Kevin, I don't think there's a single greatest handgun, any more than there's a single greatest car, or truck, or pair of skis, or NFL quarterback. I've found that a lot of tools have uses to which they're better suited than others, and this includes my sidearms.
Over the years I have carried the following handguns for plainclothes duty use or for personal CCW:
If push came to shove and I was handed any of the above pistols and told that's what I had to carry for personal protection for the next X number of days, I'd be fine with it. I would not willingly choose a 380 over a larger caliber nowadays, but if I had to I could make it work. (I carried the 380's back before viable 9x19mm pocket pistols like the Kahrs came along).
All of them were solid choices, in my experience. They were/are all:
Reliable Powerful (powerful enough, anyway) Ergonomically suitable Accurate
None of these pistols had any significant "custom" work done on them, other than minor action work. Most were not flat or lightweight, either. I shot every one of them a great deal, to convince myself they weren't going to puke when the SHTF, and to satisfy myself that I could make them work as intended under any and all circumstances.
But if I had to pick only one handgun from that list as my choice for the rest of my life (ugh, I hate that hypothetical, but, okay, for once I'll play along) I'd pick the Glock 23, 2nd Generation model with night sights, standard 13-round magazine. My second choice would probably the the SIG P220, and the main reason it's #2 is its single-stack 8-rnd magazine. My third choice would probably be the S&W M65.
Good luck with your article. Let us know when it comes out.
"I'm gonna have to science the schit out of this." Mark Watney, Sol 59, Mars
