My grandmother found a revolver among my grandfather's possessions after he passed. She had no idea that he had it, and is now hoping to learn anything about it that she can. The only markings I can find are the Japanese characters on the back of the handle and a stamped "18" on the face of the barrel that abuts the revolver cartridge.

I have attached some pictures of the revolver and of the writing on the handle, but am not positive. Let me know if there are other angles or details that can help identify the revolver.

Thank you for your help,

Colin

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I am not sure why only 1 picture was attached or why I cannot add others. Can anyone help?

Hi,
I'm more in reading japanese sword signatures, but I give it a try:
The fist part is a date: Meiji 15 Year = 1882 (the time of the regency of Mutsuhiro Tenno startet with the period called Meiji in 1862, so first year is 1862 etc.)
Followed by two kanji (signs) I can't make out properly
again a numer 29 followed by the kanji for "number")

At the bottom maybe are a signature of an owner oder manufacturer.

I recommend to ask Markus Sesko ;-)
https://markussesko.wordpress.com/

Greetings
Andreas

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IIRC there is/was a Type 29 revolver in a rimmed 9mm cartridge issued from the late 19th C. till the end of WW2, typically issued to NCO's in the Imperial Japanese Army and maybe police. With some more pics I can tell you if that's what it is.

Your Grandfather may have brought it back after the war.

Edit: Oops! I was thinking Type 26. Sorry, that's not your revolver.

Thanks to everyone for the replies. I have attached some additional pictures that I hope will help.

Please let me know if you need additional views to help with identification.

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It looks sort of like a S&W Model 1 to me - maybe a Japanese copy of that gun? Or, a model imported to Japan?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_%26_Wesson_Model_1

You should really post this on "The High Road" or somewhere like that. There are guys on there who'll be able to tell you for sure.

"The Model 1 was in popular demand with the outbreak of the American Civil War as soldiers from all ranks on both sides of the conflict made private purchases of the revolvers for self-defense. So much that orders for the Model 1 revolver outpaced the factory's production capabilities, forcing Smith & Wesson to expand into a new facility and began experimenting with a new cartridge design more suitable than the .22 Short in 1860.[4]

This popularity led to numerous knockoffs and patent infringements by other armsmakers."

Thank you for the suggestion. I will try over there too.0

In case anyone is interested, here is the thread I started at the high road:
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?p=9929376#post9929376

Looks like they gave you some more information, but nothing definitive.

You might ask them if there are any other forums you should check - maybe there's an "early Japanese firearms" forum somewhere? (it's the Internet - anything is possible)

Or, it may be that there is no definitive answer about this gun. Maybe it was a copy made by some small arms manufacturer in Japan and nobody knows about it anymore?

Good luck.

Hi,

Looks like a copy of the S&W model 1. I've seen a number of model 1s with Japanese provenance. The Japanese were very fond of S&W revolvers:

http://www.castle-thunder.com/tjctsaw/

If you look on the cylinder, do you see any stamps or other markings? Even if its a copy, there might be proof marks on it.