Any good (or better) quality handgun from Colt or Smith & Wesson probably deserves a so-called “factory letter” to go with it. Both companies offer this service and while it is getting expensive, it may, in the long run, add to the value of the gun. Basically, a factory letter is derived from the shipping records of the company and reports the basic description of the gun, any special features, the day that it left the factory and to whom it was shipped. Today that means a gun store with an FFL, but in older times, guns sometimes went straight to the end user.

No, I was not suggesting a title for a new folk song when I wrote that line. In a recent phone conversation with American Rifleman editor Mark Keefe, we were both perplexed about the absence of hammers on new automatic pistols. Almost everything in the way of new designs is a striker-fired pistol. Sure, hammers persist on still-produced classics like the 1911 and Browning Hi Power, as well as several veterans of the Wondernine Wars like the Beretta and SIG Sauer. But look at the basic 9 mm service pistols of Glock, S&W, Springfield, Ruger, Taurus, Caracel and possibly others. They all use some form of spring-loaded, in-line striker that moves straight forward to smack the primer, rather than a floating firing pin that is struck by a pivoting hammer. Why?

One of the sought-after “Holy Grails” of Smith & Wesson collecting is a nice clean specimen of the 1st Model .44 Hand Ejector—the Triple Lock. This classic revolver was introduced as the “New Century” model and was produced from 1908 to 1915. Approximately 20,000 revolvers were made in this short period of time. It was an expensive gun that required a great deal of hand-fitting. Since it was popular with military officers who liked the big .44 and .45 cartridges for which it was chambered, many of the guns were pressed into service in the early months of World War I. Wartime experience with the gun’s finest feature—a precisely fitted third cylinder lock—may have caused the gun to be discontinued. That lock system was not fully reliable under the muddy, dirty conditions of trench warfare.

When Single Action Army revolver No.1 left the old plant on the river in Hartford, it had a barrel that ran some 7 1/2 inches from forcing cone to muzzle. In time, other guns came along with shorter barrels, most commonly 5 1/2 or 4 3/4 inches. These three lengths served the interests of handgunners about 99 percent of the time. One of the three lengths worked well for most shooter’s since 1873, when all of this Peacemaker business began. In the so-called “first generation SAA” period, which was basically before World War II, Colt was willing to fill special orders for other lengths. We know of a handful of guns made with extra-long barrels, some of them the Buntline Specials. And we also recall a larger quantity of Sheriff’s or Storekeeper’s Models with no ejector rod assembly on the lower right side of the barrel. I always wondered what the Frontier handgunner used to poke out his empties when equipped with one of these guns. Most likely, it was a pencil or plain old stick. Most of these guns, however, were one of the three standard barrel lengths and that remains true to the present.   

Smokeless powder is powder that burns with little or no smoke. And of course, stainless steel is steel that won’t stain. So a hammerless revolver must be one that has no hammer, right? Uh-uh, I afraid not. The term is often misused. The user of the term is trying to describe an internal hammer revolver or a spur-less hammer revolver. This type of gun has a long history in America, with some models dating to before the cartridge era. The advantages of such a firearm are considerable, but let’s look at the standard features. Usually, there is a humped or rounded upper rear corner on the receiver. Within the receiver, there is a pivoting hammer that includes or contacts a firing pin to fire a round. Since there is no way to get to the hammer from the outside, it cannot be cocked and is fired via long-arc DA trigger pull, or in more modern terminology, a DAO. There’s an advantage to a gun with a closed action that keeps debris out and even more of an advantage to a pocket gun with little in the way of latches, levers and what-not to snag on clothes and equipment. That’s why these internal hammer wheelguns have been on the scene almost from the earliest days. They are not new.