Handgun - Forgotten Weapons

Finnish m/44 Prototype Blowback 9mm Pistol

April 24, 2019 Ian McCollum 15

The m/44 pistol was intended to be a lower-cost replacement for the Lahti L35 pistol for the Finnish Defense Forces, but production delays resulted in the first batch of 25 examples not being completed until […]

S&W 3566: An IPSC Game-Changer that Didn’t

April 18, 2019 Ian McCollum 49

This pistol (and its ammunition) is lot #2401 at Morphy’s April 2019 auction. In 1994, Smith & Wesson began shipping the Model 3566, a double-stack, single action pistols tuned for high-level USPSA competition. It was […]

.577 Caliber Bland-Pryse Stopping Revolver

April 4, 2019 Ian McCollum 30

This revolver is lot #2573 at Morphy’s April 2019 auction. There were probably less than a hundred of these Pryde-Patent break-action .577 revolvers made in total, and this one has managed to maintain an excellent […]

Shooting the H&K MP7

March 30, 2019 Ian McCollum 37

Thanks to H&K and Trijicon, I have a chance to do some shooting with an MP7A1 PWD today. The MP7 is unusual for a gun of its size and configuration in having a fully locked […]

Musgrave 9mm: A Gun for the Black Market

March 27, 2019 Ian McCollum 40

In the brief couple of years between the election of a new black-majority government in South Africa in 1994 and the dissolution of the Musgrave company, it attempted to produce a new 9mm pistol to […]

Swing and a Miss: The Joslyn Army Revolver

March 19, 2019 Ian McCollum 8

Benjamin Joslyn patented this .44 caliber, 5 shot, side-hammer revolver in 1858. He initially contracted with one W.C. Freeman to act as manufacturer and sales agent, but Freeman was unable to actually fulfill the first […]

ManuFrance Commercial Luger

March 17, 2019 Ian McCollum 9

Between 1909 and 1915, the huge French mail-order firm of Manufacture Francais d’Armes et Cycles de St Etienne (later called Manufrance) sold Luger pistols (as well as many other types of firearms). They were enough […]

Whitney Wolverine: Atomic Age Design in a .22 Rimfire

March 16, 2019 Ian McCollum 40

The Whitney Wolverine was a .22LR semiauto pistol designed by Robert Hillberg in 1954. It is a very distinctive looking gun, with the nickeled versions in particular being the epitome of Atomic Age styling. Unfortunately, […]

Knoch Needlefire Pistol

March 15, 2019 Ian McCollum 5

This is a handmade, single shot needle fire pistol (zündnadelpistole) made by a German gunsmith named A. Knoch in Munich in 1850. I have been unable to find any documentation about the man, but the […]

Walther Model 3: A Tiny Early .32

March 14, 2019 Ian McCollum 17

Walther was founded as a rifle making company in the 1880s, and expanded into the flourishing market for semiautomatic pocket pistols around 1910. The Model 3 was the company’s first .32 ACP caliber pistol, and […]