Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! The Sisterdale revolver represents one of the most original Confederate handgun designs from the Civil War era. Conceived in 1862 by Alfred Kapp and a group of Texan compatriots in Sisterdale, these men set out to manufacture their own .44 caliber revolvers to arm themselves and potentially supply the Texas government. They managed to craft six guns at the Kapp homestead before the project was scrapped, likely due to the revolver’s impractical design. Its unique features included an external cylinder hand-operated by the hammer and a separate flat spring component serving as the cylinder stop. These externally mounted parts would have left the Sisterdale revolver prone to fouling. Just one example is known to have survived and passed down through generations of the Kapp family until resurfacing decades later. While innovative in nature, the Sisterdale revolver failed to progress beyond the initial prototype phase.
“This fabulous and unique massive 44 cal. dragoon revolver has a most partially external complex mechanism for turning cyl as can be seen in photos. This gun is in wonderful condition with spectacular provenance and history, dating to its manufacture in 1862; long retained in the family of the Confederate soldier who not only carried it but who helped make it. Pistol was retained in family until 1974 and has been in the collections of only 2 preeminent Confederate Texas collectors until this offering. This massive gun measures over 14″ overall with 7-3/4” bbl weighing 4lbs. Bill Gary in his 1987 text Confederate Revolvers dedicates an entire chapter to this unique survivor of which six were noted to have been made. Pictured in Lone Star and Double Eagle, Civil War letters of a German-Texas Family, by Minetta Goyne, 1982, pg. 67. A passage dated August 10, 1862, Camp Clark states, “Assembled to produce six-shooters for the army on or near the Ernst Kapp farm, not only the Coreth brothers, but at times also Adolph Munzenberger, August Schimmelpfennig, Hermann Kammerling, and a somewhat nebulous character variously called “Wilhelm der Schmidt” or “Schmidt Willem” all were involved in the project. All were under the direction of Alfred Kapp, who had special qualifications resulting from a tour of the eastern United States in 1856-57, during the course of which he had worked at the Colt factory in Hartford. Together these men produced a number of pistols (six, it is thought) that experts describe as combining certain features of the Colt, the Remington, the Smith and Wesson, and the Rogers and Spencer. Only one is known to exist today.” The engineering excellence among this group of German-Americans in Sisterdale was amazing. This particular pistol is among the very finest of any made in the South, with fabulous aesthetics and the overall unique mechanism and horn grips. “
LOT #2203: SISTERDALE, ARMY, NSN, 44 CAL. (n.d.). MORPHY AUCTIONS. photograph. Retrieved November 26, 2023, from https://auctions.morphyauctions.com/lot-427749.aspx.
