Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns 1903 Colt 32 ACP parkarized

I recently came across a 1903 Colt pocket pistol in original parkerized condition.. It is not military marked, just the normal Colt marking and made in 1922. Does anyone know anything about these??

Bob

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Cool guns. I used to have the polished blue version in .380 ACP. I think Patton carried one.

Parkerized 32 hammerless were the Version V made in WWII. Roughly 17,800 were made in that finish towards the end of production in 1945.

The John Browning-designed 1903 Pocket Hammerless in .32 ACP chambering was one of Colt’s most popular handguns, with 572,215 made between 1903 and 1945, along with enough parts to keep it in production until 1953. Actually, the gun was not hammerless at all, as its hammer was merely concealed within the frame. Standard finishes were blue or nickel. Early stocks were checkered hard rubber; later guns featured checkered walnut with Colt medallions. In an age when revolvers dominated the handgun scene, the instruction sheet explained that even though the 1903 Pocket Hammerless was an “automatic,” the trigger had to be pulled for each shot, stating “... it is impossible to fire all the shots by pulling the trigger only once.”

Collectors break down the Model M into five basic variants. The Type I (1903-1908) featured a 4-inch barrel, while the Type II (around 1908-1910) changed to a 3¾-inch barrel. Type III (1910) eliminated the barrel bushing, Type IV (1926) introduced the magazine disconnect, and Type Vs were World War II-production guns, most of which were Parkerized

Type I: Integral barrel bushing, four-inch barrel, no magazine safety, serial numbers 1 through 71,999[2]
Type II: 32 cal separate barrel bushing, 3​3⁄4-inch barrel; 1908–1910, SN 72,000 through 105,050[2]
Type II: 380 cal separate barrel bushing, 3​3⁄4-inch barrel; 1908–1910, SN 001 through 6250 [2]
Type III: integrated barrel bushing, 3​3⁄4-inch barrel; 1910–1926, SN 105,051 through 468,789[2]
Type IV: integrated barrel bushing, 3​3⁄4-inch barrel, magazine safety[2]
Type V: integrated barrel bushing, 3​3⁄4-inch barrel, military sights, magazine safety on both commercial and "U.S. property" variations. SN 468,097 through 554,446.[2]
There was an M1903 version with a military Parkerized finish, which is otherwise the same as the Model IV, SN 554,447 through 572,214.[2]

IIRC they were the General Officer Pistol of the era.

Bogart used one in several of his movies, notably Casablanca and (I think) Key Largo; supposedly because he was not a very large man and a 1911 looked huge when he held one.

Correct and yes Patton did carry one.

In Europe during WWII Patton had a small .32 caliber Colt automatic pistol which he called his "social pistol". He usually wore this .32 in a small clip-holster in his right hand trouser pocket when he was in the rear areas. He wore it inside his jacket as an additional "safety precaution" when he was in the front lines. On rare occasions, such as the formal ceremony when Patton turned over the command of the Third Army to Lt. General Lucian K. Truscott, Patton wore a more "subdued" weapon; a Colt .38 snub-nosed Detective Special with black, hard rubber grips.

Probably wrongly depicts him with a polished steel civilian model.

Here's the 1908 Model I used to have. The hard rubber grips it came with had one cracked panel, so I replaced them with these custom walnut grips.

Sweet!

Here it is with the original grips on.