Velo-dog
The Velo-Dog was a pocket revolver originally created in France by René Galand, son of Charles-François Galand in the late 19th-century as a defense for cyclists against dog attacks. The name is a compound word composed of "velocipede" and "dog".
Design
Surviving examples vary considerably in appearance, but have certain features in common. The hammer is shrouded to avoid its snagging on clothing, so the weapon is double action only. Another feature of many late-model Velo-Dogs is the lack of a trigger guard and a trigger that folds into the body of the weapon when not in use. All common models have short barrels and originally fired the Velo-dog cartridge, although many produced after 1900 were chambered in .22 LR or .25 ACP rounds. Alternative ammunition options existed such as cartridges loaded with cayenne pepper or dust, or bullets made from wax, wood, or cork.The original revolver uses the Galand company's proprietary 5.75 mm Velo-dog cartridge, a centrefire cartridge slightly less powerful than the 22 Long Rifle, using a jacketed bullet. The cartridge is, or was until very recently, still made by Fiocchi.
Despite the low energy of the round, a suicide case was recorded where a woman shot herself twice in the temple with a.25 Velo-Dog revolver before succumbing.
Today, the Velo-Dog term is used for a broad assortment of European and North American pocket revolvers in various calibers by diverse makers.
They all are pocket-sized. They all have one or more of three specific features — concealed hammer, folding spur-trigger, and manual safety.
History
French manufacturer Galand introduced the first in the mid-1890s. Most came from Belgium, Spain, France, or Russia with additional production in Germany, Italy, U.S., and Brazil, with nearly 90 different manufacturers identified. The most prolific production was from the turn of the 20th century to World War I, when a cottage industry sprung up producing Velo-Dogs of various standards. Quality of produced guns varied widely. These guns seldom had a manufacturer mark or unique numbers, making identification impossible. Some manufacturers added identifying numbers to exported versions. The firearms museum in Liege, Belgium has a very large collection of such guns.There were over 30 different gun makers in the Eibar region of Spain alone before the Spanish Civil War and since only 4 of them survived there is no way to date individual weapons or distinguish different assembly or batch numbers.
Many early gun makers manufactured Velo-Dog firearms in batches or by the rack, numbering the weapons by batch or rack number. This may be mistaken for a serial number. Velodogs were cheap to produce and not very expensive to purchase, making unique Velo-Dogs extremely rare and somewhat valuable.