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Darrenger

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It's Derringer, but it is named after the gunsmith Henry Deringer Junior. Why it's two R's when you are naming the gun & one R when you name the smith who invented it is a mystery to me. Someone here may know the "story" behind that & ease my curiosity.
From what I have read, originally they were just a pistol built by Deringer, but as small concealable guns gained popularity the general name for small pistols became derringers. Back in the day there were not as many people overly concerned with the exact spelling of words so I suspect that is where the extra r came in. Or that is what I can figure, a lot of records are not very clear back then.
 
Maybe the following will clarify the naming confusion. Henry Deringer could have referred to any gun that he himself made as a Deringer. As his handguns (which were made in four sizes: coat, pocket, baby, peanut, which he called his "pocket pistols") became popular, they were widely copied without his permission. People called his pistols Deringers because it made sense, especially when he was the only maker of a quality product. As the popularity grew there were four retail business associates, called agents, who sold his pistols, true Deringer models, with their name marked on them as well, but, other than those, most were illegal copies. Just like today, soon others tried to jump on the bandwagon and make quick cash with copies. Of course they called them Deringers, they were crooks. Although Deringer never took the time to patent his design, he sued, and won, for illegal use of his name on those copies. To avoid legal action the makers of the knockoff pistols began to change the spelling on their copies. This is where the two r's enter the picture. To sum up, any gun made by Henry can be called a Deringer. Anything else, made by anyone else, then or now, is a derringer (meaning small pistol often in the Deringer style).
 
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This has probably been shown earlier but Her are three original Henry Deringers. different sizes and different calibers. I believe the middle one is the same size used to assassinate President Lincoln, the smallest one was colloquially called The Peanut. I understand Henry made or designed larger weapons but they must be very scarce since I never saw one. I'll look in Wikipedia.
 

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