Henry Deringer (October 26, 1786 – February 28, 1868) was an American

gunsmith A gunsmith is a person who repairs, modifies, designs, or builds guns. The occupation differs from an armorer, who usually replaces only worn parts in standard firearms. Gunsmiths do modifications and changes to a firearm that may require a very ...

. He is best known for inventing and giving his name to the derringer pistol.

Early life

Deringer was born in

Easton, Pennsylvania Easton is a city in, and the county seat of, Northampton County, Pennsylvania, United States. The city's population was 28,127 as of the 2020 census. Easton is located at the confluence of the Lehigh River, a river that joins the Delaware River ...

, on October 26, 1786, to colonial gunsmith Henry Deringer Sr. (1756-1833) and Catherine McQuety (1759–1829). The family moved to

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sin ...

where his father continued work on the

Kentucky rifle The long rifle, also known as the longrifle, Kentucky rifle, Pennsylvania rifle, or American longrifle, a muzzle-loading firearm used for hunting and warfare, was one of the first commonly-used rifles. The American rifle was characterized by a ...

, both an ornate sporting model and a basic version for the U.S. Army. He sent his son to Richmond to apprentice with another gunsmith there. Henry Deringer moved back to Pennsylvania after serving his apprenticeship and set up shop in 1806 in Philadelphia, on Tamarind Street. He married Elizabeth Hollobush at the First Reformed Church in Philadelphia on April 5, 1810. According to McElroy's directory in 1841 Deringer had a house/gun shop at 370 North Front Street,

Northern Liberties Northern Liberties is a neighborhood in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Prior to its incorporation into Philadelphia in 1854, it was among the top 10 largest cities in the U.S. in every census from 1790 to 1850. Boundaries Northern Liberties is loc ...

, Pennsylvania, PA.

Work

Deringer's early efforts were for military contracts, producing military pistols, muskets and rifles. Among those he produced was the Model 1814 Common Rifle and the Model 1817 Common Rifle. He produced trade rifles, designated for the Native American tribes, to fulfill the U.S. treaty obligations. His specialties became fine sporting rifles and dueling pistols. He stopped pursuing government contracts by the mid-1840s. In 1825 he designed the first of the large caliber, short barreled pistols that would lead to considerable wealth and fame for himself. Using the basic flintlock action in common usage at the time, the pistols were muzzle loading single shots, or in some cases, double barreled in an over-under manner. Later models used the

percussion cap The percussion cap or percussion primer, introduced in the early 1820s, is a type of single-use percussion ignition device for muzzle loader firearm locks enabling them to fire reliably in any weather condition. This crucial invention gave rise ...

action, although both actions were manufactured and sold for some time. For arms of his own design, he adopted the newer percussion cap technology, putting his pistol on the modern cutting edge. He was innovative; he perfected the percussion cap about 1820, and Deringer was marketing them by the 1830s, and possibly the mid-1820s.

Name and trademark

Deringer never claimed a patent for his pistols and the public bought them as fast as he produced them. Further development and copying of his design resulted in the

derringer A derringer is a small handgun that is neither a revolver nor a semi/ fully automatic pistol. It is not to be confused with mini-revolvers or pocket pistols, although some later derringers were manufactured with the pepperbox configuration. ...

(note the double-r) pistol that was generically manufactured widely by other companies. There was widespread copying of his designs, including outright counterfeiting with his proofmarks being copied. One company even hired a tailor called "John" Deringer so that it could put the Deringer name on its firearms. Some of Deringer's workmen also left the company to set up their own duplicates, whilst others copied his pistols as closely as possible with some even putting on its Deringer name and trademark. Deringer fought these infringements for most of his business life. The ''Deringer v. Plate'' ruling, in which the

California Supreme Court The Supreme Court of California is the highest and final court of appeals in the courts of the U.S. state of California. It is headquartered in San Francisco at the Earl Warren Building, but it regularly holds sessions in Los Angeles and Sacra ...

ruled in the company's favor, became a landmark in trademark law.

Death

Deringer died in 1868 at the age of 81 and was buried in

Laurel Hill Cemetery Laurel Hill Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery in the East Falls neighborhood of Philadelphia. Founded in 1836, it was the second major rural cemetery in the United States after Mount Auburn Cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts. The cemetery i ...

in Philadelphia.

References

External links