H&R .32 Short Revolver

[Wheeler]

I'd of dropped $140 on it. The little H&Rs were pretty good guns.

[FrankB]

I offered $100 this afternoon, and they’re holding out. They know I always cave...lol! The lockup with the trigger pulled is plenty tight.

[Jim Watson]

With all the dinky guns on the market, and Teddy Roosevelt buying .32 Colts for NYPD, what was the challenge?
Halt or I'll give you peritonitis!

[Stephanie B]

With all the dinky guns on the market, and Teddy Roosevelt buying .32 Colts for NYPD, what was the challenge?
Halt or I'll give you peritonitis!

Peritonitis was about 99-100% fatal back then. So that .32 might not have had a lot of stopping power, it’d have killed them deader than hell in a most unpleasant manner.

[Lex Luthier]

I offered $100 this afternoon, and they’re holding out. They know I always cave...lol! The lockup with the trigger pulled is plenty tight.

I would lay good odds that that little revolver will tune right up into a decent trigger pull after you clean out the 110 year old grease-turned-to-varnish from the internals. They were not a crappy company, they just turned out products to a price. That little guy was *not cheap* in 1900-1910. Maybe a day's labor cheaper than an equivalent Colt or S & W.

[Jim Watson]

1901 Sears & Roebuck catalog
.32 hammerless revolvers, blue 3".
S&W. $11.75
H&R. $4.00
IJ. $4.00
F&W $4.00
Sears $3.40

Colt New Pocket $11.00.

$7.75 difference would have been over 3 days' pay for a streetcar motorman (Picked because my Dad was a bus driver.)

[Lex Luthier]

I was looking for that very info and managed to not find it. Thanks, Jim!

Ok, three days' pay difference, maybe 3.5, if you're talking about the Smith & Wesson. ( The previous numbers were a WAG, of course. Mea Culpa.)
Still, they weren't crap guns by the standards of the day. The motormen would have bought H & Rs; the route and mechanic shop managers would have the Colts & S & Ws.

[03RN]

And think how much fun it could be.. you are hanging out with 'gun people', at the range, whatever, particularly if they lean towards the pretentious tacti-cool side, and they ask what you are running today.. Reach in a side pocket and slowly, deliberately slide that out and watch their faces. Fun messing with people sometimes like that, like when I showed off my backpack PDW at work one day by pulling out my Broomhandle tucked into its holster stock.

Probably close to revolver shooters beating them in uspsa

[Glenn E. Meyer]

With all the dinky guns on the market, and Teddy Roosevelt buying .32 Colts for NYPD, what was the challenge?
Halt or I'll give you peritonitis!

I read that the threat of infection was why folks in those days were scared shitless of little guns that we would mock as mouse guns today. Look at the first SW 22 short revolvers - haha! Get a 9mm! But dying of infection - never mind.

My daughter gave me a book on dueling. One guy showed up to his duel, naked. The rationale was that the lead ball was sterile. If not killed by the ball, it was the crap on your clothes that killed you. His opponent was outraged and refused to duel. Another ploy as a boiled, silk shirt, same reason. The silk might just be pushed in, and clean pulled out.

Of course, today we could dip our balls in Lysol - never mind. This isn't about Covid.

[mtnbkr]

Of course, today we could dip our balls in Lysol

You go right ahead. I won't be dipping mine in Lysol thankyouverymuch.

Chris