I picked up another a couple of weeks ago. This one appears to be lightly fired, if at all, maybe even unissued. This one is black magic finish, blue ejector rod, 4" barrel, smooth grips numbered to the gun, lanyard ring, serial number V244900, AND, top strap is marked US NAVY.
A little personal history with the Victory revolver: I'm now 75. When I was around eight years old I sold newspapers on the street in downtown Hattiesburg, Ms. There were two real good Army Surplus stores downtown and I made it a point to walk through both of them every day as both of the owners would buy one of my five cent newspapers. I was constantly going through all of their inventory. The stuff they had back then would be a museum today. One of the things they had was lots of WWII and Korean era military guns. The Victory revolvers were plentiful and cheap. They sat in the display cases for a long time because nobody wanted them. Compared to the newer guns they were ugly and rough looking.
I joined the Navy in 1966. The security people on base and on board ship were still carrying Victory revolvers.
I joined the local PD at age 21 in 1969. We had to furnish our own handguns. I didn't have one so the chief open a large walk in safe, pull out an old ammo crate containing somewhere between 20-30 Victory revolvers. He told me he got them from nearby Camp Shelby, a very active WWII base. He told me I could borrow one until I could buy my own. I picked out a Navy marked Victory and carried it for about two months until I bought a 4" model 10-5. I turned the Victory back in. The Chief retired about four years later. After he left none of those Victory revolvers could be found.
