt Paterson revolvers had limited early military success. In tests in 1837 the U.S. Army found the design too delicate for field use, so only small government purchases were made (about 100 for the Navy in 1841 and 50 for the Army in 1845, after Patent Arms had folded). The revolvers cost around $40–$50 each (very expensive at the time), so sales were mostly to governments, militias and private buyers. The Republic of Texas bought 180 Paterson pistols in 1839 (especially for its Navy). More famously, frontier Texas Rangers eagerly adopted the .36‐caliber No.5 “Holster Model”, which became known as the “Texas Paterson”.



By 1839 Colt had modified the Paterson design to add a hinged loading lever under the barrel, the 1839–1842 “improved” Paterson models still had a folding trigger and single-action hammer, but now included a ramrod arm to make loading faster. Pulling the ramrod down (via a lever pivoting under the barrel) let the shooter seat balls into the chambers without taking the gun apart.
Barrel lengths and grips were the same as earlier models (7½″ to 9″ barrels were common, plus shorter “Belt Model” variants), the No.5 .36 cal remained the largest Holster Model.



In 1837 Colt introduced the Ring-Lever Rifle. These were longarms with an 8-shot cylinder and a circular ring lever in front of the trigger guard. Pulling the ring lever back simultaneously cocked an internal hammer and rotated the cylinder, effectively the rifle’s loading/hammer was hidden inside the frame. A round trigger guard lay immediately behind the ring lever (hence the nickname “two-ring” rifle).
The First Model Ring-Lever Rifle (1837–1838) had a 32-inch octagonal barrel and was produced in calibers from .34 up to .44 (Very few 10-shot cylinders were made, standard cylinder capacity was eight.) Only about 200 of these first-model rifles were built, making them extremely rare today. Notably, 50 of these were purchased by the U.S. Army for use in the Second Seminole War in Florida.

The Second Model Ring-Lever Rifle (1838–1841) was externally similar but with minor changes. It abandoned the topstrap and was offered only in .44 caliber. Barrel lengths of 32″ and 28″ were available. During production Colt added the same loading improvements as on the pistols: the cylinder rear became rounded, a hinged loading lever was added under the barrel, and a small notch was cut in the breech shield for capping. About 500 second-model rifles were made, and saw use by the army in small numbers aswell.

The Colt Paterson ring-lever rifles saw some official use. Aside from the 50 bought for Florida, the Republic of Texas ordered about 100 Second Model rifles in 1839 for its army, in general these rifles and carbines were used by U.S. and Texas forces on the frontier and in Florida. They were more complex and fragile than later Colt longarms, but represented the first mass-produced repeating rifle.

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