[QUOTE=Ivan the Butcher;141532078]in the 1980's and early 90's, I would buy these "Junk" 25's for $10, and they usually were broken but came with a partial box of ammo. Normally a spring was the problem and Firing pin was #2, repair parts ran $3-5, I would fire 3 shots to verify function and sell for $35 with the ammo. At that price one never lasted past payday!

Also had 2 or 3 left in apartment over the years, I came up with ammo and sold them the same way!

I have only met one person in my lifetime that actually reloaded 25 ACP!


I remember these cheap little guns were everywhere years ago. I would pick them up cheap too, often from some of the poor money managers I worked with. Really didn't run into that many broken ones, many had only been shot a couple times and more than once I got them with a still full box of ammo too. Sometimes sold them back to a guy when he had more money from his latest paycheck left... with a small storage fee so to speak LOL.

The few broken ones I did see usually needed a firing pin or a magazine ...... Some people can't leave the feed lips alone and it's worse if they dropped the mag and stepped on it.

Oh yes, need to add I do reload the little 25. I have a box I set up and shoot through to recover the fired cases, out in the open they are usually gone for good otherwise. My own tastes run to a little higher quality than those old cheapies though. I like classic vest pocket guns like the old Colts, Ortgies, Mauser and others as well as the better later guns like the Beretta.

Back in the 80's, I had a group of friends that a Raven .25 floated around. We would get together for range time and show and tell. Afterwards there would be a few beers and maybe some "horse trading". Sooner or later would be heard"I'll throw in a 25 auto and a box of ammo". Became a running joke. I think there was an unloved .22 Jennings in the mix also.

Didn't know of it until I was grown and out of my parent's house, but my mom carried a little .25acp Astra Firecat in her purse for years.

Neat little mouse-gun that lives in my safe now.

Don

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Laus Deo! <><

Some are more identifiable than others. Mystery vest pocket pistol

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Release the Kraken

Yours looks like the twin to my mystery 25. Mine is #8561 but there no tapped holes at the back of the frame like yours.

Given the proximity to Fort Knox the notion it might have traveled from Germany in some GI's hold baggage is a distinct possibility.

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Whenever discussions of cartridge effectiveness come up, I revert to my career. In 30 years as a Baltimore firefighter, I responded to hundreds of shootings, and the two things I learned were that shot placement is everything, and I don't ever want to be shot with ANYTHING. Once a bullet enters a human body, all bets are off.

In the specific case of the .25 ACP...some years ago in East Baltimore an old man saw some kids vandalizing his car across the street. He opened his front door, cranked off a couple rounds from a .25...and killed one of them.

And then there was the time we responded to a shooting in a housing project near our station. Our patient was the intended victim of an execution with a .25, and the shooter had the pistol aimed right at the middle of his forehead...but at the moment the assailant squeezed the trigger, the victim jerked his head to the left. The bullet pierced his scalp but not his skull, skidded around subcutaneously to the right side of his head, and left him with a huge hematoma over his right temple. He was conscious, alert...and complaining of a bad headache.

Here is my Colt .25 auto Vest Pocket with the required flap holster. I also have a Beretta 950 .25 auto, but no pictures at the moment.
Larry

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Miss My Buddy crsides!!

Years ago I mentioned at work that I have found a Jennings 25 under the seat of a car I had bought. Next day a guy brought in a steel framed Italian copy of a 36 Colt, in good shape, and asked if I wanted to trade even up. I asked why and he explained that a couple nights ago a noise on the back porch woke him up. He went to investigate, turned out to be a raccoon, and remembered the only firearm he had in the house was a percussion revolver. Wanted to make the trade so he would have a cartridge firearm available. I made the trade, including trading half a box of ammo for a handful of lead balls and partial can of FFFG. Actually felt a little guilty for a day or two.

For many years my mother, a Virginia probation officer, carried a 1908 Colt 25 as her duty weapon. My daughter has that gun.

Also, for many years my Grandfather, a Texas Judge, kept an Italian made 25 in a knit glove in his judicial robes. It spent nights on his night stand. My son has that gun.

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Randy
Provenance nerd

I was in a gun store one day in the late 1980s and on a table there dozens of boxes of Raven 25s in blue and chrome for $39.95 each. I bought a blue one and never shot it beyond 20 feet and it was not very accurate at that range but it was perfectly reliable if my thumb didn't touch the slide or push the safety on. Kept it for many years and shot many boxes of ammo through it and then sold it at a gunshow for what I paid for it.

Mine came via ma-in-law #1, and allegedly was a bringback by one of her brothers from the ETO. I didn't believe a word of it, but having seen yours...

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Release the Kraken

A lot of people knock the Raven .25s as pure junk. Lemme tell you about mine. Years ago I saw an add locally for a Raven .25. Said it didn't work, make offer. I went and took a look at it. Guy said he had taken it apart to clean it and it just wouldn't feed afterwards. I gave him $20 for it and took it home.
I then disassembled the gun, turned the firing pin back around the way it was supposed to go and it worked like a top ever since.
I showed it to my best friend who immediately insisted that I sell it to him. I gave it to him for what I had in it.
A few years later, he passed away. While going through his stuff for his wife, I came across that Raven again. I gave his wife $25 and took it home. I have no intentions of selling it again.
Say what you will about the Raven .25. Yes, its cheaply made junk. No, its not particularly accurate. But the darned things are incredibly reliable. They just refuse to jam and go bang every single time. That's what you want in a defensive gun.

I have never owned a Raven, but have been offered several for cheap prices. I have also read that they are tops for reliable functioning. Some contend that they are "inaccurate" (whatever that means) but so what? If you can make a COM hit at 10 feet, what greater "accuracy" could you want or need? For a long time I carried a Galesi .25 as my pocket pistol. It was also very reliable, but only with the CCI 50 grain FMJ ammo. And that was just fine with me.

I have to confess to being the owner of 4 of the little 25acp mouse guns.
A Bauer Baby Browning stainless steel clone
A Colt Vest Pocket 25 that I saved from the scrap heap,
An Astra Cub (a.k.a. Colt Jr) and
An Iver Johnson TP25 that I picked up cheap just because it was so similar to the TP22 that I like so much.

The only one I have pictures of at the moment is the little Bauer.

I have to admit I have been jonesing for and on the lookout for one of those little Walther #9's. I think that is probably about the smallest "standard" cartridge firearm ever put into regular production...

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Send lawyers, guns & money...

People love to diss the .25 auto, and by extension the .22LR based on mythology and gun lore. Yet, some of the most high-profile killings and maimings in history were carried out using one or the other.
In my 32 year career in health care I've never seen ONE person show up with a bullet wound created by a .22LR or .25ACP who laughed it off as inconsequential. MOST who come bursting through the doors of an ED with a GSW are already in shock and near death - REGARDLESS of caliber used!
Why does it matter that the gun forum world is rife with those who think it's cool to discount the terminal effectiveness of so-called "mouse" calibers? It matters because that is PRECISELY what floods emergency rooms across the United States on a nightly basis! Perhaps had they NOT read that a .22 or .25 can't hurt anyone, they MIGHT have made a different choice when they saw one pointed in their direction!

Many years ago, when I was a just turned 21 year old, I wanted a Raven 25, or an RG-22 in the worst way. Either of them had the one essential feature I absolutly had to have.

They were cheap...and I was broke...but I still wanted a handgun.

I think they both sold for about $30.00 at the local A&N stores. I really wanted a Smith and Wesson Model 28 I'd seen at the G.E.M. store, but that was about $130, as best I remember. Might as well have been a million dollars...I had about as much chance of coming up with that as $130.00. Could you actually write a check for $130.00?

But I could at least imagine a situation where I caught some overtime, or no unexpected expenses came up and I MIGHT be able to stash away $30.00. Maybe.

I never did though. But those little Ravens and RG's kept the dream alive until some years later, when I did finally get a Model 19. A lot of handguns have come and gone since then.

Now I want to find a Raven...

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John 3:16 .

Back when concealed had to be concealed I carried an Astra Cub .22 Short many miles for many years. I never shot anybody but at hog killing time one shot in the brain and the hog fell deader than 4 oclock. Larry

[QUOTE=CajunBass;141546822

Now I want to find a Raven...[/QUOTE]

Bird or gun? Larry

Worked at a "cop shop" gun store in the early 90s and we sold a lot of the Ravens and Lorcins for somewhere around $40-$60. There was another manufacture, about the same quality but I forgot the name now. The buyers ranged the gamut from that's all they could afford but practicing their right to self defense, went with what they could. Good on them and I never judged when selling them one, even though the shelves were lined with Sigs, Glocks, HK's and more. We even sold a few to cops, used as pocket carry back ups. Most went with PPK's, J frames or Sig P230s but some just couldn't find the coin to justify those and still wanted something, so the Ravens filled the bill.

Years ago being more into Colts at the time, I found this little gem in a pawn shop while on the Outer Banks. Guy had bucoo very nice cameras, which is what I was looking for, but couldn't resist this little guy in its original box, with docs, and a box of vintage Geco ammo, with exactly 9 rounds missing. Anyway for OTD for a Benjamin & a Grant...why I always carry cash when hitting any pawn shop anywhere. Bought a high end digital camera too so he sure didn't lose anything.

Got home did a little research and found that after the import ban in 68, Colt made what you see below for only 2 years (1971 to 1973) in Hartford, CT. Colt started these with s/n OD 82601 in 1971 and ended with s/n OD 120471 in 1973, so approx 38000 of these guys..not a bad production run.

Note the GECO ammo box doesn't mention Colt.

Got out of Colts and sold this one as you see it for $450 locally. Just my opinion, but grandsons Crossman pellet gun seems to be about equal in recoil (or lack thereof)

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Charlie B
SWCA#3083, SWHF#570

It might be from this manufacturer: Iraola Y Salaverria or look here for more info:
https://www.cornellpubs.com/free-fil...dels-codes.pdf

I only have one I keep in hidden in my office. I'll toss it in my pocket sometimes when im running out the door.

Beretta 21a in .25acp