Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Colt Police Positive Special .38 NP

Looking for some info on this handgun. According to the S/N it is a 1956 vintage. Any ideas on getting ammo? It was my dad's gun he bought over 25 years ago. I would like to be able to carry it as a professional process server.

Get it examined by a gunsmith who knows old Colts.

Ammo is available, but first you need to know what cartridge it uses and that it is safe.

The gun is is excellent condition. The firing pin has no visible wear at all and the bore super clean. My Dad bought from a guy who collected handguns just to have handguns. I doubt it has ever been fired. I have a gunsmith scheduled to look at it tomorrow. Thanks for the input. I want to go in knowing everything I can know!!!

It fires standard .38 Spl ammo and if timing and lockup are good you are good to go.

Note that Terry said STANDARD .38 Special Ammunition. I'd try to dodge +P ammo with that little jewel.

tromba: I believe that fine old Colt Police Positive .38 New Police may be chambered for the.38 Colt New Police cartridge, also known as the .38 Smith & Wesson, a much less powerful round than the .38 Special. If that Colt is in the condition you describe, its value to a collector may far exceed its value as a defensive carry weapon. If that revolver were mine, I wouldn't shoot until I'd gotten the opinions of a qualified gunsmith, not just a parts-changer. Most gunsmiths who understand those older Colt double-actions have either retired or died. Then I'd do some research and find a knowledgeable and honest Colt collector to learn the full story about that revolver. The average Colt collector is a real enthusiast who has forgotten more aboutColts than most of us Smith& Wesson guys have ever known about Smith & Wesson products!

After further review, I find that the .38 Colt New Police is interchangeable with the .38 S&W, which is NOT the same as the .38 Special or .38 Colt cartridge.

I apologize for any misinformation I may have spread.

To the OP, you should find yourself a different carry piece.

If it is a Police Positive Special it should be chambered in .38 spl. If it is a Police Positive then CT is correct.

T. I just went searching around for the cartridge. If it is a 38 NP, it is the same as a 38 S&W. If Colt hadn't been so quirky about not wanting to stamp S&W on the barrel of their revolvers, this could all have been avoided.

That is a fact.

OK, a little clarification here.

First, in terms of revolver models, there is the Police Positive (PP), and the Police Positive Special (PPS). The difference between the two is the length of the frame and cylinder. The Police Positive had a shorter cylinder approximately 1.3" length whereas the Police Positive Special had a longer cylinder approximately 1.56" length, and the frames were correspondingly sized.

Next, in terms of chamberings:

According to my references, the PP was made between 1905 and either 1943 or 1954 depending on the reference, and was chambered in .22, .32 New Police (aka .32 S&W Long) and .38 New Police (aka .38 S&W).

The PPS was made between 1908 and 1977 with a later revival, chambered for the .32 New Police, .32-20, and .38 Special, but it was also chambered in the .38 New Police. Interestingly, the PPS was never chambered in .22 LR AFAIK but the alum alloy frame Cobra was.

So, in other words, both the PP and PPS were chambered for .38 New Police aka S&W, but only the PPS was chambered in the .38 Special, because it was too long for the shorter PP cylinder.

If the OP's revolver was made in 1956 then it is a PPS, since PPs were no longer being made in that year, but it could be chambered for either the .38 S&W or the .38 Special. IF the barrel marking is correct (this discussion came up in another thread) it is chambered for the .38 S&W. I do not have a Colt revolver in .38 S&W but I note in my .Colt .38 Special revolvers the chambers narrow down at the front. If the same is true for the .38 S&W cylinders then it should be easy to determine if it is chambered for the S&W as the S&W has a significantly shorter case length than the .38 Special, and presumably a .38 Special would not chamber in the cylinder.

If it is chambered for the .38 S&W I would agree with TwentyTwo that it would be better as a collector than as a practical carry gun both because it is a weaker round than the .38 Special and because ammunition would be significantly more difficult to source and comparatively obsolete for defensive purposes since it is not a popular round and therefore manufacturers probably only have round nose lead bullets loaded for it.

However, IF the revolver in question is actually chambered for .38 Special AND it is in good condition it should be safe with modern +P ammo. I base this assertion on the fact that in the 1939 Stoeger catalog, under the Police Positive Special blurb it specifically lists ..38 S&W Special High Speed and .38-44 S&W Special cartridges as being suitable - these were hot loaded .38 Specials that S&W recommended only in their .44 frame or N frame revolvers, and are equivalent to today's .38 Special +P. Since Colt stated their pre-WW II PPS was safe with that ammo, a post-WW II PPS should be as well.