Several years ago an old friend gave me a Cogswell & Harrison Victory conversion. It's been on the back burner, and I've finally gotten around to having a closer look at it. This forum and others have been really helpful but I'd like to run some things past you to see if I understand correctly...

The butt S/N is straightforward enough- V62xxx.

I was told the cylinder and barrel came from a model 10. From looking at the cylinder it appears (?) to be from a pre-model 10 revolver. S/N 55xxx in a much 'older' style font. The barrel is 5", consistent with many Victory models, much less popular in civilian guns, as I understand.

Is there an obvious way to tell if the barrel has actually been replaced? The barrel flat has no markings of any kind, not sure what to make of that. Doesn't seem to make sense that the cylinder would have been replaced w/a .38 special, but the barrel was replaced w/another .38 S&W...

I'm told it's a 'shooter' with lead bullets, not so much with others- again, consistent with what I've read of that caliber/barrel combo. Looking forward to losing the Hogue grips for something more 'authentic', giving it a good scrubbing, and running a few mild wadcutters through it. ;-)

Here's a few shots, thanks for any info or opinions!

As you are aware, you've got a former British Victory model/British Service Revolver, originally from mid-1942.

Cogswell & Harrison conversions come in all kinds of shapes. Many had their barrels shortened to 4, 3.5, or 2 inches, they had their cylinders converted to .38 Special and were refinished.

Yours obviously has a standard 5 inch barrel, labeled .38 S&W if I understand correctly. Unless the under-barrel serial was buffed off prior to refinish, it's indeed a replacement. There are rumors that C&R actually got spare parts from S&W.

Details are hard to nail down, most is hearsay, but there is talk of actual .38 Special replacement cylinders. You could find out by trying to insert a .38 S&W round; if it doesn't fit because it's too fat, that would indicate a true .38 Special cylinder, unless the chambers were sleeved, but I think only Parker-Hale did that on some conversions, not C&H. I'm not sure about that serial number 55XXX on the cylinder; if that came from an actual earlier gun, it would put it before 1910. I guess they could have bought scrap parts from some dealer who parted out old revolvers.

Replacement Victory smooth wooden stocks can be found in various online venues like ebay or on Gunbroker.

And you were told correctly. With standard lead loads, it should make a nice shooter, although probably not exactly a tack driver.

Thanks, that's pretty much what I was thinking. I guess the plain barrel should have been an obvious deduction on my part! Duh...

The barrel/cylinder/extractor were done in the states a couple (few?) decades ago, so no telling what box of parts they came out of.

One thing is for certain- that old gun feels NICE when you thumb back the hammer... ;-)

One thing that occurred to me: If you are sure that the cylinder was not part of the C&H rework, but was done here later, check for a C or D letter prefix to the serial number somewhere on the cylinder face, just in case it came off a later M&P/Model 10. But I'm not even sure they still put the number on the cylinder that late.

I couldn't spot anything else, but fwiw I didn't see the '2' on the extractor star until I cropped/enlarged the pic!

Had a little fun in Photoshop...