Originally Posted by DCWilson

Welcome to the Forum!

Serial numbers for that model passed 400000 in the mid '20s, so that one probably left the factory around 1920-22. I'm not sure it has been refinished. The photos are overexposed, but it looks to me as though someone took a gun with a failing blue finish and just rubbed it with steel wool and tried to make it look better without necessarily making it look new. There seems to be shallow pitting everywhere, so possibly the gun was completely covered in thin rust at some point. Note that the sideplate screws seem unmangled; they may never have been out of the gun. Note too that the sideplate to frame fit is ungullied. That indicates that if the gun was refinished, it was done by someone who knew how to do it sensitively.

I don't understand the dark patch visible on the forward top of the cylinder in the right side photo of the gun. There is also a tiny black spot just above the retaining pin in the barrel underlug. Could those be remnants of the original blue?

As others noted, the barrel has definitely been cut, probably from six inches to a little less than four.

If the action is tight, there is no reason not to shoot that gun. Standard loads of .38 Special are fine, but +P loads are probably best avoided. The gun won't detonate, but why stress a century old gun unnecessarily? I usually shoot low pressure wadcutter loads in my older .38s.

I may be way off base in my understanding of the photos and the nature of the finish. Let some more opinions pile up and see if others agree. I could be just another average old guy with bad eyes.