The only ordnance purchase I'm aware of for the 1862 Police was on the open (retail) market, when 50 Police revolvers were bought from B. Kittredge & Co. in May of 1862. I highly doubt there was a contract or purchase for 14,000 of them by the Ordnance Department (but for sure thousands were purchased privately by soldiers).

 

How distinctly different is the 1862 Pocket Police from the Pocket Navy? They intermingle in the serial number range so perhaps that's the seed of the confusion in the video if indeed there is confusion.

 

Todd, I can't agree with you since from the study made by John D. Breslin of The American Society Of Arms Collectors ( https://americansocietyofarmscollec...-content/uploads/2022/06/2002-B85-Colts-Frame-36-Caliber-Percussion-Pisto-1.pdf ) it has been established that the Police model was produced beginning in 1861, whereas the production of the Colt Pocket Of Navy Caliber began only in 1865, and that the two guns had their own serial range. And it has never been said that this last gun had military contracts.

 

I'll go with that then. The intermingling numbers information came from an NRA site that is likely off then.

 

This may not help with the 1862 Police, but it does contain as much information as I could find on the 1865 Pocket Navy, posts 1 through 4.

Original Colt Pocket Navy - 1853, 1862, or 1865? You pick.

 

About the only thing that could possibly help date a Civil War era Pocket Navy would be good documentation stating that a particular Pocket Navy was carried by or presented to someone during the 1861-1865 years. Also, the documentation would have to date from the Civil War years and not what someone wrote or thought 50-75 years ago.

 

Here is what Norm Flayderman wrote about the Colt Pocket Of Navy Caliber in his "Guide To Antique American Firearms", which is the bible of every antique gun collector :

But the object of my thread was about the Colt 1862 Police Model being bought by the army during the civil war, and I got only one answer from Johngross whom I thank here.