Originally Posted by wildcat83

Last year I bought a S&W Victory model marked ".38 S&W Special CTG" on right side of barrel, "U.S. Property G.H.D." on left side of top strap. S/N is V391812, and is matching on grip frame, barrel, cylinder, and extractor star; Number on inside of right grip is about 100,000 higher number; 4" barrel; finish appears to be parkerized but might be the gray fiinish--hard to tell. Question--are the grips attached likely what the original grips would have been? Also, thought I had some kind of issue, as a .38 Special round would only go into cylinder about 3/4" of the way; closer inspection I found snap rings about 3/8" wide snapped into each chamber. I was able to push these out using a .30 carbine shell and grabbed them with needle nose pliers (see photo)--what would these have been used for?

Thanks for any info on this piece of history.