Colt Walker

Colt Walker 1847 - .44 caliber.

One of the original Colt Walker 1847s - .44 caliber used by Clint Eastwood in the film The Outlaw Josey Wales. Since deactivated by the propstore of London.

The Colt Walker is the more successful followup to the Colt Paterson 1836, created by Samuel Colt in partnership with Samuel Walker for the Mexican-American War. Designed as a pistol for cavalry, who kept their pistols on their horse, for use against horses, the Colt Walker is physically large and made for a powerful load that is still the most powerful handgun ever issued by the US military (even after the invention of smokeless powder). Only a little over a thousand were produced, but the high power combined with the fragile design led to only 191 being turned in at the end of the war with only 82 in serviceable condition (these numbers may have been inflated by enlisted soldiers' well reported mishandling the strange new technology and misreporting their status to steal the expensive pistols) and another three confirmed purchased by officers. The Colt Walker would be succeeded by the far more successful, and much smaller, Colt Dragoon. In 2021 the Colt Walker would be named the state firearm of Texas.

The historical importance, relatively low production run, high loss rate, and power mean original Colt Walkers are rare and extremely valuable (one sold for 1.84 million USD in 2018, well over ten times its weight in gold), though reproductions are readily available. The most obvious external difference in these reproductions is the blued cylinder, which was in the white on the originals. A few 19th-century European copies of the Walker were produced, and some of these have appeared in older films.

Specifications

(1847 - 1848)

• Type: Revolver
• Caliber(s): .44 ball
• Weight: 4.5 lbs (2.1 kg)
• Length: 15.5 in (39.4 cm)
• Barrel length(s): 9 in (22.9 cm)
• Capacity: 6-round cylinder
• Fire Modes: Single Action

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The Colt Walker and variants can be seen in the following films, television series, video games, and anime used by the following actors:

Film

Title	Actor	Character	Notes	Date
The Paris Commune (Zori Parizha)		Communards	Cartridge conversion	1936
True Grit	Kim Darby	Mattie Ross	Cartridge conversion	1969
The Outlaw Josey Wales	Clint Eastwood	Josey Wales	Cartridge conversion	1976
Tom Horn	Lee Mendenour	Roy Jenson		1980
Three Amigos	Martin Short	Ned Nederlander		1986
Quigley Down Under				1990
El Diablo	Anthony Edwards	Billy Ray Smith	Cartridge conversion	1990
Last Man Standing	William Sanderson	Joe Monday		1996
Ravenous	Guy Pearce	Captain Boyd		1999
	Neal McDonough	Private Reich
	Robert Carlyle	FW Colhoun
	Jeffrey Jones	Colonel Hart
Lone Rider	Lou Diamond Phillips	Bobby Hattaway		2008
The Hateful Eight	Michael Madsen	Joe	Ivory grips	2015
Jane Got a Gun	Noah Emmerich	Bill Hammond	Cartridge conversion	2016
	Natalie Portman	Jane Hammond
The Legend of Tarzan	Samuel L. Jackson	George Washington Williams		2016
The Kid	Chris Pratt	Grant Cutler	Cartridge conversion	2019
True History of the Kelly Gang	Nicholas Hoult	Constable Fitzpatrick	Heritage commemorative	2019
	George MacKay	Ned Kelly
Fatman	Mel Gibson	Chris "Santa Claus" Kringle		2020

Television

Title	Actor	Character	Notes / Episode	Date
North and South	Philip Casnoff	Capt. Elkanah Bent	Cartridge	1985
Lonesome Dove	Robert Duvall	Gus		1989
Return To Lonesome Dove		Several characters		1993
1864	Johannes Lassen	Wilhelm Dinesen		2014
		Prussian Death's Head Hussars
Fear the Walking Dead - Season 5	Garret Dillahunt	John Dorie	"Humbug's Gulch" (S5E03)	2019

Anime

Title	Character	Notes	Date
Black Lagoon: Roberta's Blood Trail			2010-11

Video Game

Title	Appears as	Mods	Notes	Date
Call of Juarez	"Ranger"			2007
Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood	"Ranger"			2009
Dead Rising 2			not useable	2010
Fistful of Frags	"Colt Walker"			2014
World of Guns: Gun Disassembly	"Colt Walker 1847"			2014
Enlisted	"Colt Walker"			2021

See Also

• Colt's Manufacturing Company - A list of all firearms manufactured by Colt.