Confession time - let's see those .25 autos

LOL...use to have 4-5 Colt .25s my Dad gave me..... folks use to bring them into the Station.... with the story "This was my Dad's/Grandfather's I don't want it....here get rid of it!!!!" Pre-68 the officers just took them home.

Still have one "anib" with the box, no docs........ and a small full flap holster........

The others were my original trading fodder......
 
Guilty

aF0JrFM.jpg
 
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I don't have one at present, but H&R made a semiauto in .25 ACP long ago, in the WWI era. They must be quite unusual, as I have never seen one. Has anyone? It looked much like the British Webley semiauto. I once had one of those H&R pistols in .32 back in the days when I was a U.S. pocket pistol collector. There were once many european .25 ACP pistols, even a Russian one, the Korovin. Usually described as being the very first semiautomatic pistol made in Russia.

One could specialize in being a .25 pistol collector, and there may even be some of those. But it would be very difficult to find examples of every .25 pistol made. I think there were even some .25 revolvers.
 
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Back when I was a kid, the guard at the local bank carried a .25 auto (I think a Colt) in a belt holster. I guess he thought it was big enough. He usually wore a bow tie and had a cigar in his mouth. You could do that back then. That had to be a really boring job just standing around in the bank lobby every day.

I remember seeing a .25 auto in a belt holster being carried by a department store guard. It looked odd to me even back in my pre-gun days.
 
I admit to a fondness of itty bitty mouse guns. :D

DSCN0254_zpsmypujlos.jpg


Ok, ok, yeah the Walther is a .22. But it fits with the theme here. :rolleyes:

The PSP-25 I bought many years ago when I had a need for something very discrete. These are extremely well made licensed copies of the "Baby" Browning. This one has traveled many a mile in my pocket and has never missed a beat.

The Colt I got from another forum member a couple of years ago. Wonderful little gun. Quite accurate and totally reliable.

A Raven? Really? Well there's a little story that goes along with this one. I saw this on Armslist a few years ago. the owner said it wouldn't feed and to make an offer. I ended up giving him $25 for. I got it home, took it apart, turned the firing pin around the way its supposed to go and its run like a top ever since. :rolleyes:
A week or so later, my buddy, Bob dropped by and I showed it to him. He asked what I was going to do with it? I told him I'll likely just sell it and try to make a couple of bucks. He immediately lit up. "I want it! How much?"
I offered to just give it to him, but he insisted on paying for it. So I let him give me my $25 back and it was his.
Bob passed away recently. I was helping his wife go through the safe, when I ran across it again. I knew I just had to have it back. I gave the wife 25 bucks and now its back in my safe.

Speaking of Bob's wife, among the guns she has chosen to keep for herself, two are .25s.
First is a little Taurus TP-25. She likes the small size and the easy loading pop-up barrel.
The other is a 98% Belgian made Baby Browning in the box. I told her that if she ever takes a notion to sell, I call DIBS! ;)
 
This thread is starting to be depressing ... :( There are so many nice .25's out there - especially the Colt's - and I have only one, a little bit scratchy Beretta. I had (I think it was) a Sterling many, many years ago but sold it because it was so hard to find ammo. Now, all of the stores around here carry it - I even found a box of Gold Dots at All Shooter's Tactical. Isn't there someone out there in SWF, who owns multiple .25's, that feels sorry for me, and is welling to sell one? I promise to wrap it with only one pretty red rubber band ... ;)
 
I admit to a fondness of itty bitty mouse guns. :D

DSCN0254_zpsmypujlos.jpg


Ok, ok, yeah the Walther is a .22. But it fits with the theme here. :rolleyes:

The PSP-25 I bought many years ago when I had a need for something very discrete. These are extremely well made licensed copies of the "Baby" Browning. This one has traveled many a mile in my pocket and has never missed a beat.

The Colt I got from another forum member a couple of years ago. Wonderful little gun. Quite accurate and totally reliable.

A Raven? Really? Well there's a little story that goes along with this one. I saw this on Armslist a few years ago. the owner said it wouldn't feed and to make an offer. I ended up giving him $25 for. I got it home, took it apart, turned the firing pin around the way its supposed to go and its run like a top ever since. :rolleyes:
A week or so later, my buddy, Bob dropped by and I showed it to him. He asked what I was going to do with it? I told him I'll likely just sell it and try to make a couple of bucks. He immediately lit up. "I want it! How much?"
I offered to just give it to him, but he insisted on paying for it. So I let him give me my $25 back and it was his.
Bob passed away recently. I was helping his wife go through the safe, when I ran across it again. I knew I just had to have it back. I gave the wife 25 bucks and now its back in my safe.

Speaking of Bob's wife, among the guns she has chosen to keep for herself, two are .25s.
First is a little Taurus TP-25. She likes the small size and the easy loading pop-up barrel.
The other is a 98% Belgian made Baby Browning in the box. I told her that if she ever takes a notion to sell, I call DIBS! ;)

Actually the Walther TPH was also produced in .25acp. Quite scarce and hard to find these days. Not sure if the stainless versions were, but the blued ones definitely. I once knew a Deputy Sheriff that carried one in his boot. Back in those days, LEO's were the only ones that could get them. Neat little guns, but suffer the same lousy double action trigger as the PP models. :rolleyes:
 
I'll fess up to keeping two mouse guns. ( There were others but lack of purpose and/or quality got them traded off long ago.) The first, is a Bauer .25. The Bauer is basically a high quality copy of the Baby Browning in machined stainless. It's quality and "coolness" keeps it in the fold but it rarely makes it to the range these days. Admittedly though, it disappears in a pocket.
The other is not a .25 but worth mentioning . It is a similar vintage Jennings 22 that my (then) fiancee bought me some 31 years ago. Like the OP, just showing that little Jennings got me out of a bad situation once. Given it's history, it has a place in the collection.
Here is a picture of them both. Funny, I used to think the J-22 was tiny. The Bauer 25 is dwarfed by it here.
 
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For a little lesson on the lethality of the .25 ACP, go to Wilipedia and look up Major General Vasily Bhlokin of the Red Army.

Having lotsa time on my hands, I did a search on the Google - using those terms pointed to a Wiki article on Stalin's purges. But, trying a find on the web page didn't show his name. I'm guessing he was one of the executioners, maybe, or he survived an executioners shot from a .25? Interesting that the Russians (apparently) had access to .25 autos and ammo ...

Edited to add: I should have gone to Wikipedia itself, as DWalt suggested. Blokhin was a horrible creature of a human and awful story! Wiki spelled his name as 'Blokhin' versus 'Bhlokin' ... damn Russkies! I was reasonably familiar with the Katyn massacre, before, but did not realize that one person was the primary murderer. And, Stalin promoted him to major general ... :(
 
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Having lotsa time on my hands, I did a search on the Google - using those terms pointed to a Wiki article on Stalin's purges. But, trying a find on the web page didn't show his name. I'm guessing he was one of the executioners, maybe, or he survived an executioners shot from a .25? Interesting that the Russians (apparently) had access to .25 autos and ammo ...

Yes, Bhlokin personally conducted thousands of executions using his own German Walther .25. The reference and his reasoning are there on the Wiki page (under the heading of :Katyn massacre) as DWALT points out.
This was a bad dude!
 
Hello Forum;

I picked up this Colt some years back. Owner then told me that the missing 9 rounds from the vintage box (Geco - 1973) were the only rounds fired through this Colt.

My later research showed that after the 1968 GCA banned all imports, Colt actually came out with this little beauty in 1971 but sales were so miserable that it was completely discontinued in 1973.

I haven't carried it or shot it and bought on speculation but it a nice little gun that if the story is true....one of the last designs truly manufactured in the USA by the real Colt craftsmen in CT.

Don't actually know how it was marketed or listed as various Blue Book, Lee, etc. also don't know what to call it. Some say Colt Jr., some say Astra (definitely wrong), some just say Colt Auto.

I'm no longer active in Colt collector circles, and too involved with S & W to pile into research again for a $couple hundred value gun that is safe queen status, but if any of you can shed light on what this gun was really known as in 1971 to 1973 I'd appreciate an update for my files and write-ups.
 

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