When did Jacketed bullets come out for hand gun loads

[jh45gun]

Just wondering I was reading a book of one of my favorite authors and he made the comment of a steel jacketed slug ripping through the bad guys body. Only problem is this was set in the late 1890s. I know jacketed bullets were developed by the Rubin (Swiss) in 1882 and the French used Jacketed bullets in their Lebel in 1886. But I can find no mention doing a search on pistol bullets. It stands to reason there was no need to switch from lead to jacketed until the velocities got up there with smokeless powder. With the Holy Black lead bullets would have sufficed just fine and no need to jacket bullets. So does any one know when jacketed pistol bullets came into use? Date?

[Matthew 25]

Still no need to switch from lead to jacket bullets.

[ReloaderFred]

It would have been before the first of the 20th Century. The 9x19 was invented in 1902 and I'm pretty sure it was using jacketed bullets for the Luger. The .45 acp was invented in 1905 by John Browning for his 1905 Pistol, which I'm also pretty sure used a jacketed bullet. Then there were the Mauser Machine Pistols, which I'm pretty sure used jacketed bullets, too.

Those are the ones I know off the top of my head, so I suppose a search would turn up the correct answer. My guess is that for the most part, lead bullets prevailed for revolver use and jacketed for semi-auto use.

Hope this helps.

Fred

[jh45gun]

Thanks Fred I figured it was after the turn of the Century. Matt I agree I use lead bullets for most of my shooting. The reason I want to know is I contacted the guy who wrote the book with that comment and told him that those of us that use and shoot guns prefer reading books and watching movies with period correct firearms and ammunition. When they write something that is not correct or put something in a movie that is not correct it takes away from the book or movie or tv show ect.

[John Traveler]

Jacketed pistol bullets were introduced in the 1890s with the then-new Mannlicher, Mauser, and the predecessor of the Parabellum (Luger) semiauto pistols.

The jackets were found to be necessary in pistol ammunition just as it was found to be necessary in rifle ammunition when using the new smokeless propellants that gave much higher velocities.

[Matthew 25]

jh45, I was just digging a little. I shoot plenty of j-bullets myself. I would like to know more about this history, too. I hope someone comes up with a good source.

[Thumbcocker]

I believe that the C96 "broomhandle" mauser pistol was always a jacketed round. It was introduced in 1896, not sure when it would have been on the market after that but surely before 1900.

[Von Dingo]

I believe that the C96 "broomhandle" mauser pistol was always a jacketed round. It was introduced in 1896, not sure when it would have been on the market after that but surely before 1900.

A young Winston Churchill had a C 96 broomhandle Mauser during the Battle of Omdurman in 1898 in the Sudan, and the Second Boer War in 1899.

[jh45gun]

OK that answers that question when they came out and first used now when do you suppose ammo for Black Powder Loadings like the 45 Colt and 44/40 ect came out with jacketed loads?

[Bret4207]

In terms of when they were available to the general public? I bet if you went to some of the cartridge collectors sites you'd find out for sure, but I'm betting the late 20's/early 30's for the 44-40 and 45 Colt at the very earliest. If you meant the 38 Special then surely the late teens or early 20's for the "armor piercing" type loads, maybe the late 20's after thinking about it. The 45ACP, 32ACP, etc all had FMJ for the longest time.

[Char-Gar]

Prior to the mid-50s, the only jacketed ammo available for handguns were FMJ for auto pistols and a metal piercing load or two for the .357 Mag, for cops to use against automobiles. Everything else was lead of some sort. Most if not all auto-pistols started life with FMJ bullets. The Broomhandle Mauser and P.05 Luger for certain. I once shot up a couple of boxes of 9mm ammo from UMC. It was loaded prior to 1910 and had 125 grain cupro-nickle truncated cone bullets.

The experimenters got into the game and folks like Harvey of Lakeville arms tried to push the lead envelope with half jacketed bullets and cast bullets with zinc washer bases. Some loading tool manufactures started offering. machines to make half jacketed bullets like the Swag-o-Matic from CH. Speer started production of some half (3/4) jacketed bullet which are still in their line.

To my recollection the first true JHP bullets were 9mm offered by Norma. This was about 1962 or so. They could be had either as ammo or components. I still have most of the first box of Norma 9mm JHP bullets I ever saw. In short order every manufacture piled on and the game was afoot.

The early JHP bullets didn't work all that well. It took Lee Jurris to come along with Super-Vel ammo to really make things work as they do now. Lee sold millions of rounds of handgun ammo and then the major manufactures ganged up on him and put him out of business with price cutting.

Lee deserves far more credit than he is most often accorded. He started the ball rolling on truly effective JHP ammo and his work has saved many lives of LEOs. He is also a great human being.

I suppose I might have missed a detail or two in all of this, as it is coming from pure human memory and not any research into the subject. But I think this will stand up to a reasonable level of scrutiny

[Von Dingo]

The early JHP bullets didn't work all that well. It took Lee Jurris to come along with Super-Vel ammo to really make things work as they do now. Lee sold millions of rounds of handgun ammo and then the major manufactures ganged up on him and put him out of business with price cutting.

Lee deserves far more credit than he is most often accorded. He started the ball rolling on truly effective JHP ammo and his work has saved many lives of LEOs. He is also a great human being.

Charger, I'm not sharpshooting, or correcting, this all happened before my time.

A couple of years ago, GUNS magazine had an article on Lee Jurris. Unreasonable demands were thrown at him from suppliers, and when he met them, they just stopped delivering componants to him. Along with the reasons you cited, having no product to deliver to keep up with orders, killed Super-Vel.

Apparently him innovating, anticipating, listening to market demands, and meeting them, didn't sit well with the old guard.

[Bret4207]

Chargar, do you recall a metal piercing for the 44 Special? I seem to recall an article in Gun Digest maybe of early jacketed handgun ammo. Dang, now I'm going to have to go look. Seems like there were "metal cased" target loads too. But, with my so called memory....

[onceabull]

We were shooting jacketed bullets in 38/40, 44/40,& 32/20 handguns before l950,and I still have cartridges and boxes in both of these that predate WWII... I assume that was the case because these cartridges were also commonly used in rifles of those eras... Onceabull

[9.3X62AL]

Chargar's recollections are in line with my own readings on this subject. I was around and active in the hobbies when Mr. Jurras got fanged by The Big Boys, and thought it was pretty nasty of the mainstream makers to regard him and treat him this way.

[Char-Gar]

I know Lee Jurris pretty well. He was also the guy behind the Automag pistols. He is still well, kicking and building 1,000 yard bench rest rifles. He moved a couple of years ago and is now in Arizona. When he moved, I got his copy of Hatcher's Notebook and his copy of Pistolsmithing by Nonte. This was a copy inscribed to Jurris from Nonte, as Lee had a chapter in the book. These books are among my most treasured possessions. He was not happy about what happened to Super-Vel, but he is not bitter about it.

He had a web site a couple of years back but it didn't last long. Like many old timers, he grew weary of folks who didn't know their A$$ from a hole in the ground, challenging him on just about everything he wrote. It just isn't worth the effort to put up with some of the pissant ignoramuses out there who have read two years worth of pulp gun magazines and think they know everything. The level of ignorance and arrogance by some posters on internet sites is truly appalling.

IMHO, he is one of the living treasures of the shooting community and far under appreciated for the roll he played in getting us where we are today. He was one of the early recipients of the American Hand gunner Award.

Bret, there may have been been some 44 metal jacketed ammo, but I don't recall it. My recall is far from perfect, but I am too lazy to check my facts and don't really give a s$%& if they are off a mite. I spent allot of years in Graduate School where everything had to be footnoted, book and page, but those days are thankfully behind me.

The .357 Mag was the big boy on the block and it was said it could shoot through an engine block. Well, we know that was hooey, but it could put an engine out of commission when hit in the right place.

Onceabull.. I have a box of old 32-20s with jacketed bullets, but they are labeled for rifle only. I have shot other boxes of this ammo in Colt Army Specials and later Smith and Wesson M&Ps, with the heat treated cylinders. I would think twice before shooting them in the Smith without the heat treated cylinders. I don't know about 38-40s or 44-40s. Where those jacketed loads made for rifles or pistols?

Von Dingo..There are plenty of days when I wished all of this happened before my time, but I can't roll the clock backwards. I am stuck with what I have. :-)

[Von Dingo]

I think stuck is the wrong word Charger. I'm just happy to be here, and get some of the shared knowledge. I started reloading about six or seven years before becoming acquainted with the net. The little things that have been picked up since these sites were discovered have been a great help. Plus, it's nice to know I'm not alone, I'm a grumpy, soon to be old guy, in training, already as you say "weary of folks who didn't know their A$$ from a hole in the ground". Trying to keep my mouth shut, and keep my foot out of it:p.

[ReloaderFred]

As I'm already an old coot, I'll chime in on the metal jacketed .38 Special/.357 Magnum Metal Piercing rounds. There were two of them. One used a lead bullet with a conical/truncated cone brass or copper cap on the tip of the bullet. The bearing surface was lead. The second used a bullet that I believe is probably zinc, or a zinc alloy. This bullet was more of a round nose bullet, with a slightly longer nose on it. Somewhere in my stash I have samples of both bullets, but since I adhere to the PHD system of filing (Pile it Higher and Deeper) I can't lay my hands on them at the moment.

Hope this helps.

Fred

PS: Oh, and I also have no patience with armchair commandos and experts, who have learned all they "know" from the internet, and couldn't read a book if their life depended on it........ Or for that matter, are afraid to experiment to see if something actually works.

[twildman]

I recall that the (reprint) 1902 Sears catalog has smokeless loads for 44/40 and 38/40 with jacketed softpoints. I have seen some very early such loads, and the jackets were cupronickel. E. Keith had a low opinion of the effectiveness of those loads.

[twildman]

BTW the 45 Colt smokeless loads at that time also used lead bullets just as the BP ones.

[onceabull]

Chargar: Dug through the treasures for a while and came up on some of those 38/40 and 44/40 prewar boxes..The only one labeled for "rifle use only" is for the 38/40 ,also marked "express" . The bullet is a 130 gr jacketed hollow point by RemUmc..the 38/40's with the 180 gr jacketed and the 44/40's with 200 gr jacketed are non-denominational as far as labeling goes..That HiSpeed 32/20 load (marked for rifles) was commonly seen in our world of the 50's...Known far and wide as the "poachers choice"for jacklighting in the orchards...I also dug out a mid 50's lyman reloading booklet.. and found these loads for rifles: in 38/40, 22.0 Gr. Herc.2400 (Max) 180 gr jacketed, and for 44/40: 27.5 gr Herc.2400(Max) 200 gr jacketed...I wouldn't shoot either in ANY Orig. win mdl.1873 of my own, and if I were to try those in a revolver it would be a Ruger Blackhawk,or equiv. Let someone else be the first to plow elsewhere.. The revolvers in play there in my youth were either Peacemakers, or Colt New Service.... Onceabull

[Char-Gar]

I would not shoot them in a Winchester 73 or a pistol, but a Winchester 92 is another thing altogether.

[9.3X62AL]

27.5 grains of 2400 in 44-40 WCF.......HIJO LA! Not gonna happen in my '73--in fact, the 2400 dosage units for that rifle are 1/2 that powder weight, for 1175-1200 FPS and fair-to-middling accuracy. Minute-of-blacktail at any range I'd contemplate with that rig, anyway. SAECO #446 is the slug involved, with CCI 300 primers setting the music off.

[onceabull]

With PLENTY of time downriver, I've pretty much set in the opinion that Many years ago factory smokeless loads ,jacketed or no,for the WCF hyphen dual purpose cartridges were set up to be safe in the weakest rifles out there:Win.md 73, earliest Marlins(pre 1893,1894)..Those labeled for rifle use only may well have proved toxic for the above cited actions,but would have been fine in the wonderful 1892 Winnie, 1894 Marlin, or 14 1/2 Remmie..Personally I'd wager UP that the Colt New service will handle with ease any load safe in the win 73.. Charger:there were no Marlins in the field where/when I was starting , just Win.92's and Rem.14 1/2s, Most everyone local opined that the 14 1/2 must be stronger because the 14s and 141's were out there for grownups to use....I'm no longer convinced of that, having seen the 92's and clones in 44 Rem.Mag. that seem to hold together..probably won't matter,given the $$$ it takes to get a 14 1/2 today,and my generation was not first in line as the old guys rifles got passed down... Onceabull

[jh45gun]

Just as I thought so it is safe to say any jacketed bullets for the 45 colt or other pistol rounds used in the late `1800s did not come out with jacketed bullets until in the 1900's. Thanks for the replies guys.

[oldscool]

Full patch or fmj were offfered from WRA from '92, soft point jacketed from WRA in '96. 32, 38, and 44WCF were among the offerings, tho are scarce. A lot of people would not believe that nickled brass shotshells were in existence 20 some years earlier either. I collect brass scattergun shells, and am not real up on rifle or pistol cartridges. There is a guy on here from Iowa, I believe Dave-Swannee??? that should be able to help pin your question down, as there were other ammunition companies alive at the time too.

Just for example, there was a time when companies that had skilled craftsmen actually catered to customer wants, and were not hampered by corperate bean counters as to what they could provide.
http://www.hunt101.com/data/547/shiney_old_stuff.jpg

I have CRS at the moment, but you might google when bar anvil primers were used to date the nickle shells shown. You might think there was no need, but I would not assume they didn't exist if I saw one in a movie.

[Oyeboten]

My own acceptence, is that there was no justiciation for Jacketed or FMJ Bullets for Hand Guns in the 1890s or since, other than for some special application conditions.

Rather, as far as I can tell, the early Automatics elected to associate themselves with FMJ Ammunition/Bullets from the get-go, in order to appeal to Military Interests of those Nations as prospective purchasers of the Arms, who wished to abide by the Hague Convention, which in the mid 1890s had forbidden the use by any of it's subscribers, of expanding-type Bullets in War.


Proper Lead Bullets are fine in .38 Super or .357 Magnum or other high Velocity Hand Gun Hand Loads, and fine in an early Mauser or any other Automatic of the peiod, and fine at those Velocities.

It's just that technically, a Lead Bullet is not in keeping with the Hague Convention Guidelines, and, whether an actual signatory or subscriber to the Convention or not, it became tacit among almost everyone's Military, and, ammunition Manufacturers, that Military Arms, or, Cartridges prospectively intended for Military Use, would be FMJ, and that is how it went.

[jh45gun]

My own acceptence, is that there was no justiciation for Jacketed or FMJ Bullets for Hand Guns in the 1890s or since, other than for some special application conditions.

Rather, as far as I can tell, the early Automatics elected to associate themselves with FMJ Ammunition/Bullets from the get-go, in order to appeal to Military Interests of those Nations as prospective purchasers of the Arms, who wished to abide by the Hague Convention, which in the mid 1890s had forbidden the use by any of it's subscribers, of expanding-type Bullets in War.


Proper Lead Bullets are fine in .38 Super or .357 Magnum or other high Velocity Hand Gun Hand Loads, and fine in an early Mauser or any other Automatic of the peiod, and fine at those Velocities.

It's just that technically, a Lead Bullet is not in keeping with the Hague Convention Guidelines, and, whether an actual signatory or subscriber to the Convention or not, it became tacit among almost everyone's Military, and, ammunition Manufacturers, that Military Arms, or, Cartridges prospectively intended for Military Use, would be FMJ, and that is how it went.

Only reason I wanted to find out was to correct an author about using period correct ammo in a SSA. Though Sharps and Winchester Rifles were mentioned also.

[Von Dingo]

My own acceptence, is that there was no justiciation for Jacketed or FMJ Bullets for Hand Guns in the 1890s or since, other than for some special application conditions.

Rather, as far as I can tell, the early Automatics elected to associate themselves with FMJ Ammunition/Bullets from the get-go, in order to appeal to Military Interests of those Nations as prospective purchasers of the Arms, who wished to abide by the Hague Convention, which in the mid 1890s had forbidden the use by any of it's subscribers, of expanding-type Bullets in War.


Proper Lead Bullets are fine in .38 Super or .357 Magnum or other high Velocity Hand Gun Hand Loads, and fine in an early Mauser or any other Automatic of the peiod, and fine at those Velocities.

It's just that technically, a Lead Bullet is not in keeping with the Hague Convention Guidelines, and, whether an actual signatory or subscriber to the Convention or not, it became tacit among almost everyone's Military, and, ammunition Manufacturers, that Military Arms, or, Cartridges prospectively intended for Military Use, would be FMJ, and that is how it went.

To my line of thinking I agree with most of your statement. At the same time I wonder how much of it had to do with ease of production too. When the factories make millions of rounds, it is far easier to swage a soft lead core, then swage a jacket on it. Rather than lovingly casting a slug of proper alloy and lubing it. The British were using a lead slug in the .38/200 (is that is incorrect, forgive me) at the beginning of WW II.

[Thumbcocker]

I doubt cast projectiles were used in 1800's handguns very often. the vast majority of projectiles used in civil war rifles were swaged. I cant imagine that factory ammo in the mid to late 1800's were anything but swaged.

[Oyeboten]

Makes sense to me that swaged would be vastly more effecient means of produciton than Cast, when in a Manufacturing scenario.

Far as I recall, the Hague Convention in effect, stopped the use of plain or naked Lead Bullets for War, and, pretty well everyone went to FMJ or 'Copper Patch' by the mid 1890s for all Hand Gun and Rifle used in Military contexts.

'Dum Dums' or related ( semi-jacketed, Soft Nose expanding or semi-jacketed Hollow Nose forms ) no doubt continued or remained available in various designs for Civillian and Hunting Rifle contexts, even as the old .476 Manstopper Cartridge and it's Lead DEHBWC Bullet, apparently did for a while for Revolvers chambered for it.


I am sure that the Commonwealth .38-200 Cartridge was fully Jacketed for both WWI and WWII in it's Military applicaiton, even if 'plain' Lead Bullet Ammunition was available for that chambering for Civillian or LEO use.