Magnum Musings – Mexican Magnums - Manos Arriba! Policia Cabron!

Magnum Musings – Mexican Magnums - Manos Arriba! Policia Cabron!


When searching through the archives looking to document Registered Magnums, there is one glaring gap within the records: RM’s that shipped to Mexico.

The records -do- exist, but they are incredibly difficult to find because unlike the records for guns that were sold to the parts of the world where you CAN drink the water, the Mexican Magnums had unique paperwork and it came in volumes!

Anyway, I eventually figured out a search technique that would get me the Mexican Magnum records and I have to say that it is rather interesting.

Right now, I’d say I’ve seen about 300 Magnums that went to Mexico and if you pushed me I’d say the total number is likely 400 or maybe a bit more. That’s actually a fairly decent percentage of the whole productions.

While various arms houses in Mexico sold the guns, the primary importer/distributor was Heedles & Breidsprecher. I eventually figured out that instead of searching for the magnums by Registration number (a technique that works about 90% of the time) I should instead search through correspondence from H&B.

You see, the amount of paperwork needed to ship guns mostly lawfully into Mexico was legion. Seriously. I’m looking at 25 to 40 page long files just to get a half dozen crates of guns into the country. There is tons of correspondence about having to go through the NY consulate for paperwork approvals and “fees” which I suspect are ‘la mordida’ although thats just supposition on my part.

A couple interesting things stand out about the Mexican Magnums. First, relatively few are actually ‘made to order’, where someone is ordering a particular configuration of gun for them selves. Instead, most orders are for ‘inventory’ guns that are sold off the shelf to people who will take them in whatever configuration the dealer is selling. To that end, most of the guns will have Gold Bead front sights, unremarkable rear sights, Magna stocks (once they were available) and almost never have a Wesson Grip Adapter.

One thing that is very interesting is that almost all the Mexican orders specify that the guns be marked MARCA REGISTRADA and have large S&W monograms. The reasoning behind this seems to be that the Mexican purchasers wanted visible proof that they were purchasing a genuine Smith & Wesson revolver.

H&B commented on this in a letter dated 07SEP38 where they relate that one of their purchasers wanted to know why some revolvers had large monograms and others had small. The unsigned factory response is shown below:



According to this, there is a small quantity of revolvers floating about that will have S&W monograms on BOTH sides of the frame; large on the right and small on the left. It seems to me that, if the markings are proven genuine, these double logo guns would be a rather rare variation of S&W revolver.

Unfortunately, I suspect most of the guns that went to Mexico, Magnum and otherwise, are lost to time and governmental interference. Still, If someone in Texas finds an old M&P or Model 1926 or even an RM with two monograms, they may be holding a rare variation.

Stuff like this wouldn’t see the light of day without the efforts of the fine folks at the S&WHF; are you a member? Join: Smith & Wesson Historical Foundation



Best,

RM Vivas

Another terrific investigative post from the pen (keyboard) of RM Vivas.

As ever, thanks for the interesting read.

See you next week!

Have been re-reading the Roy Jinks article on the Registered Magnums titled "Registered .357 Magnums." It was presented at the 2009 S&WCA Annual Meeting and later published in the S&WCA Journal.
Says there was a company directive in May of 1936 stating all guns going to Spanish speaking countries be marked "Marcas Registradas" under the trademark.