I saw what I believed to be a 38-44 heavy duty, 4"bbl, blue, chambered in .38special at a friend's home tonight.

It had a humpback hammer, fixed sights with half moon front blade, ejector shroud, last patent date was 1914 (top of barrel), five digit numerical serial number, five screw frame. Very few freckles, couple holster rubs on the blue finish. Seemed to lockup nicely. Light single action, smooth DA.

How rare are these old gals?

No photos - my bad.

I think you meant humpback hammer rather than trigger, but even so there is room for confusion about hammer shape because the prewar N-frame hammer had a kind of "humpy" look to it that allows it to be misidentified on occasion.

There were about 11000 HDs made in the 1930s before wartime contracts took them out of production, so you can't call them rare. But the demand for them is high, and 11000 won't go very far when everybody wants one (or two, or three, or...). So they command high prices even when well worn, and very high prices when in near-new condition.

Those of us who have one or more of these massive old fixed-sight .38s just love them. I think the five-inch barrels were most common among the prewar guns, but four-inch and 6.5-inch barrels were also available. They were produced after WWII as well, but it doesn't sound like you have one of those. Postwar guns had an S prefix to the serial number.

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David Wilson

Well, if it is a 4" barrel with patent dates on top of the barrel, then the barrel has been cut as the 4" barrels did not have any address/patent info on the top of the barrels as there was not room to roll them. The 4 and 6.5" HDs are more scarce than the 5" guns are. You did not indicate if the gun has service grips or magnas. The serial number would help date it. Like Dave said, the hammer can be confusing as I first thought the regular pre war style hammer was a humpback until someone showed one to me.

Hope this helps,
Bill

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38-44heavyduty.com

Thanks all -

The lettering on the barrel consisted of two lines of printing with three patent dates on the second line (ending with the 1914 date) - the markings seem evenly spaced between the rear of the front blade sight and leading edge of the frame and did not, at first inspection, seem like a shortened barrel.

Can't tell you which grips were on the gun. These were wooden, checkered with the silver medallions at almost the very top of the grip panel.

If you measured the barrel from the muzzle to the leading edge of the frame, you might think it was a four-inch barrel. But you should measure from the muzzle to the face of the cylinder. I'm wondering if the gun you saw was actually a five-inch barrel. That would leave room for the full patent date rollmark. (I should have thought of that in the first place, and I'm glad Bill caught it and brought it up for discussion.)

Those sound like service grips to me.

Just for discussion, here's a well used 5" prewar HD (shipped 1932) with service grips: did the gun look like this?




This is a humpback hammer installed on a different .38/44 with adjustable sights.

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David Wilson

Top picture - same grips. Five inch barrel too - I remember remarking about the depth of the forcing cone and the noticeable gap below it between the front cylinder edge and the rear edge of the frame. I'll try to get all/most of the serial number.

which hammer does your gun have?

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38-44heavyduty.com

In the two photos provided by Mr. Wilson, the hammers appear different from each other. The hammer on gun in the top picture is what is on this gun - the serial number is 477XX.

That serial number points to a 1936 ship date for the gun. The humpback hammer became available as an option about a year later (though of course it could have been easily installed later in a Heavy Duty .38/44 already in use).

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David Wilson

Traded into this 38/44 HD, just sharing. It has been factory refinished sometime in '72

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If you are going to XX out the SN, you might want to do it on the letter.

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Guy
SWHF #474 SWCA LM#2629

Wow - according to that first photo, your gun has the extremely rare "floating front sight" and the almost-never-seen "cantilevered top strap" options.

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Do or do not. There is no try.

I don't really know why I picked this one up a few months ago. I'm sure I bought it too early, but it was in such nice shape, and I'm a sucker for diamond Magna grips. The fact that it had the box with it didn't hurt. I have been told the serial number (S-64496) indicates 1946, so it must have been fairly soon after the return to civilian production.







I don't think it's been fired outside the factory, but there is no way to prove that. If it has it wasn't very often, and I haven't fired it yet. Haven't decided if I'm going to or not.

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John 3:16 .

Or on the stocks also


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Kris
OGCA, NRA LM

You said it might never have been fired outside of the factory,and as old as it is,that a treasure in my mind's thinking. And it's a beautiful revolver. Thanks for sharing!

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Life is short,live it fully.

Pls explain for the lay person, floating sight & cantilevered ?
TIA

The closest SN I list to S64496 is S636xx shipping in 7/46. But I also show two lower SNs as shipping in 1947. Allegedly, S62486 was the first N-frame made after the end of WWII. Yours could have shopped in either 1946 or 1947.

He was joking. If you look at your pics again, you can see the red reflection from the surrounding area, and it's making the front sight look as if it's floating above the barrel, and the top strap looks like it's not connected toward the front, above the barrel/cylinder gap, thus, cantilevered.

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