how effective is tha 32 S&W long round

I actually witnessed a similar occurrence involving a rabid raccoon on my front porch and a .38 S&W.

One morning there was a commotion on the porch in which my brother had stepped outside, saw the rabid raccoon and hurriedly scrambled back inside the house.
Worried that it would attack/infect somebody else in the neighborhood, my brother grabbed an old Iver Johnson .38 revolver, went out the front door, circled around the house to the back porch, took aim and shot the raccoon in the torso. The raccoon barely flinched, it just stood up and started shambling away, so my brother emptied the whole 5-shot cylinder into the raccoon, then retreated because it still didn't stop it.

Later that day we found that it had crawled under a tarp we had over a pile of firewood and eventually succumbed to its wounds.

The most shocking part though was the state of the raccoon and the porch where it had been. We noticed that it had bled very little despite the fact that every shot was a hit, and also that all of the bullets had stopped inside of it because there were no exit wounds on the raccoon, nor were their any holes on the porch.

For reference, the raccoon had been shot with a total of 5 .38 S&W (not to be confused with .38 Special) lead round nose bullets, all of which stopped inside of it's body. I've seen .22LR pass straight through raccoons before.

So yeah, if anybody ever wonders why certain older cartridges such as .32 S&W of .38 S&W fell out of favor, it's because apparently they were so absurdly week that they can't even drop a raccoon with a full cylinder dump.
In addition, this is way caliber wars regarding the effectiveness of modern Self-Defense cartridges are so stupid. Because cartridges which were actually ineffective no longer have firearms chambered for them.

Pistol calibers...

I recall ions ago when a raccoon came out of nearby brush close to our front door step, grabbed my leg and bit me through my jeans

I got my Browning Hi-Power 9mm with 115 gr fmj and shot the varmit three times and it walked away! Looked in the brush and finally dispatched the thing with a close up head shot.

Needless to say, I’m not very fond of the 9mm.

After going through treatment in the ER, I spent the next six weeks getting injections to preclude potential rabies...(once you get it, you die). The Health Dept checked for rabies on the raccoon but such proved inclusive.

Wished I opted for the 30-30 instead of the 9mm!
 
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I've worked three .32 a.c.p. (71gr. fmj) shootings. all were single hits, all were deceased quickly, one instantly. shot placement is what did it, not caliber. I have no doubt that a .32 caliber 98gr. lrn @ 750 fps would have been just as effective.
 
About 2008 I emptied my S&W 30-1 into a strange acting raccoon that was stumbling around the carport of our mountain house. Several torso shots failed to kill it; so I put the last few into it's head. This was a mixture of various LRN and WC .32 S&W and Long ammo. In all fairness, this animal was nearly the size of a first grader. I was less than impressed.

Mag Tech and Buffalo Bore make modern SD loads in .32 S&W Long that work better than the ammo I used that day. That said, I love .32 handguns for their accuracy and light recoil. I have seven around here now.

I put 4, 22 LR Hi Power HPs from a S&W M41 in a big old momma Raccoon that was staring me down in my porch. It stovepiped on the 5th round (M41 doesn't like anything but standard velocity). It was about the size of a medium-large dog. I had to buy a special LARGE size live trap (it was too big for the standard size raccoon trap that works on every other raccoon that ever walked into it. One time i caught 3 youngsters in the same, regular size, trip.

When I first saw that big old momma raccoon it at a distance, she put her paws up on the top rail of a 3 rail horse fence (with chicken wire stapled to it to try to keep them out). She was as tall as the top rail on the fence when on her hind legs and seemed to just float over the top rail.

Then I caught a few of them hiding out in the coconut palm trees, too. That's when I went on a full scale varmint war. No more calling the trapper to take them away after I caught them at $50 a pop. One of my buddies got fairly well cut up by a raccoon when he tried to chase it out from under his car. Then my medium size pit bull (a real sweet girl) just hates raccoons and cats. She was a rescue dog at about 2 years old when I got her years back. She was sliced up pretty well which I figured was a swipe from an animal's paw during a fight, figured later it was likely a raccoon because of the instinctive hatred she had for raccoons. She would play with cats before she'd kill them if I didn't catch her in the act but she'd take a raccoon to its final breath no matter how bad she got hurt in the process. I was forever bringing her to the vet to get checked for rabies, just in case. I wasn't sure if the required rabies shots prevented her from getting rabies or what it did but I didn't want her to catch it. This dog, till today, is as sweet and kind as can be UNLESS she sees a raccoon !

My children used to think they were so cute calling them the hamburglars (like McDonalds) when they are nasty buggers, especially when cornered.

Only way to kill a raccoon without making a mess of chopped meat out of it is a nice .22 LR HP behind either ear facing forward toward the eyes. They go right down with a almost no after twitching.

About 10 years ago I was overrun by raccoons on my 5 acre ranch. They would raid the porch almost every morning at about 5 AM. They love the twilight hour. Some opossums, too. But other than being gawd ugly the opossums don't bother anybody or anything around the ranch.

Like a good citizen I purchased 4 traps. I was trapping them and PAYING to have them taken away at $50 each until I figured the trapper was likely letting the same raccoons I just caught, loose again right up the block instead of 50 miles out west like he was supposed to.

Once dispatched, I had been burying them a few feet deep only to find something had been digging them up and eating them. Since then I just tossed them into the heavily wooded area, between my back fence and the canal that borders it. The next morning, without fail, there was only a ball of fur and some odds and end bones but no stink from decaying body rot ... just GONE !

Unless they eat each others' flesh I don't know what type of varmint eats the whole raccoon. I figured a snake would leave NO trace of it. Yes, I have those too, but only smaller pygmie rattlers and cottonmouths. The body is way to narrow to swallow an entire raccoon, I think.

Your .32 should have been more than enough to dispatch a raccoon, if bullet placement was correct. No matter how big or small, body shots don't seem to effect raccoons with a .22 LR. County ordinance here states I cannot use anything larger than a .22 for varmint hunting on my own property.

Try the .32 H&R Magnum if you're in love with .32s. I have a ported .32 H&R magnum lite-weight, the same size of a J-frame S&W. The only Taurus I own. It fires .32 S&W long as well as the .32 H&R Magnum. Both rounds are getting hard to find, the H&R mags a bit harder than the .32 long.
 
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.32S&WL is probably second only to the .25acp as the worse defensive handgun cartridge of all. I knew one guy who said he would shoot rabbits with his .32 snubby and some would up and take off running after being hit, that's how pathetic they are.

You can pretty much breathe on a rabbit hard and it will keel over and die so if a .32 wasn't killing them I'd sure hate to be relying on that to stop a man. I'd rather have a .22LR, at least you can get some good penetration with that.

that's nothing. I once shot a deer with a 30.06 and it ran about 50 yards before it even fell down. then, after it fell it tried to get up and run again. took a few more seconds before the tail stopped twitching. it was a through and through shot that took out both lungs. now, are you saying that a 30.06 is as worse as the .32 Long?
 
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Pistol calibers...

I recall ions ago when a raccoon came out of nearby brush close to our front door step, grabbed my leg and bit me through my jeans

I got my Browning Hi-Power 9mm with 115 gr fmj and shot the varmit three times and it walked away! Looked in the brush and finally dispatched the thing with a close up head shot.

Needless to say, I’m not very fond of the 9mm.

After going through treatment in the ER, I spent the next six weeks getting injections to preclude potential rabies...(once you get it, you die). The Health Dept checked for rabies on the raccoon but such proved inclusive.

Wished I opted for the 30-30 instead of the 9mm!

9mm FMJ has a long and well-earned reputation for ineffectiveness. Even the hot 124gr NATO loads used by the Military don't have a great reputation as man-stoppers, hence why operators still pack .45s. The only 9mm rounds which seem to have a decent reputation are the 147gr +P+ JHPs which are currently used by Law Enforcement, and even then it wouldn't surprise me if they either went back to .40 S&W or decided to experiment with other cartridges sooner or later.

Regardless, FMJs just don't work out well in handguns. I don't know if JHPs would have made any difference when it comes to something as small as a raccoon, (they might just pass right through without expanding regardless) or even a larger caliber handgun bullet like a .45, but it can be random, my brother once killed a rabid groundhog with a single shot to the stomach with a .22 Short. One thing is for sure though, a headshot will take care of anything.

If it was out during the daytime and just attacked you completely unprovoked, then it was most likely rabid, regardless of what the tests had to say. Raccoons are nocturnal and in my experience aren't particularly aggressive. I actually knew a few people who kept them as pets, and according to them they behave similarly to cats.
 
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There are also many examples of a deer dropping immediately after being shot with an even lesser cartridge then a 30.06. There are always exceptions but rabbits are known for being exceptionally weak animals. Most can be taken out with a good pellet rifle so if a LRN .32S&WL out of my friends snubby consistently failed to drop them then that's not exactly a ringing endorsement of the caliber. There is a reason why no one is producing defensive revolvers exclusively for the .32S&WL anymore.

if you're taking out rabbits with a pellet rifle and your buddy can't do it with a .32 Long, I'd say he's lacking shot placement. ~122 kinetic foot pounds of muzzle energy is plenty to kill a rabbit quickly.
 
I usually carry a alloy 45acp or 44 special myself. But, during her morning walk/jog my wife carries a older 3 1/4" I frame 32 S&W long. Why size and recoil. She can use anything in my safe, she has short my 500 and sometimes carries a 640 with 38 specials, Keeps a 4" 15 on her side of the bed.

Why the 32? Size and recoil. She will carry it on her walk, she shoots it well. If she does deploy it it would be up close. I would rather it was something larger. I have a model 37, but she hats the recoil. Maybe someday. But, hey it is better than nothing and crime is extremely low in our little town.
 
There are also many examples of a deer dropping immediately after being shot with an even lesser cartridge then a 30.06. There are always exceptions but rabbits are known for being exceptionally weak animals. Most can be taken out with a good pellet rifle so if a LRN .32S&WL out of my friends snubby consistently failed to drop them then that's not exactly a ringing endorsement of the caliber. There is a reason why no one is producing defensive revolvers exclusively for the .32S&WL anymore.

It isn't the cartridge rather the RN which tends to slide through rather than disrupt flesh. I have found this to be true with the 38 LRN as well. I used a 32 long for more than a few years as a trapline gun. A decent SWC with a flat face will put critters under 50 lbs down quickly when hit correctly. It is not the answer when trying to penetrate thicker bone.
 
.32S&WL is probably second only to the .25acp as the worse defensive handgun cartridge of all. I knew one guy who said he would shoot rabbits with his .32 snubby and some would up and take off running after being hit, that's how pathetic they are.

You can pretty much breathe on a rabbit hard and it will keel over and die so if a .32 wasn't killing them I'd sure hate to be relying on that to stop a man. I'd rather have a .22LR, at least you can get some good penetration with that.

Did your buddy manage to retrieve the dead rabbits?

If he didn't, I'm betting they took off running because he missed.

If he did, I'm betting they were really poor hits.
 
9mm FMJ has a long and well-earned reputation for ineffectiveness. Even the hot 124gr NATO loads used by the Military don't have a great reputation as man-stoppers,

Is ineffectiveness a plus? If not, there has to be some other compelling reason why the vast majority of the world's militaries have adopted it.
 
Is ineffectiveness a plus? If not, there has to be some other compelling reason why the vast majority of the world's militaries have adopted it.

Handguns aren't the primary weapon of a soldier, they're a backup, a last resort, the thing that you use when you run out of ammo for your rifle or it is somehow rendered inoperable.
In other words, handgund aren't relied upon by the Military for their effectiveness, nor should they be considering that handguns in general, regardless of what they're chambered in, aren't known to be very effective.

Also, logistics. If the majority of your allies are carrying a specific cartridge, then it makes sense to adopt it yourself so that ammo can be shared between allies.

Frankly, it wouldn't make any sense for any military to adopt a new pistol cartridge. They obviously have a huge stockpile of 9mm FMJ, and switching to a .40 or .45 wouldn't make any difference as long as expanding bullets are prohibited. FMJ just isn't very effective in handguns, and a bigger bullet won't really help with that.
 
that's nothing. I once shot a deer with a 30.06 and it ran about 50 yards before it even fell down. then, after it fell it tried to get up and run again. took a few more seconds before the tail stopped twitching. it was a through and through shot that took out both lungs. now, are you saying that a 30.06 is as worse as the .32 Long?

...these animals, as do most wild animals, have a much greater propensity for survival. Not unusual for a deer to run a bit after getting hit with a high powered rifle unless CNS is severed.
 
9mm FMJ has a long and well-earned reputation for ineffectiveness. Even the hot 124gr NATO loads used by the Military don't have a great reputation as man-stoppers, hence why operators still pack .45s. The only 9mm rounds which seem to have a decent reputation are the 147gr +P+ JHPs which are currently used by Law Enforcement, and even then it wouldn't surprise me if they either went back to .40 S&W or decided to experiment with other cartridges sooner or later.

Regardless, FMJs just don't work out well in handguns. I don't know if JHPs would have made any difference when it comes to something as small as a raccoon, (they might just pass right through without expanding regardless) or even a larger caliber handgun bullet like a .45, but it can be random, my brother once killed a rabid groundhog with a single shot to the stomach with a .22 Short. One thing is for sure though, a headshot will take care of anything.

If it was out during the daytime and just attacked you completely unprovoked, then it was most likely rabid, regardless of what the tests had to say. Raccoons are nocturnal and in my experience aren't particularly aggressive. I actually knew a few people who kept them as pets, and according to them they behave similarly to cats.

It was early evening, in the dark. Yes, very unusual behavior for raccoons, another reason I went though battery of injections. It was during this timeframe where many raccoons became rabid and distempered, and practically disappeared from this region (southern New England) during the 1980s.
 
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