Goodlake's Pepperbox Pistol and Bullet Pouch

Lieutenant and Captain (The dual rank system exclusive to Her Majesty’s Guards regiments) Gerald Goodlake, Coldstream Guards, took part in the Battle of Alma, Inkerman, and the Siege of Sevastopol. The Coldstream Guards landed at Kalamita Bay in the Crimea in September 1854, as part of the Guards Brigade, 1^st Division, English Army of the East.  These were Her Majesty Queen Victoria’s elite personal guards.  In the Crimea the Guards Brigade consisted of the Grenadier Guards, Coldstream Guards, and Scots Fusilier Guards.  The Guards’ battle honours include Alma, Inkerman, and the Siege of Sevastopol.

During a Russian probing action up Windmill Ravine on 28 October 1854, a week prior to the Battle of Inkerman, he led approximately 40 Guards sharpshooters against ten times their number in delaying a Russian flanking movement.  This allowed British reinforcements to arrive and drive the enemy back into Sevastopol.  For his gallantry in this action he was presented the Victoria Cross at Hyde Park by Queen Victoria, personally, on 26 June 1857.  He retired in 1881 as a Major General, and was awarded the Honorary Rank of Lieutenant General.

The photograph is of Goodlake’s  six-shot ‘Pepperbox’ revolving pistol and his leather bullet pouch.  He used these items throughout the Crimean War.  This type pistol, sometimes referred to as a “Pepperpot or Pepperbox”, was manufactured in .36 through .40 calibre, beginning in around 1830.  It was primarily for self-defense.  The six barrels were about 3.5 inches long.  The pistol, itself, was about 9 inches long, and weighed about 2 pounds.

The barrels revolved around a spindle, firing in turn as they came under the hammer.  As the trigger was pulled, the hammer cocked, the barrel rotated, and the hammer dropped on a percussion cap (thus igniting the powder and firing the bullet).  The bullets were round lead balls, loaded from the front of each barrel. Fairmans of London manufactured this particular pistol.

This artifact was photographed courtesy of the Guards Museum, London, UK.