Part 1: The Facts
===========

This story is about two .38 M&P 2" revolvers that are sequentially numbered, but have no other relation to each other. Its a unique story, because not only were the guns shipped six (6) years apart, but one has a very unusual marking.

In the S&WCA Journal Vol 27 No 2 Autumn 1993, there are two stories relating to one of these revolvers - specifically serial number 694105. Some years later I acquired serial number 694106. Here are two pictures of these two guns: 694105 has the black hard rubber stocks, and 694106 has the checkered walnut stocks.





From the factory letters, 694105 was shipped Aug 22, 1946, to Lou Eppinger in Michigan. He was either a distributor or a dealer. The first story in the Journal is about this gun. It explores the very late shipping date; guns that were close in serial number were shipped in 1940. 694106, which I acquired some years later, was shipped Aug 7, 1940, to the Boston PD. Based on serial number, 1940 is the expected shipping date.

The second article, by Roy Jinks, explores an unusual marking just above the trigger guard on the left side of the frame of 694105. The next picture is this one-page story.



In this story, Roy is exploring the meaning of this marking. He notes, only by way of example, that 694501 (a transposed version of 694105) was shipped to the Norwegian Air Force in Canada in 1940. While the very late ship date is not yet explained or understood for this gun, he notes that there were also other military contracts for M&P's in 1940; one is the Union of South Africa, and another (just recently uncovered) is to the Palestinian Authority in Trans-Jordan.

Roy suggests that possibly the marking was for one of these military contracts. Typically there was an over-run of frames for military contracts, and frames not used were subsequently used for civilian guns.

Here are two pictures of the mark, one a 90-degree rotation of the other.





Part 2: The Big Misunderstanding
=====================

By the way of some background information, these two revolvers were in my collection until 2004, when I "had" to downsize quite a bit. Of all the guns I sold, I regretted parting with these two, in part because I like sequentially numbered guns, and in part because I had forgotten about all the unanswered questions.

As luck would have it, I stumbled into the recent Morphy auction, and lo and behold, there they were, as one lot in the auction. When I sold them through the Amoskeag auction, they were sold as two separate lots, but it appeared that one person had bought both of them. More good luck!

The Morphy auction lot consisted of the two guns, my original factory letters, and my original copy of the S&WCA Journal containing both articles. However, their write-up contained an assumption on their part, that was very mis-leading. Here is their write-up:

"
Both revolvers feature blued finish, six shot, double action, and case colored hammer and triggers. Revolvers have matching serial numbers on frame, barrel and cylinder. One has Smith & Wesson hard rubber grips, while the other has Smith & Wesson checkered walnut grips, not numbered to the gun. Grips on both revolvers are near mint. Smith & Wesson factory letter on No. 694106 lists this gun in it's present condition; shipped on August 7, 1940, as a .38 Model 1905 fourth change, 2" barrel, shipped to Boston Police Department ballistic unit, attention Sergeant Edward J. Seibolt. The back strap is stamped "B.P.D. 118 M". Serial No. 694105 was shipped from the factory August 24, 1946, delivered to Lou Eppinger of Detroit, Michigan. The letter does not list any specifications. No mention of barrel length, finish or grips. An article by Mike Priwer in the Smith & Wesson Journal of Autumn 1993 discuses serial No. 694105 and pictures the gun with 2" barrel, round butt and rubber grips and all matching numbers. On this revolver the matching serial number is scratched on the inside of the left grip, as can be seen in the article. Article believes this revolver was made in 1938 or 1939, though it was not shipped until 1946. As to condition, No. 694105 retains approximately 85% total factory original blue with most of the wear of rear grip strip, which has turned a blue-grey patina and wear to cylinder approximately 30%, which is blending with gun metal gray. Serial No. 694106 displays approximately 75% original blue with most of the wear in the same areas and a touch more wear on the top strap.

""" If this was not interesting enough, an article by Roy Jinks also deals with No. 694105, showing a strange marking
on left trigger guard. Roy found this revolver was shipped on September 20, 1940 to the Norwegian Air Force in
Canada; one of 625 revolvers How this revolver was shipped twice from factory and has the Norwegian stamp
remain a mystery still to be uncovered. Arguably one of the more interesting pair of consecutive number
revolvers."""

This is a complete misunderstanding of Roy's story. At the time of these two stories, Roy was serving as the editor of the Journal. In proof-reading my story, he noted that I had, at one point in my story, transposed the serial number of 694105 to 694501. Roy then rechecked 694105, and found that it indeed shipped in 1946. Out of curiosity, he then checked the transposed serial number, and found that it was shipped to Norwegian Air Force in Canada.

I called Morphy, and explained all of this to their writer of the catalog description. He understood, and added the following statement to the on-line version of the description. (The hard-copy of the catalog had already been mailed out.)

""" CORRECTION: Serial number 694105 not sent to Norway, this was simply conjecture on the part of Roy reversing
number and mark not yet proven. """

All the confusion aside, I was able to re-acquire the two guns.

Part 3: The Plan
==========

While all of this back-and-forth with Morphy was going on, the re-reading nof Roy's article re-kindled my interest in the strange marking.

I have developed some more information about one of these military contracts, and will add that to this thread within the next few days,

Regards , Mike Priwer

I'm anxious to learn more.

__________________
Kevin Williams SWCA1649 HF208

Well that's interesting.

Also I find the Serial Number highly interesting as I happen to own this:













Mine does not have your mystery mark on it as far as I can see however.

Could it possibly be IA rather than an N since it looks like a left to right reversed N rather than a normal N? Just a thought. Ron

That base in Toronto while not widely known about is common knowledge to many in the surrounding areas.
It was called Little Norway and was on the Toronto Island Airport grounds first. Then moved to Muskota Airport outside Toronto.
Google Little Norway and you can find some more info on the Norwegian A/F troops that were sent there and when.
I think the AF was 2 separate at the time, Army and Navy.

I would guess the stamping on the revolver if a Norwegian Property stamp mark would be in Norwegian Language,,not English.
So Airforce would be Luft-something or other I would think.
(I flunked H/S Norwegian 101)

It's deffinetly stamped into the finished & blued metal. Not applied before final polish and blue.


When you view the stamping in the first pic ('on it's side' so to speak),
I see an 'S A' marking.
The S with sharp points like a letter Z in place of the normally smoothed curved lines of an S.
Then a A playing off the upper and middle lines of the S.
....South Africa ? The text of the letter mentions that possibility. I think SA may have been used by that Gov't at the time to ID Gov't Property.

That's all I got.

I've added Part 2 to the original post.

I still have some further information, that I will add in the next couple of days. The meaning of the mark is still unknown, however.

South Africa is a possibility for the mark. I have a very close friend who was born in Lebanon, and is a native Arab speaker. I sent him copies of the mark, on the chance that
if the mark is for the Palestine contract, maybe its one of the Arab languages. Unfortunately my friend is very seriously ill at this time, so it may be a while before I hear back.

Regards, Mike Priwer

Caleb

I've taken your one butt serial number picture, and added to a picture of the butt serial numbers of my two guns. Here it is:



When I view this picture at 100%, I see that all three serial numberings were stamped
with the same set of dies. This, of course, is what one would expect; these three frames were all serial-numbered at the same time, in the same batch. Ie, it confirms that the frame were all made at the same time, and not six years apart, which was never an expectation.

Thanks for posting these pictures. Now, if I can only find another gun with the strange
marking!

Regards, Mike

Boy, that is neat. I need to go figure out what I did with my binder full of letters in the move and see if I lettered this one.

It would be neat if mine had the marking also, I'm pretty dang curious about it. Maybe numbers 2, 3, and 4 will surface at some point here.