The Le Page family's weapons…
The Le Page-Moutier pistol is a very unusual one. It has a single barrel, but two hammers and two chambers for ammunition. It's convenient, though difficult to load... But it's original and has a strong selling point. You could always advertise it as "only available here."
“Arbenin lived in the world, and he was too smart,
To decide on publicity;
And finally, without purpose or need,
In an empty comedy - a bloody denouement.
But he got angry, and there is no harm in that:
They will take Lepage's pistols,
They will measure out thirty-two steps
And, really, these epaulettes
I did not deserve this by running away from the enemy."
"Masquerade" (1835), M. Yu. Lermontov
To decide on publicity;
And finally, without purpose or need,
In an empty comedy - a bloody denouement.
But he got angry, and there is no harm in that:
They will take Lepage's pistols,
They will measure out thirty-two steps
And, really, these epaulettes
I did not deserve this by running away from the enemy."
"Masquerade" (1835), M. Yu. Lermontov
stories about weapons. A.S. Pushkin wasn't the only one to mention the fatal Le Page guns in his poems. M.Yu. Lermontov also didn't forget to mention them in his drama "Masquerade." So, this particular weapon was very, very popular among our nobles. No domestic manufacturers were mentioned, no. But "Lepage"—YES! So, taking the life of a neighbor over some trifle was perfectly acceptable for our nobles according to the Christian faith, but... It was absolutely impossible to do this with a cheap weapon. This was the final "favor" they had to render to the enemy: let him know that he received the fatal bullet from a Le Page, and let him take comfort in that.
Yes, there's no denying that people were wild back then, both in our country and around the world, although they no longer ran around naked like the natives of the Fiji Islands, nor ate their own blood brothers like the Solomon Islanders, but drank Madame Clicquot and wore ironed trousers. But... let's return to the subject of Le Page weapons and their continued existence.
The same gun, viewed from above
And this is the inscription on its barrel, which translates as follows: “Le Page-Moutier – the king’s gunsmith”
Well, Jean Le Page was lucky with his children. Four of his six children also dedicated their lives to the gunsmithing business. The eldest daughter, Justine, married Louis Perrin, a gunsmith who worked in Poitiers from 1813 to 1830 and then in Paris, where he won bronze medals at the French Industrial Exhibition of 1834, the Exhibition of 1839, and the Exhibition of 1844. He signed his name as Perrin Le Page.
Le Page revolver with a 12-round 6mm cylinder
And this is how this revolver was taken apart. The design, as you can see, is very simple, and therefore reliable, and it still fired a full 12 shots!
André Jean Thomas, the second child in the family, also became a gunsmith and settled in a different location, at 24 rue Monnaie, around 1823. He used Le Page Fils as his signature. And Jean André Prosper Henri Lepage, the fourth child in the family, inherited the firm after his father's death in 1822. Daughter Eléonore Méliade married officer Louis Didier Fauré, which also played a role in stories this company.
Le Page-Moutier-Gribauval revolver
This weapon had a very unusual design. For reloading, the barrel swung to the right along with the cylinder. A lever was located on the barrel to eject empty cartridges.
At the same time, the revolver's cylinder could be easily removed and reloaded separately!
Jean André Prosper Henri Lepage, continuing his father's work, was officially appointed in-house gunsmith to the court of the king, the Duke of Orleans, and the Duke of Nemours in 1835. His workshop was located on the Champs-Élysées, on Rue Gourde, later renamed Rue Marbeuf. Under his leadership, the company's international reputation grew significantly. Lepage participated in the Paris Exhibitions of 1823, 1827, and 1834, and was awarded a silver medal in 1839. The company shop, however, remained at 13 Rue de Richelieu.
The revolver, signed "Le Page Brothers," had a double-row cylinder and two barrels! Now that's the kind of weapon a traveler from today to the 19th century should be armed with!
An impressive weapon, isn't it?!
Incidentally, A.S. Pushkin, in his novel "Eugene Onegin," mentions the pistols of Jean Lepage, Pierre's nephew. Moreover, the nephew was every bit as distinguished as his uncle: Louis XVI, Napoleon Bonaparte, and Louis XVIII were all among his clients. Eugene Onegin, too, was among the lucky ones who managed to acquire Lepage's dueling pistols—weapons of noble honor, so to speak, and therefore very expensive.
Incidentally, modern weapons historians still haven't solved the mystery of the whereabouts of A.S. Pushkin's dueling set from the time of his duel with Dantes. It is believed that Pushkin arrived at the duel site on January 27, 1837, with his own dueling set from the Lepage firm. It is also known that on January 24, 1837, he delivered silverware to the moneylender A.P. Shishkin and received 2200 rubles for it. Part of this money most likely went toward paying for these pistols, which he purchased at Alexei Kurakin's "Military Equipment Store" at 13 Nevsky Prospect*. However, the Le Page firm's account books in Paris for 1837 contain no entry about Pushkin ordering a dueling set. According to K.K. According to Danzas, Pushkin's second, "these pistols were completely similar to d'Archiac's pistols." However, the current whereabouts of d'Archiac's pistols are also unknown.
"Le Page-Kaufman revolver - Novo." At one time, these pocket revolvers were very popular. They often had a nickel-plated finish.
Most of Jean Lepage's designs were fairly traditional rifles and pistols, but among them was a rifle with a snap-action breechblock, the barrel of which rotated to the side when loading. When this rifle was presented to the French military commission in 1838, the government ordered 600 of these rifles from the royal factory in Saint-Étienne for one of the lancer regiments.
A hammerless pocket revolver, also known as the "Bosshu" ("Uneven"), chambered in 8mm Lebel. Right side view.
The same revolver. Left view.
Then it happened that a certain Gilles Michel Louis Moutier (1810–1887) married the daughter of Louis Didier Fauré and, in 1842, succeeded Henri Le Page as the owner of the workshop, using the signature "Le Page-Moutier." He received silver medals at the World Exhibitions in Paris in 1844 and 1849 and a first-class medal at the 1855 exhibition. He participated in exhibitions in London in 1851, where he received another medal, and in 1862. Then Émile Henri Fauré (1840–1929) joined the company—the nephew of Henri Le Page and the son of Louis Didier Fauré and Eléonore Méliade. In 1865 he became a partner of Gilles Louis Michel Moutier, and in 1868 he became the sole owner of the company and the official supplier to the Russian Imperial Court.
Le Page-Dumontier Brothers pin revolver
And this is a holster for it.
Taking part in all the World Exhibitions, he received awards in Paris in 1865 (first-class medal), in 1867 (silver medal), in 1878 (gold medal), in 1889 (Grand Prix), and in Vienna in 1873 (Medal of Progress). In 1878, he was awarded the title of Chevalier of the Legion of Honor, and in 1894, Officer of the Legion of Honor.
In 1913, gunsmith Dumont bought the Fauré Le Page company, but retained its name and founded his own company in 1925. Émile Henri Fauré Le Page died in 1929 and was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery.
The 1830 Revolution led the Belgian National Committee to task him with organizing arms supplies for the army of the nascent state. He accomplished this task so well that in 1834 the Belgian government awarded him the Iron Cross for his services to the Belgian Revolution.
Shortly before the 1914-1918 war, the company also began to specialize in the production of revolvers, and several governments turned to it for help in equipping their fleet and her army with impeccable weapons.
The 9mm Cornet automatic pistol from Le Page of Liege
The same pistol with a 12-round magazine. View from the right.
He had an original way of understanding things, what can I say...
In 1918, the Lepage company, transformed into a joint-stock company, Manufacture d'armes Lepage, resumed operations and, as early as 1919, began supplying its products to the English and American markets. The company acquired a machine shop, which it transformed into a model production facility, equipped with high-precision American machine tools. Hunting rifles in calibers 12-410 with folding barrels and external hammers and a Greener bolt, as well as hammerless rifles also with a Greener bolt, were produced. The production of Lepage semi-automatic pistols with 8 cartridges of calibers 6,35-7,65-9 mm was launched, both for shortened and 9-mm extended cartridges (Browning). A pistol of caliber 9 mm with a magazine for 12 cartridges was developed and produced; 320 or 380 caliber centerfire revolvers, as well as 5,8mm caliber VeloDog revolvers, both centerfire and rimfire.
*In Russia, dueling pistols in the first half of the 19th century could be purchased in St. Petersburg in the military goods stores of Kurakin (Nevsky Prospekt, 13), Zhernakov (Nevsky Prospekt, 19), Ponomarev (Nevsky Prospekt, 35), Surguchev (Nevsky Prospekt, 43), as well as in the officer's goods store of Shishkin (Bolshaya Morskaya St., 5) and in the workshops of the court gunsmiths Bertrand (Italianskaya St.) and Orlov (Bolshaya Meshchanskaya St., 7); and in Paris - from the same Lepage on rue Richelieu, 13; from Thomas in the Delorme gallery; from Devim (Italian Boulevard, 36); from Caron and Firmin (Opera Prospekt, 20); from Gastinne-Renette (rue Antin, 39).
**Incidentally, the pistols were made in pairs in case one of them misfired or some other accident occurred. This, incidentally, was confirmed by the duel between Pushkin and Dantes. During the duel on the Black River, the wounded Pushkin fell after Dantes fired, and snow filled the barrel of his pistol. Therefore, he was immediately given a second pistol to fire back.
P.S. The photographs used in this material belong to A. Dobress
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