Royal Canadian Navy-marked Colt New Service

[RangeRover]

Posting around details and pictures of my newly-acquired Colt New Service to find additional information and see examples held by others, as while I have to think other Canadian Navy utilized Colts (and other RCN firearms and militaria) are out there, my searching hasn't turned up too much. Here's what I have found, though.

Here's the Colt. Still in the original .455 Eley chambering. It's my first Colt.



S/N dates it to 1917 production.

Pistol features British acceptance proofs, Canadian C-broad arrow stamp, DCP proof stamps on the back of the cylinder and C-arrow-N markings; twice on the frame and once on the cylinder, which seems to indicate service with the Royal Canadian Navy.





While waiting for it to arrive, I did a little surfing online.

Clive Law, in his Canadian Military Handguns 1855-1985 (pg. 43) states “The Royal Canadian Navy, mostly because they fought as self-contained units within which pistols were considered low priority, were issued .455 cal. and .45 cal. pistols. These pistols were usually surplus left over from the First World War.” The markings on this revolver support that statement.

My revolver is also configured and marked just as this one held by the Canadian War Museum .

The Museum entry states these revolvers were used by the British military in the Great War, they were transferred to the Canadian Army inter-war, and then used by the RCN in the Second World War. “The Royal Canadian Navy issued pistols like this Colt revolver to members of the Naval Police, guards, and personnel in boarding parties.”

The picture below, which can be found on the Canadian Military Police Museum (http://mpmuseum.org/index3.html) shows what looks like what might be the big Colt crammed into a P37 holster. It could be a different revolver, though.



Here’s another photo showing a Canadian sailor wielding a New Service. This from a great site I found about HMCS Prince Robert, a Canadian armed merchant cruiser/anti-aircraft escort on hand for the surrender of the Japanese in Hong Kong on VJ day, and which brought Canadian POWs back to Canada. (http://www.hillmanweb.com/rcn/)

The photo shows a member of the Prince Robert’s crew, James W. (Judd) Whittall, Colt in hand, accepting the the surrender of a Japanese soldier in Hong Kong.



By the way, the Canadian War Museum has an excellent Virtual Exhibition online carrying over from the Navy’s centennial in 2010. The link below will take you to a section in the exhibition that focuses on small arms used by the RCN. There are entries here ranging from Long Lees, through Ross rifles and Lanchester SMGs, to the FN C1D. Picture of all objects are zoomable for detail. It’s very cool. Click on the artifact record for more info as well.

http://www.warmuseum.ca/cwm/exhibiti...px?section=4-C

I'd love to see any photos of other RCN small arms held by folks here on the Board. And any other background on these would also be appreciated. Thanks.

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[breakeyp]

Mine is like yours but in .45 LC.

[RangeRover]

Mine is like yours but in .45 LC.

Can you share some photos? And any back story on your revolver? Where did you find it?