SV Victory - Numbering Question (letter arrived)

[smith17]

Since this model was covered in Mr. Henwood's and in Mr. Pate's book, I thought this forum would be appropriate although this revolver was more than likely not shipped until 1946. AKtinman had a question about a similar revolver in the past.
A gentleman recently acquired this revolver and kindly allowed me to photograph it and pose some questions to The Knowledgeable. The gun is a blued, 4", long throw hammer, single address line revolver with a serial number on the butt of SV 771010. The pre-war magna stocks also have the same serial number stamped on the inside right half which has the blue, open cup disk. It was obviously carried a good bit as evidenced by the excessive wear on the right stock when compared to the left. The numbering question has arisen due to the fact that the barrel, cylinder, and extractor star have a different number, 811010, similar enough to wonder if the individual assembling the gun forgot his bifocals that day. I'm sure if he requested a letter, it would not address any discrepancies. ??? Anyway, I thought one of the gentlemen or -women might have seen this before or maybe have reason to suggest it is in fact a post-shipment Frankenstein. Documents are supposedly available documenting this particular gun's travels to Germany and back with the 382nd Army MPs. Any hunches or knowledge would be appreciated. Plus, I thought a Victory with these numbered magnas was unusual enough for a glance.

Ed

 

[smith17]

Since this model was covered in Mr. Henwood's and in Mr. Pate's book, I thought this forum would be appropriate although this revolver was more than likely not shipped until 1946. AKtinman had a question about a similar revolver in the past.
A gentleman recently acquired this revolver and kindly allowed me to photograph it and pose some questions to The Knowledgeable. The gun is a blued, 4", long throw hammer, single address line revolver with a serial number on the butt of SV 771010. The pre-war magna stocks also have the same serial number stamped on the inside right half which has the blue, open cup disk. It was obviously carried a good bit as evidenced by the excessive wear on the right stock when compared to the left. The numbering question has arisen due to the fact that the barrel, cylinder, and extractor star have a different number, 811010, similar enough to wonder if the individual assembling the gun forgot his bifocals that day. I'm sure if he requested a letter, it would not address any discrepancies. ??? Anyway, I thought one of the gentlemen or -women might have seen this before or maybe have reason to suggest it is in fact a post-shipment Frankenstein. Documents are supposedly available documenting this particular gun's travels to Germany and back with the 382nd Army MPs. Any hunches or knowledge would be appreciated. Plus, I thought a Victory with these numbered magnas was unusual enough for a glance.

Ed

 

[opoefc]

My guess is that it is a numbering error. Not unheard of when it comes to Victory models. The fact that the butt (frame) number & the grip number are both 771010 demonstrates the practice that this number is applied after the grips are fitted to the frame, and that was where the number error was made. It should have been the 811010 seen on all the other parts as this gun is a late gun with the post war ( not pre war) magna stocks, as indicated by the black medallion retaining plate on the back of the grips. One way to test if my guess is correct is to letter the gun and see if SV771010 shows up as a duplicate serial number with two guns going out with that number and SV811010 is "open on the books" because the 2nd SV771010 should have been SV811010. Also I do not see any military inspectors marks in the pictures, and the gun has a commercial finish, so the gun was a commercial shipment. If it was used in Germany with a MP outfit, it must have been a private purchase by one of the MPs. perhaps from the PX. The PXs sold a lot of S&Ws in Germany. Anybody have any other ideas? Ed.

 

[mikepriwer]

Ed

I offer several comments.

First, those are pre-WW2 stocks not post-WW2 stocks. And either of those two
serial numbers is nominally before the end of Victory production.

Second, I would think that the right serial number is the one that is on the
butt, and on the grips. Certainly the one on the butt is right - even if it is
a duplicate. I've never heard of the shipping clerk ignoring the butt serial
number, and instead using the one on the back of the cylinder.

Third, that it has numbered magna stocks ( and assuming that the factory
did the numbering ) suggests that the gun was shipped after the war. At one
point I owned a commercial shipment gun with a serial number very close to this
one. I had SV773572, 5" blue, shipped 3/25/1946 and SV809634, 4" blue shipped 4/10/1946 .
Both guns went to different places in Georgia.

If I had to guess, I'd say that the butt serial number is correct, and the gun
was in soft-fitting somewhere close to the end of the war, and it didn't get
hard-fitted until sometime after the war. There was probably a week-long, or
month-long party at the factory right at the end of the war, and all the guns
that were in soft-fitting stages stayed that way for some prolonged time. When
they finally got around to assembling guns again, this one got blued, and
the wrong barrel and cylinder got put on it. For whatever reason, due to end-of-war
events, its original barrel and cylinder got lost.

That is what I think !

Later, Mike Priwer

 

[smith17]

Thank you, Ed and Mike, for your comments. I would suppose they were entitled, for obvious reasons, to party. In addition, it was probably a welcome break from a 24 hour production obligation for several years.

Ed

 

[opoefc]

Mike, you're right about the grips. They are pre-war style and were used on early post war guns like this one. I missed the words "open cup" in the description of the grips, which identify that type of magna grips. I'm sure the butt number is the recorded number used for the shipping records, regardless of whether it is a stamping error or not. When the grips were fitted to the frame and the butt & grip serial number stamped on the gun, there was no barrel or cylinder on the gun - just the frame & grips. When the frame was ready for the barrel & cylinder then it got the SV811010 numbered parts. Possible that the frame for SV811010 was damaged and the parts stripped and used on SV771010? It would be interesting to know what the assembly numbers are on each major part to see if there is a match. The shipping dates, or absense of same, for those two numbers, will put some of the pieces in place for the puzzle. Ed.

 

[smith17]

I finally got around to requesting a letter for this revolver. I had been lead by the previous owner to believe that it belonged to the Army's Military Police and had travelled to Germany. He later furnished documentation of a range of serial numbers that had been shipped to them. But the letter did not substantiate this claim. However, I was not disappointed. The records indicate it was sent to the New York Police Department on March 19, 1946 with a blue finish and walnut Magna stocks. After going through the files here, it appears that many of the SV guns were shipped about this time in March of 1946. I am just surprised the gun has no NYPD marking on it. Thought it might be of some interest.
Ed

 

[Tom Doniphon]

Thanks for posting the info on your letter. I think that puts the matter to bed.

I bet S&W used some pre War stocks it still had laying around for these early post War guns. Otherwise, someone has replaced the grips and numbered them to the gun.

 

[PZ93C]

I want to see if the other parts are on SV811010.

 

[smith17]

Although I went into some detail in my description on the letter request, that bit was not addressed. I finally have a specific serial numbered gun to look for. This may take some time.

Ed