I’m copying this from the “Ultimate Highway Patrolman Thread” where I first posted it. I just wanted to make sure the answer gets as much exposure as it can since I see it questioned enough here, there, and anywhere gun talk goes on.

It doesn’t get brought up too often, but I have always wanted to know what the marking on all the Highway Patrolman barrels was about. It looks like a bow sided H with four dots around it. I have read some crazy stories on what that symbol means. I don’t know why I waited so long to go right to the source for the answer but here it is posted with Mr. Roy Jinks’ permission:

“I hate to disappoint you, but those dots have no meaning and are only a decoration. The problem is everyone wants to read something special into these markings. But there is no special meaning at all.” - Roy G. Jinks, Historian, Smith & Wesson

After some of the crazy stories I have read and been told or even had guys swear was the truth (gun show stories are the greatest…) this boils down to one simple fact of life.

Sometimes the reality isn’t as much fun as the fiction.


The ultimate Highway Patrolman thread.including N frame ser# ranges