The Colt and the Snake: history of the rattlesnake on Clint Eastwood’s gun
The silver rattlesnake on Clint Eastwood’s Colt is probably the most famous western movie gun ornament. This is its story.
Il serpente e la Colt: storia del serpente della pistola di Clint Eastwood
Leone first saw Clint Eastwood in the western series "Rawhide", where Eastwood's character Rowdy Yates carries a rattlesnake Colt.
You can find the TV series on Amazon.com
Not everybody knows the story behind the silver rattlesnake on Clint Eastwood’s famous revolver used in all the movies of the “Dollars trilogy”, also know as the “Man With No Name trilogy”: a Colt Single Action Army in “For a fistful of dollars” and “For a few dollars more” and a (historically inaccurate) cartridge converted Colt Navy in “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” (this latter made by Uberti, which also sells the same gun through Cimarron Arms as of today).
Leone saw Clint Eastwood for the first time while Eastwood worked in famous western series “Rawhide”. In the second episode of the first season, “Incident at Alabaster Plain”, Eastwood’s character, Rowdy Yates, confronts a gunslinger, Ward Mastic, played by Peter Mark Rickman (no relation to Alan Rickman), who carries a Colt Single Action Army with the silver rattlesnake on its grip.
After several adventures, Yates (obviously) defeats evil Mastic and, at the end of the episode, shows his mates the gun he kept for himself, which he will carry for the rest of the series.
In the following photos, you can see Uberti's replica of the Colt Navy 1852, converted for cartridge use for Cimarron Firearms that was carried by Clint Eastwood in "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly".
Scene from the Rawhide episode "Incident at Alabaster Plain", showing the Colt with the rattlesnake carried by gunslinger Ward Mastic.
As it often happens, Eastwood really kept the gun for himself. He got it, with the gunslinger rig he would then wear in all its movies, from famous leatherworker Andy Anderson, of North Hollywood Gunfighter Shop
Anderson was an avid shooter and loved the Colt SAA but, due to a wound received during WW II, he suffered from a disability that prevented him from bending his wrist. A disability curiously similar to that of “Manco” (spanish for “one armed”), Eastwood’s character in “For a few dollars more”.
Due to this disability, Anderson created for himself a rig characterized by a specific holster angle which not only was very comfortable to carry and draw from, but also safer, as the muzzle of the gun pointed away from the shooter’s leg.
The rig was so successful that Anderson sold it to all major western movie stars of the era.
Actor Robert Conrad, star of the series The Wild Wild West
Among the productions that catered to North Hollywood Gunfighter Shop, were also Rawhide and the Wild Wild West series, whose lead actor, Robert Conrad, also carried a Colt with the same silver rattlesnake on the grip: probably the same gun, one that apparently Anderson himself often carried.
He probably had had the rattlesnakes made from a silversmith, since he was not skilled in this craft, but unfortunately all attempts at locating the original craftsman who made the rattlesnakes have been fruitless.
The Colt with the snake, in a sequence from the movie "For a Few Dollars More"
"For a Few Dollars More": You can clearly see how the Colt has two snakes, one on each side of the grip. The Uberti replica, for some reason, has the snake only on the "outside" panel.
In "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly", "Blondie" cleans his converted breech-loading Colt Navy, using oil from a lamp.
As we said, in the end the Colt with the rattlesnake grip become Clint Eastwood’s property.
When Eastwood was hired to star in “For a few dollars more”, given that the movie was a low budget production, he carried with him some costumes and his rig with the Colt, which became worldwide famous following the enormous success of the movie, and was used again in the following production.
The same grip was then created for the cartridge converted Colt Navy of the third movie of the trilogy, that, while chronologically made after the first two, is set before them, with a tenuous continuity: in "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" Blondie gets the poncho, the same poncho worn by the Man With No Name (noncommittally called "Joe" by some characters) in "For a fistful of dollars", where he gets mauled in a beating that caused shock in the audiences of the time for its brutality, and which results in a disability, the same disability due to which Eastwood's character "Manco" has to carry a leather support for his wrist in "For a few dollars more", which is last in the narrative chronological order of the movies.
The gun with the rattlesnakes is Clint Eastwood's property as of today.
The same topic has been treated in a video created by Bruno Migliorini, an italian fan and scholar of the West and western movies. We encourage you to have a look at the video (only in Italian language, but you can use Youtube automatic subtitle feature)
La vera storia dei Serpenti a Sonagli sulla pistola di Clint Eastwood*
(*The true story of the Rattlesnakes on Clint Eastwood's gun)
