Prop guns are real weapons loaded with blanks and verified usually
Westerns use pedersoli and pietta and uberti and Colt etc remakes same as we would
And some originals too
Loaded with low charge blanks
Someone got a live round in
They do use live rounds for affect too
And on occasion a blank has wax or plastic cap over the powder and it can get stuck and when fired next it fires that at decent velocity
But that’s not what happened here
This was a live round
And photographer was looking at him for straight on shot I’d guess
Tragic
Pretty girl
Someone earlier asserted that the weapon involved is a single-action revolver. I asked how that was known. If it is assumed just because the film genre is a "western," then that is rather short-sighted. There are "westerns" at the turn of the century (think: The Son) where semi-automatics (thank you, Mr. Browning! Also, Mauser and others made semi-automatic pistols during the late 1890's) were used.
Plus, the "revolver" could also be an exotic revolver, such as a LeMat used in the American Civil War (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LeMat_Revolver ; https://www.cabelas.com/shop/en/pietta-lemat-cavalry-44-cal-black-powder-revolver), if the movie teller wanted to give the main character (?Baldwin) an "edgy" gun, either a semi-automatic or a LeMat.