Overview

The Handgun Story traces the fascinating history of the 'one hand gun' from its crude fourteenth-century origins to the sophisticated products of today. As technology has progressed, handguns have got smaller and deadlier, to be carried in holsters, pockets and even lady's mufflers. Today they are the weapons of choice for undercover agents and would - be assassins; ideally suited for both attack and self-defence. The earliest pistols had a tendency to misfire, but this was cured by the cap-lock. Cap-lock revolvers proved a massive success in the American Civil War with hundreds of thousands used on each side. Self-contained metal-case cartridges were to bring a fundamental change to handgun design: not only by allowing the introduction of revolvers that ejected automatically or were easily reloaded, but also by paving the way for the automatic pistol. World War I provided the handgun with a proving ground. At the end of the hostilities, with so much surplus weaponry, work on the handgun could have ceased; instead, a new developmental phase was begun by the nations that had emerged from the crumbling Imperial empires. During World War II the efficiency of well-established designs was confirmed and new designs, such as the Walther P. 38, showed their potential. The emergence of the submachine-gun in 1945 reduced the status of the handgun - but only temporarily. The need for efficient self-defence shows no signs of lessening; and the rise in shooting for sport, particularly with the revolver, has sharpened the quest for efficiency. The never ending search for advanced production techniques shows that the handgun has as much a future in the twenty-first century as it had in the heyday of the Wild West, or in the trenches of Passchendaele. sales Detailed examination of the gtuns and manufacturers Fully-illustrated with more than 100 photographs and diagrams Written by a world authority on handguns Author John Walter is the author of more than 60 books including The Guns that Won the West and Military Handguns of Two World Wars

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9781848325005

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...takes readers on a tour of the history of the development, adaptation, and uses of handguns...provides numerous renderings of the mechanisms of a variety of guns... will interests both gun and history enthusiasts .--Book News, Inc. ...packed with diagrams, history and black and white photos; a key guide for anyone interested in handguns. --Midwest Book Review

.. .takes readers on a tour of the history of the development, adaptation, and uses of handguns...provides numerous renderings of the mechanisms of a variety of guns... will interests both gun and history enthusiasts. --Book News, Inc. .. .packed with diagrams, history and black and white photos; a key guide for anyone interested in handguns. --Midwest Book Review

Author Information

John Walter, born in Glasgow in 1951, is among the world's most prolific writers on small arms--author of seventy books, translated into more than a dozen languages. Walter has worked with edged weapons, bladed tools, firearms, railway locomotives, warships, scientific instruments and even heraldry. Among his published works have been several studies of the Luger pistol; four editions of Rifles of the World; The Airgun Book; The Rifle Story and The Handgun Story; Guns of the Elite and its current successor, Guns of the Elite Forces; The German Rifle; and The Greenhill Dictionary of Guns and Gunmakers.

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