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Extremely Rare U.S. Inspected World War II Colt Super .38 Shipped to Remington Arms
LOT 1487
Outstanding and Extremely Rare World War II U.S. Inspected Colt Super .38
Semi-Automatic Pistol with Factory Letter, Documented as Shipped to Ordnance
Inspector at Remington Arms Co. - Serial no. 36795, 38 super auto cal., 5 inch round
bbl., blue finish, plastic grips. Per the included factory letter, this pistol was part of a 24 piece shipment to the “Resident Inspector of Ordnance”
at Remington Arms in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
This places it as part of a very limited run of late
World War II Super .38 pistols ordered by the U.S. government. 400 were ordered in total,
with 24 delivered to Remington and the remainder to the Military Administrative & Supply Division at the Fowler Building in Rosslyn, Virginia. It is speculated that when the government ordered its batch of Super .38’s there was a massive typo in the ammunition order to Remington, which made them think they were on the hook to make and quality assure over 32 million rounds of ammo; Remington went in expecting to need 24 pistols for ammo testing, and likely expected to shoot every last one to death to meet the demand. Once the confusion was sorted out (and after Remington made nearly 2 million rounds of .38 Super), 20 of the pistols were routed through Springfield to the Pentagon, with their final disposition unknown. It has been speculated that the original destination of these pistols was the OSS, as the Fowler Building acted as one of their warehouses, and they would have greater need of non-standard weaponry than most government outfits. More information on these pistols can be found on p. 107-112 of “Colt’s Super .38: The Production History From 1929 through 1971” by Douglas Sheldon. The final fate of most of the U.S. .38 Super pistols is unknown; out of the 24 Remington-shipped pistols and the 376 Fowler Building-shipped pistols, only 13 (5 Remington, 8 Fowler) were identified in collections by Sheldon at the time of publishing (1997), with this specific example pictured on p. 108 as one of the known examples. Very, rare in any condition, this particular U.S. Super .38 made it through the decades in prime condition; finding another one, let alone a better one, is unlikely. Fixed blade front sight and flat top square notch rear sight on the matching serialized slide, with the caliber marking on the right and the two-line Colt address and patent dates on the left. A Swartz-pattern firing pin safety is factory installed. The barrel is blued with a polished chamber. The frame is “GHD” (Drury) inspected with the Ordnance “cannons” stamp on the right, and fitted with a thin knurled hammer, short stamped trigger, long grip safety, arched serrated mainspring housing, and reinforced Colt grips. The correct full blue magazine has the Colt Super .38 Auto markings on the base. CONDITION: Excellent, retains 98% plus of the original high polish blue finish with some scattered very light handling marks and a few areas of very light edge wear. The grips are also excellent with some light wear near the top of the right panel and a few scattered light blemishes in the otherwise crisp checkering. Mechanically excellent. Provenance: The Dr. Robert Azar Collection. Estimate: 18,000 - 27,500
Collector’s Fact
Of the 400 Colt Super .38 pistols ordered by the U.S. Government during World War II, 24 were delivered to Remington. Some of these pistols are believed to have been destined for the OSS.
AS PICTURED AND DESCRIBED IN THE BOOK COLT’S SUPER .38: THE PRODUCTION HISTORY FROM 1929 THROUGH 1971 BY SHELDON
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