I recently picked up a very nice .308 custom rifle built for someone else, with metalsmithing by Dave Talley. I haven’t been able to determine with 100-percent certainty who crafted the stock, but all indications point to the late Jere Eggleston as the maker.
It is a terrific little rifle. It is built on an intermediate length Mauser action, and shoots like a dream. With the unlikely exception of another Cape buffalo hunt in Africa, I could comfortably and efficiently do all the remaining hunting I have left in me with this one rifle. So could most everyone else.
Chapter 10
The Life-Saving .357 Magnum
The .357 Magnum became a popular law enforcement choice, after it was found the .38 Special did not have the stopping power to save officers’ lives.
This powerful-for-the-time cartridge was introduced in 1934 and was an almost immediate success. It is, in essence, a .38 Special case lengthened by 1⁄8th of an inch to prevent the possibility of firing the higher pressure round in chambers designed for .38 Special pressures.
Wikipedia credits Elmer Keith, Phil Sharpe, D.B. Wesson of Smith & Wesson, and Winchester, for the development of the cartridge. The 3rd Edition of Mike Bussard’s Ammo Encyclopedia credits only Smith & Wesson.
Elmer Keith writes in his book Sixguns as follows: “Next we have the .357 magnum Smith & Wesson cartridge. I worked with Doug Wesson on this development and sent him the first Keith bullets used in developing the load. We also put 1000 rounds of 173 grain Keith solids backed by 11 grains No. 80 through a .38/44 Heavy duty S.&W. Revolver just to see if it would take them or blow up. They developed an average of 42,000 pounds and the gun held them with no danger.”
Phil Sharpe, in his book, Complete Guide to Handloading, wrote “The .357 Magnum cartridge was born in the mind of the author several years ago. On a hunting trip with Colonel D. B. Wesson, Vice-President of Smith & Wesson, a pair of heavy frame Outdoorsmen model revolvers were used with a large assortment of handloads developed and previously tested by the author. In the field they proved entirely practical, but Colonel Wesson was not content to attempt the development of a Magnum .38 special cartridge for ordinary revolvers, and set to work on a new gun planned in the field.”
However, a bit later in the same chapter, he wrote, “The author is not connected with any arms or ammunition maker and desires this fact clearly understood. He did not design the gun or the cartridge, although he cooperated and collaborated in a minor way.” Why he chose to distance himself from the project, I have no idea. Perhaps he was concerned about liability issues.
Both Keith and Sharpe mention Colonel Wesson and also Winchester in their writings on the .357 magnum, so it’s a safe bet that all were involved.
The .357 Magnum is simply a .38 Special cartridge that has been lengthened by 1⁄8 of an inch.
For many years, starting around 1902, through essentially WWII, the chances of finding a police department armed with anything other than a revolver, either Colt or Smith & Wesson, chambered for the .38 Special cartridge, were about the same as finding a rooster with lips!
Police files are rife with hair raising details of police shootings which involved multiple hits on criminals and still having the perp wound or even worse kill the officer(s) involved. I personally witnessed such an event many years ago. The policeman involved was a friend of my family.
A few weeks before the incident, he had reluctantly accepted the job as Chief of Police of a small town. The town provided no equipment support and each LEO was required to provide his on handgun. The only one my friend owned was a WWII surplus 1911 auto in .45 ACP.
He caught all manners of flak about carrying such a cannon, so he traded it in on a new S&W Chief’s Special. A few weeks later, while serving a warrant, he was involved in a shootout. He shot the perp several times, putting him on the ground, down but no where near out. The perp shot him from the ground and killed my friend instantly and he expired from his wounds later that evening.
Had the LEO still been armed with the 1911, I’m sure the outcome would have been far different.
Many police officers across the country upgraded their arms by adding a revolver chambered for the .357 magnum, often doing so at their own expense. While many Police Departments frowned on the practice, the officers could use either .38 Special or .357 magnum cartridges in the same revolver.
These days, most PDs around the country have armed their officers with semi-auto pistols. Quite a few switched to the 9mm Luger, but it is my sense that many have gone to larger calibers such as the .40 S&W, 10mm, or even the .45 ACP.
As I write these words, the US Army has announced that they are looking to replace the standard sidearm, the Beretta 9mm, with a larger, more powerful handgun/cartridge combination. I thought that they had learned that lesson in the Spanish-American conflict before the turn of the twentieth century.
I guess the old adage, the more things change, the more they stay the same, applies.
Chapter 11
Sizzling Varmint Medicine, the .22-250
Whether as a wildcat or factory cartridge, there has always been something mystifying about the high-velocity .22-250.
There is some considerable confusion as to when this popular varmint cartridge was developed, and who developed it.
Its name comes from the fact that it uses a .22 caliber bullet, and the parent case is the .250 Savage. The parent case came out in about 1915, so it was sometime after that.
The names associated with the cartridges development most often include Harvey Donaldson, Grosvenor Wotkyns, J.E. Gebby and J. B. Smith. Considerable development work went on in the mid-1930s.
At least one version was called the .22 Varminter, and others, the .22-250. Wotkyns is generally credited with developing the forerunner to the .220 Swift, although Winchester chose to use the 6mm Lee Navy case, rather than the .250 Savage. Author, gunsmith and consummate handloader, Phil Sharpe, was an early fan of the .22-250.
For many years the cartridge languished as a popular wildcat, until Browning announced in 1963 that they were adding the chambering to their rifle line.
My old pal, mentor, and good friend, John T. Amber, wrote in the 1964 issue of Gun Digest, the following: “Browning did an unprecedented thing this year — they added a caliber to their High Power rifle line, the Wildcat 22-250, for which no commercial ammunition I available! As far as I know, this is the first time a first line arms maker has offered a rifle chambered for a cartridge which he — or some other production ammunition maker — cannot supply.”
The cartridge also has, in a way, a powder named for it. H-380 was an unnamed spherical rife propellent when the late Bruce Hodgdon first used it. When a 38.0 grain charge behind a 52 grain bullet gave one hole groups from his 22 caliber wildcat (now called the .22-250), he appropriately named the powder H380.
Ever since the .22-250 has gone from wildcat to factory cartridge, varmints have been shaking in their boots.
I’ve also heard that the velocity delivered with that load, around 3800 fps, played a role in the decision though that may also be just so much fluff.