Colt .45 revolver owned by Patton fetches $75G at auction

A Colt. 45 revolver owned by General George Patton sold for $75,000 at auction. (Profiles in History)

A Colt .45 revolver once owned by General George S. Patton sold for $75,000 at auction in Los Angeles Thursday.

Profiles in History, which conducted the auction, had expected the working firearm to fetch over $60,000. The Colt .45 Model 1873 single-action revolver with distinctive stag horn grip was acquired by the famous World War II general around 1928.

The gun, owned by Patton until his death in 1945, is often considered to be a version of his famous ivory-handled Colt. 45, which is on display at The General George Patton Museum and Center of Leadership in Fort Knox, KY. The weapon’s $75,000 price tag includes the buyer’s premium.

A host of other historic manuscripts and artifacts were also auctioned, including General William Sherman’s final demand for General Joseph Johnston’s surrender of the Confederate Army in 1865, which sold for $100,000. General Robert E. Lee’s General Order No.9, his signed farewell to his vanquished army, sold for just over $90,000.

A selection of rare and intimate letters from Albert Einstein on everything from God to his son's geometry studies and a little toy steam engine were also auctioned Thursday for more than $420,000, far exceeding Profiles in History's pre-sale estimates.

The 27 Einstein letters were in both English and German and written longhand and on a typewriter.

Amassed over decades by a private collector, the letters represented one of the largest caches of Einstein's personal writings ever offered for sale.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.