Taylor's & Company 1865 Spencer Carbine 45 Colt 20" 7rd Rifle

Christopher Spencer's repeater changed what one soldier could do with a rifle. Seven metallic cartridges fed from a tube in the buttstock, and a trooper could run it dry and reload in a fraction of the time a percussion gun took, with no worry about damp powder. The 1865 pattern corrected the flaws found in the earlier 1860 guns, and this Taylor's & Company recreation follows it closely: case hardened frame and lock, blued 20" round barrel, a single barrel band held by a spring in the stock, ladder rear sight, and an oiled walnut stock.

Chambered in 45 Colt rather than the original 56-50 rimfire, it feeds a cartridge you can buy at any counter or load on a single stage press at home. Working the lever drops the breech block and ejects the empty; the hammer is thumb cocked separately, which is exactly how the originals ran and half the reason people want one. Seven rounds ride in the buttstock tube. At 20 inches it handles like the cavalry carbine it copies, which makes it as usable in a cowboy action match as it is on a wall.