I have probably posted this before .....

[JimT]

but there may be some now who have never seen it.

Full Circle

Enough has been written about the .357 that I have no need to rehash old history. Suffice it to say that the First Magnum impressed people from the beginning and that it still has a place in one's battery today. No collection of handguns is complete without one.

While it was touted as a "car stopper" for Police work, it did duty as a game-getter from it's birth. Major Doug Wesson and Elmer Keith were the first notables to use it on game and write it up. Today it is fashionable to pooh-pooh it as a Big Game gun but these men did not see it that way.

There is some reason, however, to at least (in principle) agree with those who are hesitant about the use of the .357 on Big Game. First, the factory loadings today are loaded to less pressure than the original loads and consequently have less power. The early .357's were loaded in cartridges that utilized a Large primer and heavy loads developed quite a bit of pressure above the established levels of today's factory offerings.

early357_1.jpg

Second, it is a .35 caliber pistol and as such the shots must be placed on the game very carefully. A lot of those who take to the field these days are not experts either in hunting or shooting. In the field a person must know when and when not to take a shot... or as the movie line goes, "A man has to know his own limitations." Unfortunately many do not and if they read that so-and-so used "this" or "that" to bag his trophy they figure they can too.

Having said that, I know a number of hunters who would be perfectly at ease using a .357 on the game they hunt. They are both excellent hunters and shooters and would do just as well with a .22 should that be all that they had. They understand the principle that it is "the man, not the machine" as John Linebaugh is fond of saying.

The .357 did duty in the Korean War and proved very effective at penetrating the body armor worn by Chinese Communists. It was also carried during the Vietnam conflict and was used effectively. I have a good friend who is alive today because of his use of a .357 (the gun was given to him by Elmer Keith) on a VC who had homemade armor. The VC shot several men in the compound and was not stopped until my friend got his .357 going. They found later the Viet Cong had metal plates tied in front and on his back. The .45 ACP did not penetrate, but the .357 made holes in and out!

It's use as a Police weapon began to be curtailed in the 1960's. It had proven very effective against criminals.... so much so that the protests said it was too effective! Litigation and political pressure caused many Police agencies to look for a weapon that had a "nicer" public image and little by little the .357 was phased out. Very few Departments today use them.

357 Magnum Testimonials from earlier days

1935
Major Douglas Wesson

Antelope - 200 yards (2 shots)
The Antelope was hit the first time at 125 yards. It ran, stopped and was shot the second time at 200 yards. The second shot killed it.

Elk - 130 yards (1 shot)
The Bull Elk was killed with one shot through the lungs.

Moose - 100 yards (1 shot)
The Moose was shot in the chest near the base of the neck. It cut the 2nd rib, passed through both lungs, sheared the 8th rib on the off side and stopped just under the hide. No follow-up shot was required.

Grizzly Bear - 135 yards (1 shot)

The Antelope, Elk and Moose were taken on a Fall hunt in Wyoming, near the West entrance of Yellowstone Park. The Grizzly was taken later in Canada.

The above game was taken using factory loads which were a 158 gr. bullet at 1515 fps from an 8 3/4" barreled S&W producing 812 ft. lbs of muzzle energy. (S&W later shortened the barrels to 8 3/8" as we have today)

To those who criticized, the Major replied that they "..had not the slightest conception of what we have accomplished in ballistics.." - a statement that still applies today.

1936
Elmer Keith
"When the new .357 cartridge and gun came out I gave it a very thorough tryout ... and found it had more actual knockdown killing power on all game that I shot with it than any other factory loaded, real revolver cartridge on the market.... (It) proved to have much more actual shock effect and killing power ...than any factory loaded revolver or auto pistol cartridge including the .44 Special and the .45 Colt..."
Sixgun Cartridges and Loads pages 29 & 30

1938
Walter Sykes
Wildebeest - 100 yards - complete penetration, knockdown on the first shot.
His Guide, John Hunter (of "HUNTER" and "AFRICA AS I HAVE FOUND IT") wrote that the .357 was "the one and only hand-arm for African hunting"...

1938
Sasha Siemel - Professional Hunter in South America
6 Tigres - Amazon Jaguar's - using the S&W .357 Magnum
He wrote, "...It does all the work of a rifle and is light and easy to carry.."

WW II
General George Patton
He referred to his S&W .357 Magnum as his "killing machine"....

1980
Skeeter Skelton
"No automatic cartridge is as powerful as the .357 Magnum........Years ago I stated that if I could have only one gun, it would be a Model 27 S&W."
Skeeter Skelton on Handguns page 16

My First Magnum

It was in the late 1950's and I was about 14 years old when my Dad gave me my first center-fire sixgun, a Ruger Blackhawk .357 Magnum. Boy was I proud of that gun! I shot thousands of rounds through that pistol ..... in one year alone shooting over 20,000 rounds of home-made ammo.

I cast the bullets on my Mom's kitchen stove melting the lead in a cast iron skillet and using a Lyman bullet ladle to dip the lead out out and pour it. The main bullet I cast was the Ray Thompson bullet ... Lyman #358156. It had 2 crimp grooves so that you could seat it out in .38 Special cases and have the same powder capacity of the .357 Magnum cases.

Dad reamed the gascheck step out of the mold so that the bullets were plainbase instead of gascheck as designed. It also increased the weight a bit.

I lubed them by standing the bullets in an old cake tin and pouring melted lube around around them. When the lube hardened I cut the bullets out of the lube with a Kake Cutter and then pushed them through a Lyman bullet sizing die on a 310 Tool.

All my .357's were loaded using the old Lyman 310 Tool. The light loaded ammo did not need to be full-length sized and the standard dies on the 310 worked just fine, neck-sizing the cases only. The heavy-loaded 357's had to be full-length sized. This was accomplished using a Lyman Full-Length sizing die which was a piece of steel rod a little over an inch in diameter and about 1 1/2" long. It had been reamed to the correct dimensions to full-length size a 357 cartridge case driven into it.

I would set at my "loading bench" ... a home-made picnic table... and lube all the .357 empty cases by rubbing candle wax on them. Then one by one I would drive the cases into the die, turn it over and drive them back out using a heavy wooden mallet. It was slow work but I was 15 years old, we did not have TV and I had plenty of time. I spent many an evening pounding all the fired cartridges into and out of that die!

I had 2 powder charges that I used ...one with 2400 and one with Bullseye. I fired more of the Bullseye loads than the 2400 ... but I shot a lot of both. By scrounging my lead .. from gas stations and by "mining" the shooting range... my bullets cost me nothing but time. We made our own lube so that was "free". Primers were 80 cents or so a hundred, and powder was $8 or $9 a pound... if I remember correctly. It has been awhile. With the Bullseye load I used ... 3.0 gr. of the stuff .. .I figured I could get over 2000 handloads from a pound of powder ... for around $10 cash outlay! It was cheaper to shoot the .357 than my .22 ... though the 10 bucks was hard to come by at times in those days.

I dipped the powder charges. Dad made me 2 powder dippers and regulated them on his powder scale. The small one threw right at 3.0 gr. of Bullseye and the larger one threw 14.5 gr. of 2400 which was my standard magnum load. For serious target work I found that 13.5 gr. of 2400 gave superb accuracy ... especially after I had hand-lapped the barrel on the gun. 50 yard 5-shot groups of 2 1/2" with open sights were fairly common. Oh for young eyes again!

I had been reading everything I could get my hands on about sixgunning .. there was not much in those days... and ran across an article about lapping barrels. I talked to my Dad about it and he showed me how to pour a lap. I slugged the barrel on the Ruger and found it had a tight spot at the juncture of the barrel and frame. (Later I found this to be a common problem on sixguns.) Using Fine valve grinding compound I lapped the bore making 2 or 3 short strokes for every full-length stroke. I worked at this for quite a few hours over the next 2 days and eventually lapped a taper in bore, so that it tightened toward the muzzle. This virtually eliminated leading and enhanced the accuracy noticeably. When I did my part the gun would shoot into the X ring of the 50 yard bullseye using my handloads with the Thompson bullet.

It was with this gun that I learned to slip-shoot fast and fairly accurately. Once I was shooting with Nick Seivers of Washington State... Nick was an old Exhibition Shooter who shot for Winchester at one point in his career. He asked if I could do the old trick that some did with double action guns of placing one tin can on another, shooting the bottom can so as to make the top can fly up into the air, and then hit the top can before it hit the ground.

I was 16 at the time and had been doing speed shooting with the single action for several years. I told him I thought I could do it. He was skeptical, but set up the cans at about 15 feet. The first go around I fired fast enough but missed the top can. After that I got onto it and was able to do it fairly easily. Nick was impressed, which I enjoyed. He had been up and down the road several times in his life and had seen lots of shooters. It was a real privilege to know him and shoot with him.

I shot that old Ruger for years and took quite a bit of game with it. Eventually I obtained one of Lyman's molds in the Keith 173 gr. plainbase semi-wadcutter. This was a very fine bullet. With my handload of 2400 and fired by a rifle primer these hardcast bullets ran fast enough that they would crack a car rim at 200 yards. I never had one stop in any game animal up to Desert Mule Deer size. Accuracy was on par with the Thompson bullet.

Fast Forward

It's 2021 and it has been some years since I've had a .357 Magnum single action. Earlier in my life I concentrated on the .45 Colt and later the 454 Casull and .475 Linebaugh. Those days are past and I just don't enjoy shooting the heavy recoiling stuff anymore. I started shooting .38 Specials in the S&W Model 10 and really liked it. And it got me to thinking about possibly getting a .357 single action again.

One day a friend sent me a flyer. He was handling the estate of someone who had passed and was selling his guns. Listed among all of the various guns were a couple of 4 5/8" Ruger .357 Magnum Flat Top sixguns! To me the old model Ruger .357 Flat Top is just about the epitome of a sixgun. Small, but large enough to handle almost anything you are gonna need it for. It is basically the same size as the Colt SAA with better steel, better springs and better sights.

I immediately contacted him and put in a bid on one of them. And got the gun! When I finally had it in my hands I was really tickled. While you can see it had been used some ... it is 63 years old! ... it did not appear to have done much if any time in holster. It was not beat up. The screws were clean and not boogered. The barrel/cylinder gap is tight and it locks up correctly with no end-shake. I even had several proper size holsters in my stash of stuff. It was like I had gone full circle. I was back where I started with centerfire sixguns!

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.357 Magnum Rifle Data

"...the .357 is a whole new creature in a rifle.." - Paco Kelly - LEVERGUNS, page 77

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Firearm - 357 Rossi 92
Barrel length - 20"
Velocities recorded at 10 ft. from muzzle to first screen

Cor-Bon .357 Magnum
(advertised velocity was for handguns)

200 gr. hardcast LBT-type (advertised @ 1200 fps) - 1376 fps

140 gr. JHP (advertised @ 1325 fps) - 1741 fps

125 gr. JHP (advertised @ 1450 fps) - 2062 fps

110 gr. JHP (advertised @ 1500 fps) - 2183 fps

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Black Hills .357 Magnum

125 gr. JHP - 2020 fps

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Handloads - .357 Magnum
CCI Small Pistol Primers

140 gr. Speer JHP 8 gr. Unique - 1463 fps

158 gr. Speer Gold Dot - 18.5 gr. H-110 - 1731 fps

160 gr. LBT LFN 17 gr. WC820 - 1830 fps

180 gr. LBT LFN 13 gr. WC820 - 1511 fps

160 gr. SAECO SWC 14.5 gr. 2400 - 1640 fps
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.38 Special Handloads

148 gr. HBWC (seated flush with end of case) 3.0 gr. 700X - 942 fps

115 gr. 9mm SWC 3.0 gr. 700X - 908 fps

158 gr. RNFP 3.0 gr. 700X - 1006 fps
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Cor-Bon Black Powder loads

158 gr. flat round-nose - 864 fps .... these are a HOOT! and they feed nice too
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Black Powder Handloads

357 Magnum case – 21 gr. DuPont FFg – 158 gr. RNFP – 1049 fps

38 Special case – 18.8 gr. DuPont FFg – 158 gr. RNFP – 970 fps

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HANDLOADS

Firearm - Rossi .357 Model 92 24" barrel

125 gr. Gold Dot JHP 21.5 gr. H110 = 2317 fps

125 gr. Speer JHP 20 gr. WC820 = 2184 fps

160 gr. cast FP 3.0 gr. Bullseye = 875 fps

[Bill in Oregon]

Good stuff, Jim.
Thinking back on it, I have only owned a couple of .357 revolvers -- both Smiths. The first, a Model 28, 4-inch, I bought the day I turned 21. The most recent -- more than 30 years ago -- was a Model 686, also with 4-inch barrel. I really liked that revolver, although I am not a big .357 fan. Shooting .38 wadcutters out of it was about like shooting a .22, and boy was it accurate.

[Oldncrusty]

Thanks a bunch. Just got my first R92.

[Walt]

I just love the patina on the loading gate of your beautiful OM .357! Thanks

[Griff]

My 1st centerfire handgun was an 3-screw .357 Ruger. It was stolen from my apartment in early 1974 while I was in classes in college. It was returned to me in 1986 in really rough shape. It was in the possession of a robber who robbed a drive-thru diary, but did not figure in the robbery so the police department returned it to me... along with a case of .357 ammo! The gun looked like someone had tied to the back of p/u and drug it down a gravel road. I fixed the damaged sights and took it out to the range from time to time. Eventually, it became my wife's cowboy action gun, until she sold it so she could get a pair of SAA clones when cowboy action moved to two sixguns.