POTD: The Remington Model 1888 – Cleaning Out the Parts Bins

Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! Here we have a revolver that most Remington reference books do not even bother to list. Remington and Sons went into receivership in 1886. In 1888 Marcellus Hartley of Hartley and Graham teamed up with Thomas Bennett of Winchester to take control, and the firm became Remington Arms. Hartley needed money, and there were single action parts sitting in Ilion doing nothing at all. Out of that came the Model 1888, sold through Hartley and Graham as the New Model Pocket Army for ten dollars and fifty cents. Fewer than a thousand got built, and the 1889 Hartley and Graham catalog is about the only period mention anybody has ever turned up.

Want to spot one? Look under the barrel. The Model 1875 carried a heavy steel web below the ejector housing, a leftover styling cue from the 1858 percussion Remington that did no structural work whatsoever. On the 1888 that web has been machined off, which is exactly what the Model 1890 would do from the start. This gun sits square between the two, built out of 1875 leftovers with 1890 thinking.

Remington never came close to Colt in the single action market. Colt built around 148,000 Single Action Armies through 1896. Remington managed maybe 33,000 across all three of its models. I have always thought the 1875 was the better looking gun. Showing up two years late buried it anyway.

Most of our POTDs utilize images from our friends at Rock Island Auction Company, the premier firearms auction in the United States. Take some time to browse their current auctions – who knows, maybe you’ll find a piece of history to take home!

“Scarce Remington 1888 Transitional Single Action Army Revolver.” Rock Island Auction, www.rockislandauction.com/detail/4097/1090/scarce-remington-1888-transitional-single-action-army-revolver. Accessed 4 Sept. 2026.

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