I thought it would be good to post a photo to show the front sight and how it came out to bring conclusion to this thread.
In the end, I thinned a nickel down to smooth on both sides, making it .055 thick. From that I filed sort of an SAA-shaped sight.
Then I stacked up a couple Dremel cutoff discs and cut a groove in the barrel to accept the sight. (This photo is of a different barrel but it shows how it was done. On the barrel for this pistol, I started the groove right at the hole for the front sight.)
A little silver solder and bingo, it was done. A little too tall but that gives room to sight it in with a file. This photo was taken before I cleaned the excess solder off and polished it up some.
I decided I didn't want an 1851 anyway so I made a few other modifications and turned it into a Dance which is covered in another thread. After sighting it in, it came out quite nice, a little taller than an original but right on the money with the loads I wanted to use. The final shape I made as close to an original Dance sight as I could get, allowing for the additional height. Notice that where I filled the barrel lug dovetail isn't even noticeable.