Nice Victory Question

[7539]

First, as a new member, thanks to all of you who spend time answering these questions when you could just as easily tell us to bugger off...

I just bought a really nice Victory .38 CTG, serial number V161642. All numbers match and the gun is in excellent condition. has the ramped sight marked "Parker Hale England"

Under the frame in the cylinder slot is marked "38 special 161642 4 tons per 1-150"

any information would be greatly appreciated and, again, thanks for what you do.

 

[Art Doc]

After the war thousands of these were modified for resale in the U.S. The PH "conversion" is one of the nicer ones but reaming it for the longer 38 Special was a mistake. It will still shoot the proper 38 S&W ammo but that fodder is scarce and pricey (which is why they were reamed). I would not shoot one of these with 38 Special ammo but apparently many folks do.

The barrel on yours has been cut but luckily not so far as to lose the ejector rod lug (which is commonly done).

 

[Buford57]

You have a British surplus S&W modified by Parker Hale. The barrel would originally have been 5" and the original chambering .38 S&W (not Special) aka 38/200. The finish was matte. (Someone will fill in whether it was Black Magic or Parkerizing when you specific gun was made) The grips were smooth.

Parker Hale did a decent conversion to .38 Special. Some report that P-H sleeved the chambers so that the slightly larger diameter of the .38 S&W chamber would not cause .38 Special cases to bulge or rupture. Unless it has been sleeved the safe course would be to buy and shoot the .38 S&W ammo for which it was made.

S&W provided many thousands of these revolver to the British and Commonwealth countries and they were sold back to US consumers in conditions ranging from as-issued to nice looking conversions like yours to hacked up snubbies like Oswald used to shoot OfficerTippit just after the Kennedy assassination.