The 1880 .442 Enfield was the first "self-extracting" revolver adopted by the British Army. Indeed, it was a comedy of errors. It had an annoying tendency for loaded chambers to rotate of their own weight to the bottom of the frame. This left the user with an empty gun! Experience during Zulu and Afghan campaigns revealed that the Enfield was too heavy, inaccurate, awkward-loading, too complicated to deploy quickly, underpowered and not drop-safe. When "improvements" implemented in the Mk2 version failed to address all the problems, the Enfield withdrawn from service after only ten years, in 1890.
The Enfield was replaced by the Webley Mk1 with 4-inch barrel, firing the .450/476 cartridge. The Webley, in various “Marks” I through VI, soldiered on proudly until 1956. The Mark IV (Boer War Model) and later marks are safe for use with Cordite or smokeless loads. The earlier marks I through III should be shot with black powder only.
The .455 Mk VI cartridge, introduced 1939, fired a 265-gr. FMJ at 625+/-25 fps from a 5” barrel. The .455 was considered obsolete by the end of WW2, but lead-bullet Mk2 ammunition was made by Kynoch for export and civilian law enforcement use until 1969. CIL in Canada loaded lead-bullet .455 Colt into the mid-1970s. Hornady produced a run of Mk2 lead ammo in 2008. Starline currently produces 0.76” .455 Mk II brass. The shorter Mk2 case was adopted concurrent with the adoption of chopped cordite and flake smokeless powders to improve ballistic uniformity.
Prior to WW1, service pistol practice in the British Army was one-handed, single-action slow fire. Shooting was conducted at 30 paces on 8-inch bullseye targets. Two-handed or double-action shooting were not specifically taught. Rapid, continuous fire was expected to be deployed only in an extreme emergency. Revolver drills in the Musketry Regulations 1909-1914 emphasized deliberate single-action fire “executed with alacrity.”
After 1890 Naval personnel and Royal Marines of ship's compliment were issued Webley revolvers. These were used when standing watches, and carried on shore and boarding parties. Ship’s equipment provided ample stocks of revolvers for such purposes. Common WW1 practice was to arm officers and NCOs, as well as cooks, trumpeters, farriers, gunners, transport drivers, pilots, observers, engineers, tunnelers and sappers with “pistols.”
(Brits call all handguns “pistols,” and the term “revolver” was also commonly used to describe any handgun.)
In 1916 revolvers became secondary arms for the Machine Gun Corps, as well as for the Royal Flying Corps and the Tank Corps. Trench warfare spurred the development of “practical pistol shooting” as we know it today. Revolvers, Mill’s bombs, cutlasses, hatchets, and truncheons were the preferred armament carried on trench raids. In 1916 Capt. C.D. Tracy and Capt. J.B.L. Noel produced the “Instructional Course for the Webley Pistol,” which emphasized instinctive point shooting with the objective for every soldier armed with a revolver to be able to accomplish “The War Shot” — hitting a 16” high x 12” wide steel plate at ten yards in one second.
Pistols were universally thought of as close-range weapons for fast encounters:
“The revolver is . . . a weapon for quick use at close quarters . . . looked upon more as a defensive weapon than an arm of precision . . . for delivering a knock-down blow within the limits of its normal short fighting range . . . used instinctively . . . aligned and discharged as a shotgun is used on moving game, rather than being consciously sighted . . . .”
Pistols would only be held with two hands for engaging the enemy at distances beyond 20 yards, such as when firing at the charging Hun over a trench parapet, or when in “No Man’s Land” from the shelter of a shell crater, firing from a prone position. Otherwise soldiers were taught a one-handed, stiff-armed position, intended to absorb recoil, pivoting the body above the waist, with feet planted, as if a gun turret, and to thumb-cock the revolver as it is raised in a smooth motion after the draw, discharging the gun instinctively at the top of its vertical rise at the precise instant the sights came into alignment with the target, without dwelling upon sight picture.
When firing single-action in this fashion, the expectation was for the soldier to produce six hits on a man-sized silhouette at 15 yards in 12 seconds. An expert shot, firing double-action, was expected to do the same in 3 seconds, engaging multiple targets from near contact to 10 yards, firing instinctively from the hip. Training emphasized proper stance, grip, and draw, and coordinating the rise and alignment of the pistol. A full hand squeeze was taught to discharge the revolver without jerking the trigger, being reinforced through dry firing to build smooth, coordinated motion, executed rapidly to “shoot first and live!”
Training conditions were made as realistic as possible. Elaborate trench systems with canvas houses featured moving targets which fleetingly appeared, advanced, and retreated, crossing quickly in front of the shooter or just popping up momentarily before vanishing. Instruction included ambidextrous firing around corners when moving through a trench, clearing a dugout or house room-by-room. Training emphasis stressed use of cover vs. mere concealment, to protect raiding parties from shells or enemy fire, exploiting wall corner beams, rubble piles, or shell craters. Two-handed shooting was taught to 50 yards or more. Common-sense instructions included advice such as:
• Keep track of the number of rounds fired and top off the revolver as frequently as possible.
• Never advance with fewer than 3 chambers loaded.
• When loading single rounds, load the chamber at 10:00 first, with the others to follow anti-clockwise, because the Webley (and Colt) cylinder rotates clockwise, the cartridge will be rotated into position straightaway.
• When unloading, to avoid a spent case being trapped under the extractor, always hold the pistol muzzle up or on its side when breaking it open.
• If in the heat of battle should a revolver run empty or become unserviceable, attempt to bluff the enemy,
• If the above fails, use the pistol as a bludgeon. Use the barrel to jab at the eyes or throat or use the front sight in a backhanded slash across the neck.
• The grip on the gun must never be relinquished, nor should the gun ever be held by the barrel to use it as a club!
(Indeed, there had been accounts of officers being shot after having experienced a misfire when they grasped the barrel for bludgeoning purposes, only to have the enemy grab the butt, and pull the trigger repeatedly until the weapon discharged).
Tracey’s Revolver Shooting in War (1916) describes these methods in detail.
While pistol lanyards were uniform items of the era, Tracy considered them a liability in the trenches. “If used, [the lanyard] should only be employed at night or if mounted and NEVER attached around the neck, but around the arm, either under the epaulettes or centrally on the Sam Browne belt, allowing for the pistol to be employed with either hand.” Otherwise the lanyard had the potential to be snagged on equipment or debris. [Indeed, an acquaintance of Tracy was strangled with a pistol lanyard, and another lost his life when the lanyard was caught by the revolver hammer, causing a misfire, so that he was bayonetted].
While dated, the above is good advice for revolver users, even today.
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