Merwin 32 7shot six shooter

[leadeye]

Bought this a while back as non functional, but all it needed was disassembly and a good cleaning. No idea how old it is but with 32 S&W brass available I decided to try it out. This load is .3 CC 3f under a Accurate 31-087B, SPG lube, with a CCI magnum primer. I'm careful with guns like this firing for the first time, but after a few rounds into the dirt I tried it on a target 10 yards away off hand. Considering the revolver's target market and crude sights I was thinking length of a saloon being max range. Card table distance was probably more normal though. It performed surprisingly well at 10 yards, keeping all 7 on the black but left.

Not sure where I'll go with this, maybe clean it up some more, or refinish, but at least it shoots pretty well.

[uscra112]

Educated guess is that you have a "7 shot double action", actually made by Hopkins and Allen in Norwich, CT. - Joe Vorisek's book says it was made from 1880 to 1892. M&H was a sales/marketing house in NYC, H&A was their manufacturing partner until 1896 when M&H went bankrupt Treat it gently - all the M&H/H&A guns were made to sell cheaply. While the quality of metal and processing were not as bad as the Belgian imports of the time, they were not at all on par with Colt or S&W. More pictures would help. Does it have a folding hammer spur?

[leadeye]

Yes, kind of an interesting feature. I notice that it doesn't stay in place when the hammer falls, you have to pull it back along with the hammer if you want to take a SA follow up shot. I had heard that M&H guns were made by Hopkins and Allen and that decision had something to do with their plating process.

It's been an interesting project so far.

[uscra112]

All cheap handguns were nickel plated in those days. Less labor-intensive than polishing and bluing.

The folding hammer spur was to keep it from snagging when drawn from a pocket, obviously.

The Merwin partner of M&H fancied himself a gun designer, and given the timing I'd assume that this design is his, and not something H&A dreamed up.