Thank you for your information. I was quite sure that this must be an early gun and before the Land Lease began, because of the missing V prefix. Lucky enough this gun was not as described in the auction. It was offered as an .38 Special which would have been no surprise. Many of these guns which came to Germany for police use after WW II were converted to .38 Special. However, this one differed from the sellers description and is still in the original caliber .38-200. Getting empty brass is not such a big problem and I have already found a lot for sale. I'm not sure, but I think I can use my .38 Special set of dies to reload the empties. I'm happy that this gun has the commercial finish and the correct stocks with matching number on the right grip panel. I have the lanyard ring available and will mount it to the butt. The pin is still there. The poor British had to pay in gold, I paid in Euro and not very much. So I'm better of than the British in 1941!
The next step now is to find more information about the various marking.
Thanks again
Rainer