Elizabeth Jarvis Colt (born Elizabeth Hart Jarvis, October 5, 1826 – August 23, 1905) was the widow and heir of firearms manufacturer

Samuel Colt Samuel Colt (; July 19, 1814 – January 10, 1862) was an American inventor, industrialist, and businessman who established Colt's Patent Fire-Arms Manufacturing Company and made the mass production of revolvers commercially viable. Col ...

, founder of

Colt's Manufacturing Company Colt's Manufacturing Company, LLC (CMC, formerly Colt's Patent Firearms Manufacturing Company) is an American firearms manufacturer, founded in 1855 by Samuel Colt that has become a subsidiary of Czech holding company Colt CZ Group. It is th ...

Early life

Elizabeth Hart Jarvis was born in

Saybrook, Connecticut Deep River is a New England town, town in Middlesex County, Connecticut, Middlesex County, Connecticut, United States. The town is part of the Lower Connecticut River Valley Planning Region, Connecticut, Lower Connecticut River Valley Planning Reg ...

, to Reverend William Jarvis, an Episcopal Minister, and Elizabeth Jarvis. She was the eldest of five children in an affluent and socially prominent family. She "grew up in a lovely 1830s Greek Temple Revival house in Portland," which fell into disrepair and was threatened with demolition, but (as of 2017) may be moved and rehabilitated as part of other area development.

Marriage to Samuel Colt

She met Samuel Colt in 1851 in Newport, Rhode Island, and the two were married in 1856 The couple resided at

Armsmear Armsmear ("meadow of arms"), also known as the Samuel Colt Home, is a historic house located at 80 Wethersfield Avenue in Hartford, Connecticut. It was the family home of firearm manufacturer Samuel Colt. Armsmear was listed as a National Histo ...

. with Bishop Thomas Church Brownell presiding over the wedding. The Colts had five children. Two died in infancy; a daughter, named Elizabeth, died at the age of three. In 1861, Samuel Colt died from complications associated with

gout Gout ( ) is a form of inflammatory arthritis characterized by recurrent attacks of pain in a red, tender, hot, and Joint effusion, swollen joint, caused by the deposition of needle-like crystals of uric acid known as monosodium urate crysta ...

and left Elizabeth a pregnant widow. Seven months after his death, the baby was

stillborn Stillbirth is typically defined as fetal death at or after 20 or 28 weeks of pregnancy, depending on the source. It results in a baby born without signs of life. A stillbirth can often result in the feeling of guilt or grief in the mother. T ...

. Only one child, Caldwell, survived to adulthood, but he drowned at sea at the age of 35.

At the helm of Colt

Following her husband's death in 1862, Mrs. Colt inherited a controlling interest in the manufacturing company (worth $3.5 million at the time, or $ million, adjusted for inflation to dollars), and played a key role in rebuilding the main armory following arson in 1864., although the book claims the 2002 value was $200 million Her brother, Richard Jarvis took over as president of the company in 1865, following the death of Elisha K. Root, and the two transitioned the company from the end of the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...

through the early 20th century, seeing the evolution from

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

revolver A revolver is a repeating handgun with at least one barrel and a revolving cylinder containing multiple chambers (each holding a single cartridge) for firing. Because most revolver models hold six cartridges before needing to be reloaded, ...

s to cartridge

s to semiautomatic pistols and machineguns. Colt served for 22 years as the president of the Union for Home Work, an organization that provided daycare for the children of working mothers. She became the first President of the Hartford Soldiers Aid Society and, in 1869, organized the first

Suffragette A suffragette was a member of an activist women's organisation in the early 20th century who, under the banner "Votes for Women", fought for the right to vote in public elections in the United Kingdom. The term refers in particular to members ...

convention in Connecticut. For these actions, she was dubbed "The First Lady of Hartford". In 1867, she had an Episcopal church designed by Edward Tuckerman Potter built as a memorial to her husband and the three children they lost. The church's architecture contains guns and gun-smithing tools sculpted in marble to commemorate her husband's life as an arms maker. In 1896, a parish house was built on the site as a memorial to their son, Caldwell, who died in 1894. In 1975, the Church of the Good Shepherd and Parish House was listed in the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

Retirement and death

She sold her interest in Colt's Manufacturing Company in 1901. She was involved in society life in

Hartford, CT Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. The city, located in Hartford County, had a population of 121,054 as of the 2020 census. Hartford is the most populous city in the Capitol Planning Region and the core city of ...

and President of the Hartford Women's Auxiliary. Colt died of paralysis in

Newport, Rhode Island Newport is a seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Rhode Island, United States. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, Rhode Island, Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and nort ...

, on August 23, 1905. The ''

Hartford Courant The ''Hartford Courant'' is the largest daily newspaper in the U.S. state of Connecticut, and is advertised as the oldest continuously published newspaper in the United States. A morning newspaper serving most of the state north of New Haven and ...

'' ran a full-page obituary of Colt on the front page of the newspaper the following day, calling her the "First Lady of Connecticut". It was the first time that the newspaper recognized the death of a woman in this manner. In her will, Elizabeth Colt left a collection of nearly 1,000 objects, artworks, firearms and documents to the

Wadsworth Atheneum The Wadsworth Atheneum is an art museum in Hartford, Connecticut. The Wadsworth is noted for its collections of European Baroque art, ancient Egyptian and Classical bronzes, French and American Impressionism, Impressionist paintings, Hudson Riv ...

as well as a fund to build the Colt Memorial. The Elizabeth Hart Jarvis Colt Memorial Wing was the first American museum wing bearing the name of a woman patron. As part of her will, Colt left a sizable collection of

Islamic art Islamic art is a part of Islamic culture and encompasses the visual arts produced since the 7th century CE by people who lived within territories inhabited or ruled by Muslims, Muslim populations. Referring to characteristic traditions across ...

at the Wadsworth. Many of the works were not seen for over a century, until 2024 with the exhibit ''Divine Geometry''. The organization was curated by Wadsworth curator Hamid Hemat, who formerly worked for the Turquoise Mountain Foundation and subsequently fled the

Fall of Kabul (2021) On 15 August 2021, Afghanistan's capital city of Kabul was captured by the Taliban after 2021 Taliban offensive, a major insurgent offensive that began in May 2021. It was the final action of the War in Afghanistan (2001–2021), War in Afghan ...

. She is buried along with her husband and children in Hartford's historic Cedar Hill Cemetery.

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Colt, Elizabeth Jarvis 1826 births 1905 deaths 19th-century American businesspeople 19th-century American philanthropists Burials at Cedar Hill Cemetery (Hartford, Connecticut) Businesspeople from Hartford, Connecticut Colt's Manufacturing Company People from Deep River, Connecticut 19th-century American businesswomen Colt family