Watch: Allen & Thurber Pepperbox Pistol

A pepperbox handgun packs a good bit of punch, especially for what it is: a muzzleloading self-defense pistol with multiple barrels arranged in a cylindrical fashion (which resembles the cylinder on a revolver, though of course considerably longer).

In the video below, Ian of Forgotten Weapons takes us through a brief history of pepperboxes and their fairly widespread use by civilians for self defense, and then he takes a look at one pepperbox in particular.

This one is fairly fancy, with engraving and silver inserts on the grip panels. This one even has the name “J. Eaton” engraved on the left side of the bar-style hammer.

Similar to a double-action revolver, one pull of the trigger cocks the hammer, rotates a barrel into alignment, and drops the hammer to fire that barrel.

Ian lets us know that the pepperbox was a commonly-carried sidearm simply because it was fairly cheap and widely available. As he says, “[You could] buy this for a few dollars and go on about your life.”

Sage advice; an affordable gun is better than no gun.

Russ Chastain

Editor & Contributing Writer Russ Chastain is a lifelong hunter and shooter who has spent his life learning about hunting, shooting, guns, ammunition, gunsmithing, reloading, and bullet casting. He started toting his own gun in the woods at age nine and he's pursued deer with rifles since 1982, so his hunting knowledge has been growing for more than three and a half decades. His desire and ability to share this knowledge with others has also grown, and Russ has been professionally writing and editing original hunting & shooting content since 1998. Russ Chastain has a passion for sharing accurate, honest, interesting hunting & shooting knowledge and stories with people of all skill levels.