Col. Joseph Wesson's Brain Child "The Famous Registered Magnum"

[Guest Hammerdown]

Hello

Back in 1933-1934 Time span Famed hand Loader Philip Sharp was Experimenting with the .38 Special round to so to speak "Magnumize" it. During that time span, The .38 Special was the favored side arm of Most Police agencies, But, most that had not utilized the .38 Special caliber for daily carry back then, still had the .32 S&W Long caliber hand guns for daily carry, and they were very under Powered for the Torrid time back then. Phil Sharp took it upon him self to lengthen the Then .38 Special Cartridge an 1/8" to experiment with the then Not heard of .357 Magnum. He worked closely with Elmer Keith who at that time span was developing a Hotter .38 Special round as well for the then large-N-Frame revolver's that were being produced for The Heavy Duty and Target sighted Outdoorsman Models. Keith, had developed a Lead Bullet to withstand the Higher Pressures of the .38 High Velocity round he was working on, so it was Only Natural that Phil Sharp went to him and asked for his advice on using his Bullet for the experimental .357 Magnum round.

With Crime at an all time high back then with the Likes of Bonnie & Clyde, Baby face Nelson, John Dillenger, and Al Capone, There was a Grave concern for an officrs safety when confronting these Thugs that Often carried Colt Model 1911's, shotguns, B.A.R.'s and such, so The Then Vice president of S&W Col. Joseph Wesson saw a need in side arm power for Police agencies. Philip Sharp worked closely with Joe Wesson during his experiment with the .357 Magnum caliber, and through his testing made a true Believer out of Joe Wesson that his Experimental .357 Magnum Cartridge was Just what the Police needed to equip them self's with. This was rather risky during those time's just coming out of a major depression, but Joe Wesson went on to develope a hand gun that could harness the new experimental .357 magnum caliber. Wesson decided to make this new handgun in a Custom level offering, allowing the Consumer to add Options to their revolver, never offered before by S&W.

Joseph Wesson called upon Remington Arms to Build the new exciting .357 Magnum round that Phil Sharp had been experimenting with, so be quickly told that it would not work as far as accuracy went, and a Caliber with that Much velocity and Kinetic energy was Just not needed. That did not stop Wesson, as he then called Upon Winchester Repeating Arms, and told him of his idea and they agreed to do it only after he sent them a Test revolver to see how the caliber would react. Wesson sent them a Prototype revolver to fire the experimental .357 magnum, which was a 38-44 & The revolver sent, had a special heat treated cylinder and frame to withstand the Much higher pressures of the .357 Magnum round, shortly there after Winchester agreed to build the round for commercial sales. so Winchester developed a special Jacketed style bullet to go along with it, from the Modified Elmer Keith style lead bullet That showed the Original round velocity to be 1540 FPS. The round's pressure was shown to be Double that of the original .38 Special cartridge back then.

Once Winchester agreed to release the Experimental .357 Magnum round for commercial sales, Wesson decided to design a brand new revolver to fire it. Now it is unclear if Wesson's intentions were to build this revolver strictly for law Enforcement daily carry, or for the True sportsman that wanted the world's most Powerful handgun in the world to hunt with, but it was risky to Build such an exotic handgun, and money was tight. The new offering was the most expensive S&W revolver to be offered at a Price of $60.00, But soon after it's release orders for them started pouring in.The revolver was released in April 1935 and the first one was given to none other than J. Edgar Hoover the head of The FBI. Wesson was no Fool so he knew the best sales promotion he could give for this new gun was to give the head of the FBI one as a Gift.

These Custom Built revolver's had a special stamp placed into the crane area of them that showed to be "REG." Followed with The Registration number of each gun. The first year sales were slow with only 714 Being made, but several went to People High stature like General George Patton, J.Edgar Hoover, and Others. The barrels were offered in 1/4" Increments from 3-1/2" to 8-3/4" and The finish's Offered were Nickel or Blued, and you had a choice of over 9 different front sight offerings with many of them being custom made by the King Gun sight Corp. of California. These custom Built revolvers came with a Grip choice of Service grips, with a free Grip adopter, Magna style grips that were slightly Larger than the service style and filled one's hand better, or some were offered with The elaborate Walter Roper Custom shooting grips as mine shown. The revolver's were hand Picked and made by skilled Gun smith's with careful attention to "Burnishing" {A Fancy Word for Super Polished} of the Internal actions, and every single part on them was hand fitted with Tedious care, and flawless lock up.

Once the revolver's were shipped to their new owners there was a Special Registration Card included with the gun. The owners were instructed to fill out these Registration card and return them to the factory. Once they arrived back at the factory a special Registration certificate was made out for each gun and signed by Joseph Wesson and it included the new owners name, address, Guns serial number, and what ammunition was used to sight it in before it left the factory and what hold was used to sight the weapon in. These Registration certificates were returned to the owner in a special round tube and were suitable for Framing. Sadly, many of the new owners never returned their registration cards, so there are many Registered magnums out there without their certificates, But they all left the factory with their Registration numbers stamped into the crane area. There were 5,404 Registered Magnums made between April 1935-January 1938

By 1938 the orders for Registered Magnums were Pouring in at an alarming rate, so S&W decided to Cease The Registration process. All Handguns made in .357 Magnum Caliber after 1938 will Not have The Frame stamped "REG." like the previous ones, but the revolvers produced there after were Identical to The Registered Magnums just lacking the Reg. stamp and these ones were called Non-Registered magnums. They Only produced about 1700 of The Non-Registered magnums until all Gun production for civilian sales ceased for World War II around 1940 Era. Gun production resumed in 1946 for civilian sales, and the hand Process of making these .357 magnum revolvers ceased in 1948 Time span when they resumed production of the .357 Magnum revolvers now offering them as a standard catalog Production built hand gun. In 1950 The .357 Magnum revolvers were redesigned to have the new short Throw action, larger Micro-style click sights, and Over travel trigger stops included on them now. In 1957 S&W started stamping the crane area of all their revolver's and the Model 27 was chosen for the previous .357 magnum hand guns. The Pre-27's and Model marked 27's were the most elaborate Hand gun S&W ever offered and are heavily sought after by serious collectors of S&W's world wide today.... I for one, am Glad Col. Joseph Wesson took the risk to offer such an elaborate hand gun, and shown below is my First year issue 1935 Registered Magnum that was delivered to the Bowen Hardware Company of Augusta, Georgia on December 03, 1935 and sold to an FBI agent. It is wearing a set of Walter Roper Custom made grips from that Era as well as the Original sale's Promotion Flier S&W Offered to order the Registered Magnums. Hammerdown

[BrasilNuts]

I'm not really a big fan of revolvers, but...

that is one beautiful peice. I really like the grips and finish... and the barrel length is perfect to me.

Edited September 18, 2009 by BrasilNuts

[Guest m&pc9]

http://www.hunt101.com/data/500/medium/RM-7.jpg

At $60 I will take a pallet of them.

[Guest Hammerdown]

I'm not really a big fan of revolvers, but...

that is one beautiful peice. I really like the grips and finish and the barrel length is perfect to me.

Hello BrasilNuts

I appreciate Your Kind words. Here is the Grandson to my Registered Magnum. This one shipped in 1955 and has it's original Factory Nickel finish and Grips as well. It is said that fewer than 10 % of the Pre-Model 27's shipped with the Nickel finish and this one is the first one I had seen with a 3-1/2" Barrel. It is Also Considered Rare to see a 3-1/2" Barrel Pre-Numbered model 27 with a Full Target Package like this one has that consists of Target Hammer, Target Trigger, & Target grip's.... Hammerdown

[Guest Hammerdown]

http://www.hunt101.com/data/500/medium/RM-7.jpg

At $60 I will take a pallet of them.

Hello m&pc9

I am sure everone would. If we compare apples to oranges, they average $6000.00 Now, but Car's back then were $600.00 and now they are $60,000.00 in some case's ...Hammerdown

[Guest Hammerdown]

Hi

I have a factory History letter that show's this revolver shipped to Bowen Brother's Hardware Company of Augusta, Georgia on December 03, 1935 in Care of Charles Bowen owner of that company. While doing some research on it lately, I learned that there is one Lone past owner of The Bowen Hardware Company still Living. I goggled his phone number and called him recently. He was Pleased to hear from a Gun owner that had a Gun that shipped to his grandfather and we spoke for well over an Hour on the phone as he told me of his ancestor's past, which heavily involved with Guns.

I asked for him to type out his family roots and involvement with guns and he agreed to do it if I sent him a picture of the gun that shipped to his Grandfather. Below is the Letter that Charles Bowen III typed and sent me, But sadly, he did not have records to show the FBI persons name that bought this revolver, as they did not keep good records back then, and we Both agreed most agents remain unknown due to their Job Status.

[Magiccarpetrides]

All I see is X's

[glockster157]

You guys are killing me, I love SW revolvers. I doubt I will ever get a chance to own a museum piece like these but maybe, just maybe, I will run into one someday. My hats off to you for sharing the pics:hat:

[Ropin4gold]

Those 2 are beauitful. What kind of grips are on the second one?

[Garufa]

Hammer, thanks for the excellent posts! You're gonna get me in trouble with the bank, wife, etc.

I need another Smith.

[Guest Hammerdown]

Those 2 are beauitful. What kind of grips are on the second one?

Hello

Those are Very early Issue factory Diamond Target grips. They are called "Coke" grips, due to the slight Palm swell they have and from the rear they look to be the same profile as the Old Coke Bottles... Hammerdown