Le Redoutable: A Double-Barrel 20-Shot Revolver

"Manufrance" was the common abbreviated name for Manufacture d'Armes et Cycles de Saint Etienne, a massive mail-order catalog company in France for many decades. Like Sears Roebuck in the United States, one could get pretty much anything from the Manufrance, including firearms. In the years leading up to World War One, the catalog included more and more extravagant revolvers, culminating in the 20-shot, 6.35mm "Le Redoubtable" (introduced in either 1910 or 1911) and the similarly-sized 16-shot "Le Terrible" in 7.65mm. Both used a cylinder with two staggered rows of chambers and two superposed barrels to fit that many cartridges into a sort of practical cylinder.

After 1914, the Manufrance catalog ceased publication for the duration of World War One, and the Redoubtable was no available when it returned in 1920. Before the war, this was definitely a luxury sort of item, bringing a price equal to that of a top-end self-loading pistol like a Luger, C96 Mauser, or 1903 Colt. A standard Army pattern Mle 1892 was less than half as much, and a pocket cyclists' Velodog sort of revolver was about a third the cost of Le Redoutable.

Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N. Oracle 36270
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[h.a.]

Someone in France, ca 1912:
I know what you're thinking. 'Did he fire twenty shots or only nineteen'? Well to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I kind of lost track myself. But being that this is a 6.35mm Manufrance, the largest-diameter cylinder handgun in the world, and would knock your tophat clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well do ya, ribald?

[hughbarton]

As we used to say in the automotive repair business, "The French copy no one, and no one copies the French"....
What a delightfully zany piece of kit!
Thanks, Ian.

[Francois]

Le redoutable (the fearsome) was also the name of the first french nuclear powered submarine. I'm not sure if it carried 20 ICBM, though.

[shatterquartz]

1:35 For those who are familiar with Astérix, a reference to the Manufrance catalog appears at the beginning of Astérix and the Normans. It probably flew over the heads of most foreign readers: one of the villagers receives in the mail a huge pile of marble slabs, the "antique" version of said catalog. Later on, he threatens to throw it at Justforkix when the latter makes a showy entrance on his souped-up chariot.

[matthewhall]

I hope he can show us this on a firing range at some point.. I really like the idea of a 20 shot revolver..

[tomarmstrong]

It's French, exceptionally weird, with high quality workmanship and Ian does all the accents for it's naming. Surely he's going to buy this for his collection.

[scoutrifle]

The amount of pre-CNC machine work that went into that firearm is stunning. Skilled people doing excellent work.

[nicholaswilson]

This would be a cool "villain" gun in some action movie... A slow mo shot as they're trying to shoot the hero, and you see the alternating muzzleflashs from the upper and lower barrels...

[Kattbirb]

Just for this year's sake, I would hope someone would make a rimfire reproduction of this revolver so we could have a 20-.22

[yetanotherbassdude]

Never mind the revolver, can we just appreciate for a second that in the Francophone world a century or so ago it was completely normal for a manufacturer to specialise in making guns *and* bicycles. I get that there was actually a lot of similarities between the two at the time as both required machining of mechanical devices that require high levels of precision that were catered to a mass-market audience, but God is it still goofy as heck to know that the FN logo was once a pair of bike pedals crossed with a rifle! 😂🤣

[BlazingOwnager]

I love how FRENCH revolvers made in France look. I mean there's little tells in a lot of nationalities of revolvers of that era, sure, but French revolvers always look like absolute cartoons with those massive high backs off the almost undersized looking handle. I'm probably describing this with all the wrong terms but.. I mean, one look at that gun, and you KNOW it's French before anyone says anything.

[charlesjmouse]

It's a funny thing. I'm not really interested in firearms, other than for their being varied examples of applied engineering. But Ian's knowledge, enthusiasm, and excellent personable presentation skills, mean I must have watched just about every episode of Forgotten Weapons.

Thank you.

[invertedpolarity]

Would love to see a 20-round speed loader for this.

[mz]

Am I nuts that I would love to see this revolver fired on a range? I know it’s probably impossible to find ammo for it but I love old weird guns.

[robertrobert]

I own an odd MANUFRANCE single-shot, bolt-action, 14mm/32 ga. shotgun/garden gun. The bolt shroud encapsulates the breech instead of the opposite. I could not determine what the proof marks meant, so I hand loaded trimmed 32 ga. shotshells with black powder and .490 round balls and shot them as a test. It is such a delicate little beauty and so odd mechanically, I just had to buy it. It is now a closet queen. I forget I even own it until Ian reminds me with videos like this.

[Crab]

“Move fast baby don’t be slow. Step aside, reload, time to go.”

[mercedes-amgforlife]

There is a museum in Berryville, Arkansas that has one of these. It is the second largest Colt collection outside the Colt manufacturing themselves. They have lots of neat firearms. The guy who collected them was a millionaire at the turn of the century, and traveled the world collecting firearms along with some other stuff.

[joshuaradick]

In the old Sears’ catalog you could literally buy houses. My friend’s house on a plantation in Guatemala is house built from a kit ordered off the catalog around 1900. It also happened that the house was then built atop a Mayan pyramid.

[napdaily]

This is definitely up there high on the list of coolest guns! Brilliant engineering!

[PhotoArtBrussels]

Ian, some french docs state it is Le Redoutable in 6, 35 mm (or 0.25 caliber). "fabriqué dans les calibres 6, 5 vélodog, 6, 35 (20 coups)"
Aparently a HDH Liege product and brevet of 1910; but manufactured by Saint-Etienne.