[mdmorrissey]

I stumbled across this one and am a bit stumped. It looks to me like it has a US Ordnance flaming bomb proof mark? No other Brit NP, "England", etc proofs which would indicate it was released from Brit service to the commercial market. So it would almost seem like it passed from Brit service to US military hands without passing through the Brit commercial market. Has an offsetting flaming bomb stamp on the opposite side of the barrel section. Has anyone seen or heard of something like this? I don't think the US used these at all during WWII?

 

[Absalom]

In my semi-educated opinion, it’s a fluke. As you say, these were never issued to US troops; in fact the British were so short of these, their standard issue, that they needed hundreds of thousands of secondary revolvers from Webley, S&W, and Colt.

Perhaps it was found at some military installation in the US tucked away in some larger piece of equipment, a tank or ship, coming back from overseas after war’s end, and handed over to the local ordnance people for lack of a better idea, who stamped it because that’s what ordnance people do.

I’m totally making that up, but that’s the only realistic scenario, short of a straightforward fake stamp, which makes sense.

 

[mdmorrissey]

Perhaps it was found at some military installation in the US tucked away in some larger piece of equipment, a tank or ship, coming back from overseas after war’s end, and handed over to the local ordnance people for lack of a better idea, who stamped it because that’s what ordnance people do.

Yes, it is kind of a strange bird. I doubt any faker would go through the hassle of stamping this (not a high end type of weapon). If it had the Brit NP / "release from service" stamps, then I would lean more towards the faker scenario as it wouldn't make any sense to have been surplused by the Brits years after the war and then get a US Ordnance stamp. The fact that it doesn't have any release from service stamps, would kind of jive with your thoughts of it ending up in US hands somehow and getting stamped as such.

I didn't think that it was any kind of reverse Lend Lease - would any GI want to trade in his Colt 1911a1 for one of these!

 

[martin08]

It looks sort of cool.

 

[Absalom]

Another off-the-wall idea: Maybe a sample gun sent over for ammunition testing?

I would think the US manufactured revolver ammo like anything else for the British under Lend-Lease. I have no specific info, but I do know for a fact that large manufacturers with military contracts, like Western Cartridge/Olin, had huge armories with samples of the different types for which they produced ammunition. It would make sense to get foreign types through Ordnance channels.

 

[mdmorrissey]

I had my chance to get my hands on this gun and wanted to share the additional info found once in hand. So the gun is in overall nice shape which would suggest it wasn't service carried much, which in turn would suggest that it made the transfer to Brit to US hands outside of a Tommy to GI swap. Both the frame and barrel group have the US Ordnance flaming bomb stamp and there are no Brit NP (sold out of service) stamps, nor are there any import stamps. The issue however, is that the barrel has bulged out on both sides of the frame, plus there is a loss/discolorization of the finish (hard to pick up in photos, but on the last one I added, you can see the outline of the bulge) which IMHO would suggest: 1. Bubba got his hands on this and used some overloaded round to try and shoot it since he couldn't find any Brit surplus rounds, or 2. US Ordnance did some testing on this and ended up shooting something too powerful in it?

 

[Yoebuff]

hmmm. Interesting to say the least. I have my suspicions regarding it. We know the US did not use this weapon, so no real reason for it to be Ordinance proofed. The fact the barrel is bulged maybe the clue. I think this could have been an unusable gun due to the buldged barrel and someone wanted to try their hand at using their bomb mark for future purposes. Even if the mark was legit, I find it highly suspect that they would have needed to place more then one Ordinance stamp on the gun. from the pics, it appears they are differrent stamps in mutiple places. just my thoughts.

 

[Absalom]

Do you know the serial number of the gun (with letter prefix)? It’s visible on the cylinder, but too blurry to be certain. Also, the other two need to match, often not the case.