Is this the correct holster and ammo pouch that was issued for use with the model 15's?

I have a holster like Lobo's except mine is still sealed in a box. It has the same stock no. and says .38 caliber holster underneath that. I bought it at the gunshow in Columbus Ga. last week for $15.00. The seller had several opened or unopened for sale. Now I have two AF holsters.

check out this video. good shot of the sidearm of the unit. Is it a nickle Combat Masterpiece? Stags were the grips for sure....

SAC Elite Guard

I believe after pausing it on the part showing the weapon it is a M&P..... non adjustable rear sight.

Can one of you explain how the dump pouches work? I don't know why, but I am fascinated with those things. If you put them on the belt with the snap pointed up, how do you dump out the ammo?

I have enjoyed this thread. It brings back some good memories from my days as an airman. I was at Robins AFB from NOV 73 thru Mar 76 assigned to the 52nd Bomb Wing, SAC.

I had a great first shirt that was aware of my love of handguns and although I did not have a requirement to be qualified with the handgun he would schedule me for qualifications at the base range about twice a year. Naturally, the handgun we used was the great model 15 with TT/TH. We also used the high end W-W 148 grain match wadcutter. I was a bit surprised we used the good stuff. The course of fire was the standard police qualifier with b-27, out to 50 yards with barricades at 25. Double action was fired at the closer yardages with single action at 25 and 50. I don't know if it was that way AF wide.

The chief that ran the range at Robins was a great gun guy. He became a friend and when I bought my reloading outfit he gave me a big ammo can filled to the brim with that great W-W match brass. I still have about 6 to 7 hundred of them I never got around to reloading.
I must have had at least a couple thousand.

The guys in the wing "war" room all wore either model 15's, 10's or 36's. It was a controlled entry point with electronic locks and I was sent there a couple of times to deliver some communications or something. Some of the guns were equiped with the plastic "stag" grips. Some of the guys wore them cross draw. Others strong side in a hip holster. There was snub guns and 4 inch guns. I never could figure that out because SAC was so strict about haircuts, uniforms and appearance. Would have thought all the guys in the Room would have to be uniform. Go figure.

I've always wanted one of those AF marked model 15's. I saw one once or twice at the gunshow. They were priced way beyond my ability to pay at the time. One would be hard pressed to find a more accurate and easy to shoot 4 inch revolver by any name. I have owned 3 or 4 model 15's over the years but one never stuck like glue. If I ever find a AF marked gun it will stay with me and get passed to a family member.
GOOD THREAD!

Goldenbb, there are two options when wearing the fixed type of dump pouches. Some people wore them upside down so that you could snap them open and allow the round to drop into your palm. I also saw plenty of speed strips in use. That way, you could wear them with the snaps at the top and just open it and pull the strip out.

And yes, those are the issued holsters, at least from 1981 onward.

Lobo-

That was one issued holster, but there was an earlier version that had a swivel above the holster. A lot of the guys liked that one because it made it easier to sit in vehicles.

I personally wore both Threepersons and Jordan holsters, one for a .38 and one for a .45 auto. Had a Bianchi .45 holster,. too, basically a Treepersons. All private purchase

My first was a typical sportsman's holster. Retaining strap went over the trigger guard, not the hammer. I had to buy it in downtown Denver, because the supply room was out of holsters. A classmate from AP school and I went shopping for them, and that's what we found. My Bianchi was later mail-orderd, and a Dallas shoe repair shop made a couple of holsters for less than major manufacturers charged.

In Newfoundland, no one paid much attention, and I sometimes wore a personal Colt Gold Cup .45 on duty. All our sidearms up there were .45's, as we had some agreement with the Canadians that they'd get the base and contents eventually, and the USAF wasn't eager to send our newest stuff there.

Until enough Model 15's were available, they had priority for higher ranking NCO's and officers and for combat zones. (Vietnam) Lower ranks had a mix of Victory Models, Colt Commando and Official Police guns. The Colts were far fewer.

T-Star

While not an AF marked M15 this one has got me anxiuosly awaiting my next bonus check to buy some more S&W wheel guns.

This holster worn old workhorse had some currently serving Soldiers giving it high praises this past weekend. The trigger pull just amazed them.

I am seeing a lot of new interest in revolvers amongst the gun crowd I run with.

There may have been many styles of holster by what I see on this post. We had the holster with the swivel on it, so it would lay down when in a vehicle. It was sometimes referred to as the "Barney Fife" holster. The ammo pouched were the same as pictured. If you had a new pouch issued, the rounds were almost impossible to get out. Not the best system in the world, but that was back in the mid '60s. Back in the day, we were not allowed to use any non issue holster, and at Kadena, after a weapons incident, we were not allowed to cut them down to expose the trigger guard. Seems by this post that there was more leeway in other theaters of operation.

__________________
Endeavor to persevere. <><

I have seen photos from the 60's where AP's were wearing swiven holsters. Granted, they are MUCH easier when you spend time seated in a vehicle. I like the newer issued ones. They seemed, to me, to present the gun just at the right angle for a natural draw.

This is the type of holster we used at McCoy AFB Fla. (SAC), from 1963-1967. The Security Section used the swival holster on a web belt with a dump pouch, a belt pouch for a first aid pack, which was perfect for holding a pack of Marlboros and a Zippo, and a canteen.

The Law Enforcement Section wore the same holster on an adapter for a black leather belt and cross strap and dump pouch. We also had a night stick with a leather carrier. No handcuffs, they were at Base Police Headquarters. Go figure.

The M10 shown is the type of revolver we carried. They were all beat to ****, terribly worn and stamped "Property of U.S. Navy". As I was leaving in 1967 the Security Section was being issued M15.

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Those "crossdraw holsters, "stag" grips, ascots and berets were all standard uniforms of the day of the SAC Honor Guard at SAC HQ in Offutt AFB, NE. Guess Rodenberry thought they'd look good on his show.

I was a USAF SP for 14 years before I retrained into training and Ed. The Model 15 was extremely accurate. I shot on the PACAF Rifle/Pistol Team in 1980, which for the revolver was a modified PPC course.

I too was able to earn a Bronze Leg Match Medal years later in Minot.

Some of the M-15's in service had TT/TH, some did not. Some of the M-15's were polished blue, but as they were turned in for arsenal refitting, they came back parkerized.

Does anybody else remember the PGU-12 ammo? We were issued that in the mid 70-s...the bullet was set deep into the cartridge case, causing a compressed loading. Don't know why. SOMEBODY thought it was a good idea.

It was my understanding that the PGU-12B round was an attempt at a +P .38 Special round to increase the effectiveness of the .38 Sp round. I do not know all the ballistic particulars of the round but it was definetely a high pressure round. The first ones I saw was in the late 1970s while I was assigned to AFOSI Headquarters in DC. I was an instructor at the OSI Academy and was the firearms instructor and the Marksmanship Manager for AFOSI. Out issue handgun at the time was the S&W M-36 with a 3" barrel. We found that the PGU-12B ammo was shooting the M-36s loose in very short fashion. We noticed it first on the Academy guns as they were shot much more than the guns in the field. We sent several to the Lackland AFB Marksmanship gunsmiths and they advised that the PGU-12B not be used in the M-36.
That recommendation led to the ultimate adoption of an Officer's sized 1911 built for OSI by the Lackland smiths. Keep shootin'

I used the swivel holster with wire hangers for the Victory Model stateside and the M15 overseas. At Ubon, Thailand I worked security at TOC most of the time, and was allowed to use a locally made spring-tensioned cross draw holster on a web belt in 66-67. (I also had some definitely non-Geneva convention Keith type hand loads in the gun that no one knew about, along with extra ammo.)

So what was authorized was not always what got used.

I see reference to a 'Bronze Leg" match here. What was that, I never heard of that during my tour, 66-70.

__________________
Endeavor to persevere. <><

[QUOTE That recommendation led to the ultimate adoption of an Officer's sized 1911 built for OSI by the Lackland smiths. [/QUOTE]

And what a piece of work that was.

And what a piece of work that was. [/QUOTE]

What was wrong with it?

Thanks,
Kevin Williams

__________________
Kevin Williams SWCA1649 HF208

Thank you, sir. We never SHOT the PGU-12...we just CARRIED it. Always qualified with Federal 148 grain match wad cutters. That was the way they did things, back then.

Hmmm...a +p round nose full metal jacket. Don't think they quite understood terminal ballistics back then, did they?

A young man who worked for me in SAC cross trained into OSI. One night at his house for dinner, he showed me his little cut down 1911. He hated it, I was intrigued.

I understand OSI is carrying the SIG P-229 now. Oh, and hey! When are you guys gonna get a show like your Naval Counterparts? )

What was wrong with it?

Thanks,
Kevin Williams[/QUOTE]

I was a CATM instructor (Combat Arms Training & Maintenance)in the Air Force. We trained the cops and the OSI as well as everyone else that needed to qualify with a weapon...also did the maintenance on the weapons. The 1911A1s that the gunsmith shop made up for the OSI were chopped full sized guns as the Colt Officer's Model didn't exist yet. I remember them having ambi safety levers attached with eyeglass screws that were constantly coming out, and magazines that were cut off at the bottom with a welded on floorplate that weren't always interchangable between guns. They weren't very reliable on the range at least and some agents had a hard time qualifying with them. The little .45 was replaced with the M9 and later the M-11, which is basically a Sig 228.

KCMitch, the leg match was an NRA sanctioned match for military (or at least USAF) personnel. They would make an announcement of the date and time and give a contact number.

You signed up and showed up. They provided the weapons and ammo. The Top 10% of shooters would be awarded the "USAF Excellence in Competition Pistol Shot Badge" (whew! what a mouthful) and, if I remember right 3 points towards a silver badge and eventually a gold badge. But those matches you had to seek out and shoot at your own expense. An excellent program that was rarely used, even back in the late 70's/early 80's. The USAF, which used to have a top-drawer shooting/competition program back in the 50's and 60's, stop putting a lot of emphasis in it by then. Sure hope things have changed.

The holster and ammo pouch pictured above were used by USAF Security Police in the 70's and 80's.

The AFOSI modified .45's were WW II surplus pistols purchased from the Navy. The model 36 in use was deemed to be not powerful enough, but the Air Force didn't want to spend $300 per weapon to purchase 357 mags. They bought the surplus M1911's for $80 each and had the armorers at Lackland take 1" off the barrel and butt. We were issued one modified magazine that fit the new cut down weapon, and two full sized mags that stuck out the bottom of the butt of the weapon. We put shoe goo on the bottom of the full sized mags to keep the mag from riding up and jamming, and to protect out suits from wear.

Mine was made by Singer, the sewing machine people. I recently found out that these are rare and only 500 were made for the military. The short modified mags held 5 rounds.

My weapon jammed every 2 shots consistantly, and was totally unreliable.

S&W model 15-3, circa 1969

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I had the opportunity to carry all but the 1911 during my USAF Security days, '88-'96

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I know this is an old thread, but since it has been revived, I thought I would post pics of my two U.S.A.F. Model 15's I bought last year. I have the original stocks for both guns, but I think they look much better with the Target stocks on them.

Very nice. I have my original grips for my 15-3 but prefer the Targets. Again, Very Nice.

Looking at he guns, I think the non-football stocks should go on the 15-1, and the football stocks should go on the 15-2. What do you all think?

Older grips on older revolver, just my opinion.

Depending on the individual frames and stocks, one may fit a particular gun better. That's how I'd decide.

If both sets of grips fit both guns well, older with older.

Personally, I use either Pachmayr Presentation or Uncle Mike's rubber grips on most revolvers.
The exception is when I've used smooth rosewood S&W presentation grips, sometimes with Tyler adaptor.

I was issued a model 15 with target hammer and target trigger .. it was parkerized .. sort of disappointed I didn't get a pretty blue steel version .. Carswell AFB TX - Security Police (SAC) .. shot expert on first qualification and never wanted a different gun .. sure do miss that one ... now have three of them and looking for one with USAF property stamped on the upper frame ...

Would pay premium price for a Security Police Commemorative too if S&W ever produced one to SAC specifications

As a 2Lt in the USAF medical corp. (Hospital Laboratory Service Officer), I shot a model 15 to qualify in MIMSO (Military Indoctrination for Medical Service Officers). I shot all my rounds with a perfect score and then helped the range officers to teach Nurses etc. how to shoot. I started to get call Wyatt Earp in the hospital after that. LOL Nice gun even with the magna grips.