After reading some of Glen Fryxell's work on casting handgun bullets, it seems as though bullet hardness was very subjective, especially before WWII. Apparently back in the days of Elmer Keith and Phil Sharpe, the bullets that they thought were hard were actually soft by today's standards.
My question is, say I want to hunt whitetail with a heavy .38-44 load (and I do), which would be better, the BHN I am likely to get with an air cooled bullet made from WW's and moving at say 1200-1300 fps or a water quenched bullet for the same velocity? I also want to hunt with my .41 Magnum but I plan on keeping that a moderate load no more than 1200 fps, so the same question applies to that. Am I better off giving up some of the BHN hardness for some extra expansion vs penetration?

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