I would like to find out when this revolver was made, the numbers on the cylinder and at the base of the underside of the barrel are 182259. Any help would be appreciated.

Welcome to the forum.

Your revolver is a ".32 Hand Ejector Model of 1903 - 5th Change" produced from 1910 to 1917. If the #182259 is on the bottom handle butt, it was sold around the end of 1913.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

What kind of grips does it have? Are they hard rubber or wood, and do they follow the contour of the grip frame or do they extend beyond to make a "square butt?" I've seen mostly the latter with 6" barrels although some of the former have been observed. They are great fun guns with factory level or milder loads, and if you can find one of the holsters designed for the later Model 35 S&W, they make great "woods loafing" guns for targets of opportunity. BTW, the HKS speed loaders for the modern Models 30 & 31 fit your old HE fine.

Froggie

The grips are wood and there are no numbers on the bottom of the grips there is no exposed metal so i guess they extend beyond the frame. I haven't tried taking the grips off. The holster I have for it fits it perfect (a little stiff). Thanks for the info.

You would be well served to post a couple of pictures of your revolver. It would be good to at least show a full-on side view (preferably one of each side) and a close-up of the grips to help identify them. It's beginning to sound like a Regulation Police to me, but more input is needed.

Froggie

Do your grips have the gold S&W medallions? If so, look on the back of the right side grip for a penciled number that matches the gun's serial #.

It's way to early of a serial # to be the Regulation Police but it may have the factory extended target stocks. Are there two screws attaching the grips? Is the serial # on the grip frame on the butt or the front grip strap behind the trigger guard?

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Here are some pictures(if I can get it to work)

Attached Images

image.jpg (119.4 KB, 85 views)

Attachment 150224, Attachment 150228, image.jpg

Here are some pictures.

Nice one! How did you take a photo standing on your head?

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Tom
NRA Pistol Inst

Yep, those are the target sights more commonly expected on the 22/32 also called the Heavy Frame Target and the Bekeart Model. Yours is very unusual with those grips and a long barrel. I bet it's fun to shoot, isn't it? A picture really is worth a thousand words.

Regards,
Froggie

Those two-screw stocks for I-frame (small frame) revolvers are sometimes called extension stocks and sometimes large square butt stocks. (Small square butt stocks are also known as Regulation Police stocks; they came along in 1917 and can be mounted only on a modified grip frame.)

The two screw pattern goes back to about 1900, but the earliest ones were made of hard rubber. Wooden varieties of that pattern became more frequent after about 1911. Because that set has no inset S&W medallions, they date to the 1920s, a dozen years or so after the gun was manufactured. It's pretty certain that someone with larger hands put those stocks on the gun later in its life in order to replace the small round butt stocks that would have been mounted at the factory.

That's a grand old gun with a lot of shooting potential left in it. Those early .32s of any barrel length can be quite accurate. Have fun!

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David Wilson

Thanks for all the info, and yes I had a hard time getting the pictures I wanted. still have a couple more I couldn't get to post. the screws in the handel are pretty rusty so i've been afraid to try and take it apart, i'm not sure whwre I could get replacement screws. The gun was my wife's grandfather's he lived in Hickory, NC and was a dentist. The 1913 to 1917 date range seems plausable because my father-in-law was born in 1917.

I'm there with you. This one is original nickel and has grips that are a little earlier than yours. The gun & the grips date from about 1912. Serial number is 1582xx.



The gun may have been originally shipped with the grips, but more likely the original owner bought them as a replacement and installed them when the gun was new. Don't know if it warrants it, but may letter it some day. The original finish is still nice, but the bore is a little rough. It does shoot very nicely though when I do my part!