One of our members here is a retired Sergeant with the Kansas City Police Department. He also is an owner of one of the KCPD Magnums and has been instrumental in helping me trace down info and material on those historic guns. I just received this note from him and, with his permission, I'll share it with you.

"I just finished a gun transfer for a Sergeant assigned to the Chief’s Office. He is the past president and one of the originating founders of the KCPD Police Historical Society. We were talking about the PD’s history and mainly its firearms that have been used throughout the years. I told him about the PD purchasing .357 Magnums in 1939 and again in January of 1940 and my quest to find out who may have been issued these firearms. He began to laugh and stated that we will never find out from the PD. He related the following;

While researching the archives to determine information about a long since retired commander, he became aware of the commander receiving a Certificate of Commendation. When reading the Certificate it honored the commander for doing a fine job in “PURGING” all old documents pertaining to the Police Department’s purchases and issuance of equipment (cleaning house as we call it). This “purging” was completed in the very late 1950’s.

I asked the Sergeant if, during his itemization of the PD’s archives, he may have seen any information regarding the S&W’s .357 Magnums? He stated no, and he has seen just about everything there is in the archives. He further stated that his guess is when the “purging” was done, ALL documents were trashed, since everything seems to come to a stop (regarding history of purchases, assignments and issuance of equipment) in the late 50’s. Only items that were retained were Personnel Records, since Missouri State law requires these records be maintained for 100 years. This would be indicative of the review I conducted in the Supply Sections records of firearms issued to officers. The earliest record I found was 1960.

So that’s the story of why we can’t seem to find out much about our Magnums. Wish it wasn’t so, but it doesn’t surprise me. Those were the days when someone told you to do something, you did it, you didn’t ask why, and you did it right the first time! Apparently the commander had some very diligent troops who didn’t want to fail their assignment!"


I told him that if there was a category of "Irrefutable Information That You Wish You Didn't Know" that would be at the head of the list! That's really too bad but isn't very surprising. Over the years I have sought gun and other info from police departments and other government agencies, often through the freedom of information acts. It is really surprising just how much historical info has been destroyed. Of course, fires and floods take a large portion of it (most old records are stored in basements and old warehouses) but a lot is lost with changes in record keeping (i.e. from ledgers and index cards, to micro dots, to computers, etc.} where it was lost when it just wasn't transfered. Sometimes just "very efficient housekeeping" is the culprit. Too bad, but in defense of those guys, there was no reason that they would have ever known that later generations would have any interest in what, to them, was just trash.

Bob

Bob and all interested in KC magnums: I asked Bill Cross to research the KC guns through the scanned documents helds by S&W Historical using the serial number of my gun, and key words Kansas City, Chief L.B. Reid and a name of a S&W rep that worked that rear during that era.
No information there either.

I think many of the KCPD Registered Magnums went to the officers to which they were issued on their departure from the department. Whether or not the officers had to purchase them or not, I don't know.

Granted, this is an educated guess. Unfortunately, most of those who would know definitively have since passed.