Merwin & Hulbert .38 cal revolver with folding hammer

Merwin & Hulbert was in business 1876 to 1891.

I think the thing that did M&H in was, The Czar got the order of guns but never paid for them!

He tried that with S&W but they wouldn't bite!

Ivan

Here's its baby brother....

The 'Merwin' in M&H was Joseph Merwin who had owned Merwin & Bray Firearms. That went bankrupt after the CW.

Merwin then joined a business venture
with brothers Wm and Milian (sp?) Hulbert in the later 1860's.
That business venture was the Hopkins & Allen Firearms Mfg Co.
Wm & Milian Hulbert were together the 50% owners of the company among a total of 5.
These 3 is where the Merwin & Hulbert name comes from.

2 brothers , Samual & Charles Hopkins were among the stock holder/owners in Hopkins & Allen
Charles Allen was another major stock owner in the H&A company.
These latter 3 is where to company name comes from.

Joseph Merwin's handgun's designs were among the more advanced of the time. A separate section of the Hopkins & Allen factory was set up to assemble the Merwin & Hulbert marked revolvers and rifles.
Some were of the same design as what was being made and sold under the Hopkins and Allen name, inclu the folding hammer feature.

The real different model designs were the pull,twist bbl ejection models..
Much more fitting and better finish went into most of the M&H guns than the average H&A.

The 2 Hulbert bros went bankrupt around 1896. That was the end of the M&H guns pretty much except for old stock and parts.
H&A itself also bankrupt a couple yrs later in 1898.
But H&A came back with a new name of 'Hopkins and Allen Arms Co'

Easy way to tell an 'Antique' H&A from a 'Modern' status is the roll marked name on it.
Any M&H is antique Status.

I have read of a Mosin Nagant rifle contract going unpaid for, but it never really has been been quite clear.
Also, the same for a contract for SMLE rifles for Britain , never built , or payments never recv'd.. again neither of these storys seem to have much to them. H&A did make a small .22 revolver called the Czar though!
A Suicide Special type name given to one of their little revolvers.

I have seen a proto-type SMLE supposedly made in the 1914 era by a US firearm mfg for submission for a contract.
The story with that one was it came from either Iver Johnson or Harrington & Richardson, can't remember which.

What H&A did do and is well documented is to completely stop all sporting firearms mfg'r at their plant in 1915 and take on a contract from Belgium to produce the
Model 1889 Belgian Mauser rifle .
H&A re-tooled the factory for this contract and actually produced some of the rifles and some carbines also I believe. Nice Hopkins& Allen 'crest' on the top of the recv'r ring. Quite rare to find one of these.

But they were never able to build them fast enough and payment did not come quickly as WW1 moved ahead in Europe and overwhelmed Belgium.

H&A went bankrupt for a second time and this time for good.

The WW1 US Govt shadow War-Time production company.. New England Westinghouse moved in and took over the H&A plant.
It gave Marlin Firearms the run of the place to produce BAR parts and other War-time needs.

Once the war was over, the plant, machinery, left over H&A and old M&H stock & parts were put up for auction and low and behold,,,Marlin won the bid!.

Marlin took out what they wanted and actually built several of the H&A handgun designs for a time at their New HAven plant.

Some already assembled revolvers were remarked MArlin from their H&A marking.
H&A had made a single shot pistol, MArlin took that one and put it into production for a time as well.
The H&A plant , now abandon was sold and became a textile mill among other things over the years till finally torn down.

I love M&H pistols. A pretty cool design and how quickly one could change barrels was neat too. Fit and finish on the few solid tops I've seen have been fantastic. The one open top pistol in 44 M&H caliber I have heald was very well used, but still pretty tight.

I also have read that the M&H revolvers were popular on the Western frontier.

Really an interesting piece of American firearms history.

I should have mentioned previously is what makes this particular revolver unusual is that it is blued. It’s certainly not rare, but the vast majority of Merwin & Hulbert revolvers were nickeled.