This 1835 invention, featuring a pinfire mechanism, followed the pioneering work of Jean Samuel Pauly in 1808-1812.
The Lefaucheux cartridge had a conical bullet, a cardboard powder tube, and a copper base that incorporated a primer pellet.
[3] In 1846, Benjamin Houllier improved on the Lefaucheux system by introducing an entirely metallic cartridge of copper brass.
[2] In 1858, the Lefaucheux pistolet-revolver became the first metallic-cartridge revolver to be adopted by a national government, becoming the standard sidearm of the French Navy.
[4][5] It is thought likely that the gun with which the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh fatally shot himself in a field in 1890 was a 7 mm Lefaucheux pinfire revolver.