THE INSIDER Holster by El Paso Saddlery

Apologize for the shadow on the bottom picture and the fact they are poorly lit cell photos. Consider them cell noir art. Will post some pictures of a gun in these holsters soon. The top picture shows THE INSIDER holster containing a Beretta PX4 Storm Subcompact and note that the PX4 is using the model with the "stirrup" that catches the barrel at the bottom of the rig. The middle picture shows both different holsters open, and the bottom picture shots them closed front forward. The gun slides into the loop under and inside the leather holding the belt clip. I like the one with the barrel stop or "stirrup" better, but it's not long enough to work with more than a 3" barrel from my limited experimentation. It could easily be lengthed simply with a piece of heavy duty velcro.

A trip through the Texas Hill Country this weekend yielded all kinds of wonderful things. Family time together, and enjoying the game, cattle, wide open spaces, vistas, high and low elevations and all the views that make the Hill Country great. Nearly every creek we passed over was flowing strong and full, as good as I've ever seen them flow over the past forty plus years or so of visiting and fishing that area.

I am incapable of driving past a creek in this region without looking to see if it holds water and more importantly, to see if it looks "fishy". So for years Mrs. El Fisho does the looking now so that I can keep eyes more on road.

The Perdenales River looked good and strong as well, a drastic improvement from last year's drought in that area. Green prevailed as the seasons change slowly and more subtly in the Hill Country. From larger towns like Mason to Llano to Junction to Fredericksburg to Kerrville and other smaller burgs and towns that surround them, I've got favorite places to stop in at when passing through.

We stopped in one favorite place today. Aside from the "almost" nice pistol I thought I'd found, I did find some interesting holster bargains. You know I like a holster bargain.

The Ch.ee.pa THE bettah. Particularly when it comes to "old style" holsters I like. I refuse to say that I like "old school". That would imply my interest had waned or was of recent origin in vintage holsters, but far from it. From my childhood, my dad's holsters of the fifties on have been reminders of quality solid belt holsters that are seldom seen these days in modern design.

I look all kinds of places for holsters, and I always have. In another post I'll go into the vast kinds of places where you can literally buy holsters for dollars or even literally given away if they are very worn out. Garage and estate sales. All kinds of antique and decorator and curio and just basically western and urban junk stores.

So of course one logical place to look is stores selling guns, and particularly, used guns. Or fellows that own gun shops and go to gun shows, and in their wheeling and dealing get some holsters that some customers they have might be interested in for certain vintage guns he knows they own.

I'll talk about the absolutely heavenly trip we took in a later post, but back to the case of the two unusual holsters, and the other holster I got as part of the deal.

All of these holsters were really a nice find today. I'll do a separate post about the wonderful pancake holster I found that fits Single Action .22 revolvers perfectly, a great alternative to a western gunbelt during the hot humid months, or for those of us who are older and when we are afield hunting or fishing, we're going lighter these days in all kinds of ways.

And now, after much rambling about my *bargain-holster- searcher-outer-skills, I found these two very intersting holsters pictured about. I'll do a legend about about each picture, but as you can tell what you basically have is a one piece suede folding holster that uses velcro to achieve gun fit and hold, and a belt clip for IWB wear. It's a very low wearing holster, much lower than say a Highnoon Holster Mr. Softy and I guess you could tuck a shirt around it.

There are two different sizes of these holsters I got for $5 total today. One is larger and does not have a velcro "stirrup" that sticks down to catch the barrel., and one is smaller and has a stirrup. The sides of the holster adjust to hold the gun, and there is a loop that somewhat holds the gun in place.

Once in the waist, it is a snug fit and the gun did not move and is not going anywhere. The gun rides low, so low that the rear of the grip does cantilever outwards, not so much printing as adhearing along the back of the top of the belt/pants. It's going to be a slow practiced draw, but you could wear this holster with a pair of cotton casual shorts and a regularly sized polo and no one would see your handgun. It disappears under jeans. The gun doesn't wear so low that it's in danger of falling out. As long as you are wearing some sort of halfway decent belt, the belt will act in conjunction with the belt loop to hold the gun steady topside.

They were probably be designed to be worn INSIDE a tucked in shirt, and I could see with a non-tailored shirt a bit on the semi-looser side that you could tuck and conceal with some fluffing at the waistline a Beretta PX4 very easily with this holster. That's not my style of carry. If I am carrying an IWB holster, it's under a jacket or a pulled out dress, casual or t-shirt.

But this interesting holster holding the Beretta under a jacket, sweater and even a generous t-shirt, well, it's damn near invisible. I haven't tried it under a jacket or sweater yet, but under the older and not so generous t-shirt I have on now for around the home late night lounging, it disappears.

A quick google rendered no info. Doesn't really matter, it's not a great collectors item, though I'm sure if I wanted I could turn them on ebay for more than I got in them. And who knows, just might.

What they are is perhaps the most function skeletonized IWB adjustable holster I've yet to see. I'm not expert in this field, but to me as a native Texan who grew up around the term for carrying a pistol in your pants with no holster and seeing so many folks who I thought had good sense throwing COCKED AND LOCKED 1911's WITH HAIR, I SAY HAIR, TRIGGERS down the business end of their trousers as cops, I shuddered.

Back in those politically uncorrect days of my youth, and really still up until the current day, Texas lawmen refer to sticking a gun in your belt sans holster as "Mexican Carry".

I'll admit, I've been known to jam a pistolo in my jeans in an emergency and and yes, at times it's been a CONDITION 1 ready to fire pistol like a 1911 or a Glock. I refuse to carry a cocked and locked 1911 (which is how you must carry them for defensive purposes) without a thumbreak or even old time leather strap twixt the hammer and el firing pin. But perhaps this holster was also designed for the minimalist who wanted just enough to ensure their gun didn't slip down their pants or slip out of the top of their pants in an undercover law enforcement scuffle.

This would be a good holster for folks with all kinds of older and larger autoloader guns for which perhaps no good IWB holsters are easily found. I wouldn't my Glock in it, because even thought the suede is first quality, it is supple and I could see some possibility of a finger or item poking into the trigger area of this holster with a Glock and engaging the trigger. Slim. Remote, but possible.

I make no secret my extreme opinion that I like external manual safety on an automatic pistol used for concealed carry. There are holsters that a Glock can be carried safetly in (again, endless plug but the High Noon Holster Co Mr. Softy) that covers the trigger in a manner that protects against accidental discharge, and that holds the gun absolutely secure within the holster until removal is desired.

So this holster has some kind of history but I don't know it. Could've been discontinued a few years ago but you'd think there would be some mention of it somewhere in some outdated catalog or webpage or wiki. El Paso Saddlery is a big company, and I'll send abour over there asking the history of these holsters. Maybe they have an archivist or a catalog or pricing history that could at least generate year, and perhaps intent and purpose behind.

I don't know if the holsters above are ambi or right or left handed, but I'm thinking that since there is a rounded area favoring a resting spot for a trigger guard on one side as visible in the photos, that they were designed to be lefties. That's an easy fix with a pair of leather shears right there in about 2 minutes with great care, to reverse that deal.

I wore it a couple of hours and it didn't move. Sitting. Standing. Driving. For this time of year, when it's cooler and we here in Texas are not sweating every moment of our lives as in summer, it's a great holster. I don't wear skin tight clothing, so I can easily conceal this holster and gun in shorts and the right shirt with a normal single thickness store bought 1 1/2" belt. Much better, of course, with an actual double thick gunbelt, but for true concealment, a nice stuff thicker single layer of leather belt can provide a stable IWB platform despite the fact you got it at TJ MAXX for $3.00.

In any event, with a nice good quality leather designer "non-gunbelt" that is stiff and thick, this holster does great and doesn't move.

It's also a very comfortable holster. Because the extended top portion of the single width suede holster serves to insulate the body from the hammer and of the slide and top of the grip, it's a very comfortable carry. It's adjustable, so it could fit all kinds of guns.

I have not tried out the larger holster, but suspect the larger top portion (ears? hammer protector?) would cushion a person well against any hammer poke, and perhaps protect the thumb safety area of the gun.

I plan to modify the holster fitting the Beretta PX4 Storm Subcompact soon by adding just a couple of stitches in a small triangular pattern (about 1/4" diameter or barely larger) to create a absolute trigger guard rest for this gun. If I decide to use the holster for another gun, I can pop those stitches out with just a couple teeny holes remaining. The $2.50 value is not likely to be significantly diminished by adding 3 or 4 tiny holes and some waxed cotton thread.

It's not a holster to throw your gun in your kit bag or backpack or briefcase or purse, because although the fit as is on the PX4 is snug and holding strong, I could see it working loose. It's a nice holster, though, TO HAVE in a purse for a female or a backpack for a male of he sudden need arises to conceal a gun in a waistband, such as coming in or out of office buildings and the like at night or on an unplanned event. It's small enough to take up no room at all.

I'll be trying them on some other guns and I'll let you know how they fit. The stirrup model seems to have seen some use, although it's in very good to dang excellent condition. The larger model has some printing intact "THE INSIDER" El Paso Saddlery. Large Auto. The smaller one ahs

Fortunately, I learned wayyy back in junior high school when on weekend or summer or spring break sojourns through the Texas Hill Country when being drug by parents and later friends through a wide variety of retail antique or curio operations I might not ordinarily visit, that it's not unusual to stumble upon old holsters in all sorts of antique places and curio shops and even smaller operations. Likewise, the Hill Country is DEER HUNTER CENTRAL, and all sorts of gun shops about in all kinds of towns you might not otherwise might THINK might have even one gun shop has several. And quite a few good gunsmiths in towns and communities large and small who also had small mostly used gun sale business along with the gunsmithing.

It's almost deer season throughout a large swath of Texas, and as far as the West of Austin and Northwest of San Antone from this weekend goes, in these parts the hunters will descend in hordes for several months spending money on every service imaginable. It's a good time for these towns, some of which do better than others most of the year. Each of these towns proudly lay claim to their particular attribute, but suffice it to say, there is no shortage of real mounted deer antlers just everywhere, every business, you name it except for certain corporate entities.

So one little nook in one of these towns has a sort of general western store, that sells some guns and gunleather, mostly western and single action for the "dress up cowboy and go target shooting with cowboy guns", which is a very popular sport but with about a third of their selection of large and compact Glocks, Springfields, Taurus and the odd used autoloader. Including some cool early 1900's Colt pocket autos. But mostly they had a ton of Single Action Revolvers, the western style revolver.

This store had some nice stuff. It made me think of what kind of rig I'd like to get for a full size single action revolver, as well as a cowboy/ranger set up for a late 1800's-1930's for a 1911 wanna bring a full size single action back and get a good sized holster made there. There were a lot of nice belt rigs and holster rigs and I mighta bit on a nice belt holster for the Model 22 of 1917 but I saw nothing that large.

So back in the corner of this store was a barrel with lots of cartridge loops, some dump type box for some type of rifle clip or strip or shells and a few holsters for standard single actions pistols that were still priced pretty high.

These two stood out as something I knew I could either use, gift to a very grateful person interested in cool vintage holsters like me, or failing that, ebay it. The Pancake holster for the .22 Single Action revolver is a keeper, and wears great. It's got an 1 1/2" belt loop, perfect for El Fisho Jr. I'll have to be making sure it's a good holster on fishing trips when wanted to carry some snake shot and a few .22 long rifle or magnums but not be wearing a full western rig.

So whaddya think about these holsters, THE INSIDER holster BY EL PASO SADDLERY? Good idea or junk? We'll see what I think in the coming weeks.

My first opinion is, it's a deep cover holster for the Beretta during the extremely hot summer months in Texas when the smallest and thinnest of t shirts and shorts are being worn, and that is going to likely be it's niche as a holster for me.

I will see how the larger model does with the 1911 or Browning Hi Power, but it'd be nice if the larger model had a longer stirrup for the barrel of a larger pistol. It'd be an easy matter to add, with some velcro, a piece of leather and a leather needle and thread. But I'll try it first and see how I like it.

THE FN Five-seveN COMBAT HANDGUN PRE-REVIEW

UPDATE: OCTOBER 16, 2010

Since writing the below, enough of the details of the attack at Fort Hood are known now to via the media from the hearings that I ask that you ignore the request for further information as I earlier wrote. It was a slaughter, pure and simple. Evil. Traitor.

I will not post any comments that discuss any further discussion regarding this traitor save for any prayers or respects for the victims of this attack.

I've been interested in this handgun for a long time, and when I was cleaning house here at the blog the other day came across this post I started back in November of last year but never published, about how after the Fort Hood Terrorist Attack the FN 5-7 was being villified in the media as the "gunification" of all things evil.

A friend of mine has one of these, and has agreed to let me use it to see how I like it. I suspect several of the usual friends will want to join in, and I'll have it to use for a while. But as I'll write below, the first review shoot will be longtime friend Billy Ray and El Fisho Jr.

Back to an inanimate object being personified as evil in the media. Like the Glock Pistol had done to it in the 1980's, and since. The last couple of weeks, it's been the AK-47 that the University of Texas shooter used in the local papers and in various online news sources. At some point some attacking thug will be shot by a Taurus Judge .410 revolver with some of the Federal "disc" self defense ammo that would have a wound track consisting of a hole big enough to see daylight through the other side, maybe a jaggedly 1-3" hole running from front to back, through and through at 3 to 10 feet, common self defense ranges.

So over the past few years, since the introduction of the FiveseveN, there was much speculation and so called gun expert opinionating about whether this caliber is an effective manstopper.

Unfortunately, a crazed and crazy psychiatrist made his own massacre jihad at Fort Hood, Texas, and used one of these pistols. 13 dead and scores of wounded. I don't know the details of this attack, or how many rounds he shot or magazines he changed, but unfortunately on American soil, sacred American soil, the effectiveness of the gun was proven not beyond a reasonable doubt, but beyond any doubt at all.

It is a killing machine, like no other handgun, in my opinion due to the compact size that it can carry 30 rounds of ammo in a normal handgun configuration. The 20 stock magazine does not protrude from the magazine well, and 20 rounds is an impressive number. But the 30 round mag only extends below the handgrip about 1 1/2", meaning it's still a concealable gun, and even if you carry the weapon with a 20 round mag for increased concealability, your extra mag(s) could be thirties.

That is signficant firepower in a normal sized pistol shooting what is basically an assault rifle round.

Yes, I'll admit that extended magazines exist for Browning hi powers, Colt 1911's and the venerable Glock 9mm's that will accept a Glock M17 extended mag, but the extended mags in the Glocks, Brownings and Colts extend a cartoonish length from the bottom of the gun so as to be too long for any type of concealed carry. I've had a good extended mag for a Browning Hi Power that worked flawlessly, a very high end magazine I'll mention, but I had poor luck with other extended mags for the Colt and Browning guns.

The Glock extended mag does function very well, or it has for me the many times I shot one with a 33 rounder attached, but again, there is no one that gun can be concealed save in a briefcase or shoulder bag. If a shooter, however, wants a pistol capable of holding 33 rounds in the mag for a bargain, then the Glocks are the way to go. There are compact, subpact and full size 9mm Glocks that take the Model 17's 33 round magazine, so you could conceiveably carry a subcompact Glock with a 33 round mag. I've shot one. It's fun.

More than one of my friends have Glock 19's with extended magazines in their work briefcase, or in their car, or as their carry guns with a few 33 round mags in the car glovebox. Law abiding folks, some lawmen and their families and some just regular people and professionals and folks concerned about crime in Texas.

However, the extra inch and half on the FiveseveN for the 30 round magazine redefines a "high capacity" combat pistol by making it belt concealable under normal clothing. I have briefly concealed the Five-seveN under a regular T shirt and shorts in a IWB holster with a belt and it was about like carrying a Sig Sauer P250 compact with a tad different grip. I think the High Noon Holster Company "Mr. Softy" IWB would be the ideal holster for the Five-seveN concealed carry.

So I'll write more later after shooting this gun.

I like the fact that it has an actual hammer, albeit concealed, and I like the finger safety more than I can say. I handled several of these, and the intuitive location of the safety lever above the trigger where the finger will be when either drawing a weapon or when preparing to engage a target makes all the sense in the world.

From the first time I touched the Five-seveN I thought that it was the most intuitive safety ever, save for that on the Ruger Mini-14 rifle, which is at the front of the trigger guard of that weapon and when engaged swings into the area in front of the trigger, so you know it's on or off immediately by touch. I really like this feature and sorely wish my Glocks had this external safety as an option. If I ever buy a Five-seveN, one major reason will be that I like the operation of this safety.

I don't have much practical need for such a gun. It would certainly be a fun gun to have, and if the ballistics of the round are anything like the .223, it could be a viable home defense round. Many of the forum reviews speak to minimum recoil, and opinions vary on the loudness of it. FN has recently been marketing it in gun magazines I read as a "woman's" home defense weapon, and of course women are now an active and very quickly growing segement of handgun purchasers.

And I think that's cool. I've been teaching female friends to shoot for years. I've taken many a friend, certainly more than 40, co-workers, bandmates, friends, to help them buy their handgun for self defense and teach them to use it and get them hooked up with a training program and a range.

But most of my women friends in Texas over the years, since my youth, knew how to use handguns, shotguns and rifles. Like me, most grew up around guns and shooting at the family place or at the gatherings with the relatives at the old home places in rural Texas for holidays.

I would like to know a lot more about the ballistics and penetration of this round. I'd appreciate a link to any studies, if any have been released, on the shooting details from the Fort Hood Massacre. Not the gory details, just how many rounds this terrorist fired from what positions in the building and with how many magazine changes. These are good details to know.

When you're in a big place, like Grand Central Station, or LAX or any other number of places, it' unfortunate but when you're standing around waiting, maybe it's a good idea to think a little bit about where the safety zones are in that facility. If some unfortunate event occurred, where would you go? What would you do? Used to be, self defense meant worrying about parking lot muggers and armed robbers coming in a business you were at or atm bandits or car hijackers.

With some observation and paying attention, you could pull a Jason Bourne escape from a crowded subway that got attacked by terrorists, or what if a group of economic terrorists attempt to seize a corporation or other facility in America? What if you work there or near there? Would you want to be armed to try to escape becoming a hostage? Would you want five rounds in that gun or thirty?

Now, the reality in America is that we are in a war, a guerilla war, where we are forced to react if there is an attack by terrorists. So there is a place for what is basically a semi-auto machine pistol/mini-assault rifle combo in a handgun sized package, capable of laying down very serious defensive or "cover and escape" fire. Five or six armed assailants could be defeated with 30 rounds. Or 20 rounds. Not to negate the 20 round capactity of this gun, but when 30 rounds is easily snuck onto the back of the gun for an inch and a half, that's happening.

The friend I am borrowing the gun from is retired and does some personal large scale vegetable gardening and raises some sheep, cattle and goats. He, like many others in Texas, has various predator problems and uses a variety of firearms in that regard. He recently bought this Five-seveN and is interested in my opinion, and I'm only too happy to do a review of this interesting firearm.

If you know some screamin' deals on (hopefully) some bulk and high end ammo are for this gun, let me know. If you know the scoop on what's available and where, please email or post a comment. I always appreciate the emails and many of my problems like this have been solved by friendly readers.

So there's a place for a pistol like this maybe in my home. Yes, I have other guns. My friends and family have long discussed where we will go if some horrible attack occurs in an area of our concern, and lots of families I know have at least had plans in loose place since 9/11. I'll write more about how well this pistol would perform in a home environment for self defense after I study the ballistics a bit and do some shooting on my own. Billy Ray and El Fisho Jr. will join me in this experiement, so there will be three different perspectives on this pistol evaluation.

Every now and then, I like to bring some wood scraps to one of my friends places and do some light shooting into 2x4's and sheetrock and plywood layers to see how certain ammo reacts and penetrates. A few friends have some old junker cars from way back, with real metal in the doors. It's interesting to see how different rounds penetrate both older and newer junk cars


The fact that a substantial small rifle combat round could be carried in a belt holster and with two extra magazines, you'd have 91 rounds on your belt.



I'll be shooting one next week, and I have to get some ammo to shoot the gun. It's not unreasonably priced, compared to any other premium combat ammo out there

WILDCARD GUNS ON THE LESS SHORT LIST

I wrote here previously about FUN GUNS ON THE SHORT LIST, which are guns I'm fond of at the moment or would like to spend some time with. But of course, that got me to thinking about OTHER guns I'm on the lookout for, always on a bargain. But maybe you'll throw out a few of your own dream guns you'd like to have or perhaps it will introduce you to a gun you aren't familiar with.

A S&W Model 65 LADYSMITH 3" BARREL .357 MAG ROUND BUTT is a gun I've always liked. It's a lightweight version of the Model 13 3" barrel round butt k frame .357. Used by the FBI for a time in the early 80's. It's a great gun, and having the Ladysmith logo on the side wouldn't bother me at all, because it's ounces lighter than the standard Model 65 of the same size, and as a bonus has an ejector rod shroud, a big thing in my book. Naked ejector rods are asking for trouble if you ever carry that gun other than in a proper holster. A bent or *snagged in a purse or backpack or breifcase on junk" naked ejector rod can be EL BAD NEWS! These guns were made in the early 2ooo's I believe, and one blogger seems to see a few in pawn shops. They're not rare or valuable, just sometimes hard to find.

A SINGLE ACTION COLT PEACEMAKER CLONE WITH TRANSFER BAR SAFETY AND 4 3/4" BARREL. This gun could come in any number of calibers and colors and flavors. I'd especially be interested in a .44-40. or even .44 Special loads. There are lots of good Colt copies out there, some with fancy grips and nice finishes. I'll know the right gun if'n I see it.

Many of these single action guns are in .45 LC or .357 Magnum, and I've had plenty of both of those calibers. Seems like there are always bargains out there on Ruger Blackhawks, and a nice shooting gun they are. But I'd like something with fixed sights for very occasional concealed carry and more likely when going out to the pasture or out fishing somewheres, in a western rig.

I LOVE 1911'S AND DO NOT FEEL A MAN CAN HAVE TOO MANY OF THEM. I've owned more than a few 1911's, and there is just that certain something about some Colt 1911's of all sizes that can just JUMP out and say "buy me". I don't like guns that have been whittled on much or parted out with hot rod parts, unless the original parts are included in the deal. It's all about trigger pull and the feed ramp to ejection port design. Those fancy race guns might be all right for target plinking but for self defense I prefer a straight forward gun with few frills.

I've never owned a 1911 in 9mm, nor have I so desired to. I think the 1911 platform is much better served with good old .45 ACP and .38 Super and that guns like the Hi Power, the P-38, various Walthers, HK's, Sigs, Glocks and others do far more cool things with the 9mm than can be done with a SA 1911. Many of these companies, like Sig and Walther and HK were doing very innovative things with single stack 9mm guns in the 70's and early 80's. One exception to my normal dislike of 9mm 1911's is the Para Ordinance LDA line of 9mm double action single stack 3" barrel 1911 derivative pistols. They look interesting as an alternative to the Walther PSP or Sig P239 for a single stack concealable 9mm, and the triggers I've tried feel very, very good.

THE WILDCARD VINTAGE AND CUSTOM SNUBNOSE REVOLVER FROM A ERA GONE BY. I'm always on the lookout for a nice custom snubnose, particularly something nice and interesting from the 1940's and 1950's. Old Colts and some old Smith and Wessons. Perferably not .38 special. I would love to find an old .44 special or .44-40 or even a .45 LC. You get into magnums in that age of gun design and you get into very heavy and hefty guns, even with the .357 magnum.

I'm interested in some old used personal gun of someone else, perhaps with the hammer bobbed for easier carry, making the gun DAO. I'm very flexible on the overall package, but demand a wide combat trigger and hammer, if there is a hammer. Nothing worse when carrying a revolver in a holster than being poked in the side by a skinny non-rounded handgun hammer, and of course that raises safety issues, which means a holster with a shrouded area for the hammer. Grip problems can be cured with a grip adapter generally on older guns.

Maybe some nice Stag grips, worn smooth by years of handling and shooting.

So I've seen a few great old fighting snubnoses over the past 30 years, and I know that perfect combat snubbie in very good condition from days gone by. It could have up to a 3" barrel, and again, I'm flexible on many things, including normal holster wear.

The late combat handgun and revolver enthusiast, as well as holster designer maker, fast draw champion and author Chic Gaylord had very specific ideas of what constituted the perfect combat handgun for self defense. I've written about those ideas previously and his book can be found quite cheap on Amazon and Ebay.

The gist of those Chic Gaylord recommendations, as they would apply to me are, that a defense gun needs a barrel of 3" at least, no shorter.

.38 Special is the smallest caliber that should be considered.

Grip adapters or grip upgrades are good.

FOR CHIC, THE GUN HAD TO BE A REVOLVER.

I think Chic devotes like maybe a page or a page and a half to the defensive handguns the likes of the mighty 1911 and the Browning Hi Power. He basically says, yeah, they are the great autos, the best at what they do. But they can jam, and my revolver won't.
And the rest of the book is about revolvers, basically.

Chic favored a defensive selection of a revolver for which a .22 LR variant existed, which allowed no excuse not to practice for high ammo prices. The .22 variant didn't have to be exact, just a similar operating system and general size. Something that would work with the same holster for holster tactical practices. He favored a variety of Colt and Smiths in various calibers and certain High Standard .22 revolvers for his competition and fast draw shooting and proclaimed the High Standard to have the best grip angle of any revolver ever.

Chic was old school. He was so old school that even when I was a kid, before he was older than 40, he was old school in the 60's in NYC. Yet for several decades, cops and private eyes and bodyguards and spies and diplomats and others who carried guns legally flocked to his holster shop, not only for holster purchase but for tactical instruction and gun selection.

FUN GUNS ON THE SHORT LIST

The SMITH AND WESSON MODEL 325 AIRWEIGHT PD snubbie in .45 ACP caliber remains an elusive pistol for me to find a good deal on. When I have had the cash money for one, they're priced too high or they are beat up. When I've just bought or just about to buy some other kind of firearm, I see them in like new condition for $525 on auction sites.

COLT 1911 IN 38. SUPER I've owned numerous Model 1911's, mostly by Colt, and for some reason I've always wanted a full size Government Model in .38 Super. It's a great caliber for shooting and for law enforcement, particularly if you have to shoot some attackers behind heavy metal car doors or other thick barricades capable of being penetrated by such a size of bullet. Frank Hamer, the legendary hunter of Bonnie and Clyde, traded in his .45 when he got into a shoot out with the outlaws and found his .45 ACP solid bullets had not penetrated the thick metal car doors of the day. His 1911 in .38 Super solved that problem.

A more reasonable selection would be one in the Commander length but I've always been fond of the full size 1911, just like John Browning designed them, save for the safety features of the later models starting with the Series 70, I think. My friend El Bar has a dandy one in Chrome plated nickle finish with Pachmayrs on it. It's a dandy.

I keep waiting for a good deal to come along on a SIG SAUER MODEL 220 CARRY in DA/SA. I came across a fantastic deal some months ago at an indoor shooting range, only to discover on close inspection that it was the SAO model (Single Action Only). In retrospect, I should have bought that gun then and there, but was pining at the time for an DA/SA model. Since that time I've had a chance to shoot a magful through a Model 220 Carry SAO, and it might be the nicest single action autoloader trigger I've ever felt that didn't cost hundreds of dollars. Like glass. Like glass.

I'd like a very gently used 20 or 30 year old REMINGTON 870 POLICE SHOTGUN with the wood stock and parkerized finish, 18" barrel and extended magazine. Simple and reliable. I've owned two of these, one with a wood stock and one with the ultra heavy metal stock sporting a 20" barrel that held lots of buckshot. I had a deal on a metal stocked folding model, but remembered how much I hated carrying that heavy thing around. It was great for shooting, but it was a bruiser for shooting in the field.

I'd want to put some sort of rubber pump grip on it as well as a Streamlight attached to it for night shooting.

Finally, both El Fisho Jr. and I usually don't go in for flashy finishes on pistols, but I do have to admit the new winter digital camo finish on the SIG SAUER MOSQUITO .22 LR CALIBER is a mighty attractive gun. And it might take place at the front of the line if a good sale pops up on one sometime. We need another .22 pistol, and I like how the Mosquito shoots. It's a bit larger than most .22 pistols, and it's supposed to be 90% of the size of the Sig P226. That's just right. The only shame is that it only holds ten rounds and that there are no extended mags available for this family fun gun. You can take a good .22 LR to the range and shoot for several hours for less than $10 in high quality ammo, and these days that's something we like to do whenever we can. Shoot alot for cheap, I mean.

HECKLER AND KOCH OPEN LETTER: MAKE A POLYMER P7

As I've chided other firearms makers in the past, and in particular your company, I fail to see why your fine firearms company is not making a revitalized, as well as the original, model of the PSP and the P7. It would be very interesting to see a polymer interpretation, a second generation of P7 pistol using the same high quality materials used in the USP.

The sell factor is that not only are there folks like me who would like to see a new model of this gun, it's the most safe handgun that I think has ever been designed. It's perfect for self and home defense for families with small children, who don't have the physical strength to cock the pistol's unique front grip safety. It's foolproof enough to have saved more than one officers life over the decades when stupid crooks couldn't figure out how to depress the safety level to shoot it.

How cool could this gun be in polymer?

Very cool, I suspect. I was always a fan of the single stack P7 rather than the hi cap P 13, but again, with polymer technology, its more or less a matter of switching grips and mags to have two different pistols, an easy matter for a crack assembly line operation.

So here's the other deal to make this pistol cool. Sell it with a .22 conversion kit, a slide, barrel and magazine compliment like Sig sells. So practice is cheaper and so the gun can do double duty as a frequently shot plinker. Again, you can sell this for more money.

Just as I have never understood why Smith and Wesson has yet to produce a .22 LR version of the now decades made in USA Walther PPK and PPK/S, I don't understand why HK fails to see the masterpiece of firearm that was the P7 and it's fellow handguns.

And yes, I know I used a picture of the smaller stature .380/.7.65/.22 LR variant of this fine gun, simply because it has better lines and to me looks more like what a Generation 2 version of the PSP/P7 could be.

THE ORTGIES EFFECT

These four pictures show some of the unique features of the Ortgies pistol. The top photo shows an old auction page for an excellent specimen of this Ortgies 7.65 mm pistol. The second photo shows the "grip safety activator button on the top right of the frame and the grip safety extended. The last photo shows the grip safety disengaged and the right side of the pistol. Note that the grip emblem displaced in the last three photos, a "D" for the company name, is a cat with a tail folded about it's head.

One of my father's favorite pistols was always his Orgties .32/7.65mm caliber pocket pistol. It's an interesting design, with not one screw in it. He bought one sometime back in the seventies for probably less than $50 and carried and shot it for years as one of his favorite pistols to slip in his jacket pocket for the walk from his downtown Houston office to his car and vice versa. In the 90's, although the finish has always been good on it, he had it completely refurbished as far as parts goes and for all practical purposes it's a brand new gun.

One interesting point about this pistol is that it has a button grip safety, meaning that the button on the left rear side of the frame "pops out" the grip safety, which then once depressed is engaged. The button grip safety does not pop back out like that on an 1911 once pressure is no longer being applied, but one must reengage the button to pop the grip safety back out in this instance.

There are lots of pages on the internets about these guns and what I've recently found out is what a good little shooter this gun is. Accurate, for what it is. At seven yards you can get nice aimed and point and shoot groups. Yeah, the cartridge ain't the best for defense, but El Fisho Jr. has taken a liking to the low recoil of this gun and has become quite adept at shooting it accurately since he's been spending a lot of time with it at the range.

My Father had a long fascination with this pistol because as a younger man, one of his good friends, Big John the hunter and shooter and collector of guns, had one. He liked how it shot, and pretty soon Big John found him a good clean used version for cheap.

But before that, in his childhood, my father in his youth had seen older men who had brought these back from WWI and then later saw fellows just a bit older than himself bringing them home from WWII. In both wars they were used somewhat as officers guns from what I understand, and there were contracts with other governments who bought these over the years.

Here's a great article about the history of these pistols.

http://ortgies.net/ortgies0015.htm

The slide markings and relatively high serial number of our pistol, which is a 2XXXXX means that according to this article, my father's gun was made near the end of the manufacture of this pistol, which ceased in 1924. It's a shooter, with no great collectors value really. I've seen them at collector gun websitesites and online auctions and they are readily available between $300 and $500 dollars.

I myself was always fascinated with the early pocket pistols of the beginning of the 1900's, such as the Browning Pocket Pistol, the Baby Browning and the pocket sized Colts. I've shot several of the above over the years, and was once very close to buying a Browning in .380 for no other reason than I liked the way it shot. My dad wisely convinced me to instead grab a german made Walther PPK/S in .22 long rifle which was the same price in the 70's as the vintage Browning.

HOLSTER FIT TIP FOR THE ORTGIES OWNER AND SHOOTER

Our Ortgies weighs in with empty mag at 22 1/4 oz. It's a well distributed weight, and one of the holsters that I've found fits it best is the Askins Avenger made for the Beretta Model 84. It's just a tad big for the pistol at the top of the holster with a wee bit of wiggle shy of a perfect fit when not on the belt, but when worn it's a snug and safe fit. You're probably not going to find a better fit in open top holsters for this gun in a non-generic cordura nylon type holster than one made for the Beretta Model 84.

I'm not inclined to carry this weapon for self defense, due to the caliber. It outweighs my Cobra, my Bodyguard Airweight and my Glock and weighs in the same as other J frames and variants. It's about the same size as a Walther PPS, for a frame of reference, and I think I'd rather be carrying a PPS in 9mm or .40 caliber than the 7.65mm. Still, it's a fun shooter and since we have it and with it's history, it's a gun we're gonna have around for a time.

It's also a good gun for the ladyfolk in our family, including my mom and sister, neither of whom care for even .38 special shooting all that much. They do it when they have to, for practice, and well could for defense, but like everyone else who shoots the Ortgies, it's just a comfortable pistol to shoot that you can hit your target with at close range shooting without a lot of noise or recoil.

VEERAPPAN: SOME QUESTIONS

As I posted here about the undisputed King of the Jungle during his tenure as The Forest Brigand as he was known in his country, in a three state area of India, VEERAPPAN: KING OF THE JUNGLE, VEERAPPAN was as hard to find as vapor during most of his life on the run. It all leads to lots of questions about this character and his story and those who hunted him for decades.

I plan to buy the book about him soon, it's all over the place used in the English language, and according to some online reviews, just might be objective enough in all directions to be an interesting read. Other reviews paint it a bit favoring the law. Here's one blogger's thoughts
http://shanenoecker.blogspot.com/2010/05/veerappan-indias-most-wanted-man-by.html
and the book is called VEERAPPAN: INDIA'S MOST WANTED MAN BY SUNNAD RAGHURAM. Written before his death, it's not going to contain the end of the story up to the death of VEERAPPAN, so you have to sift through the articles and obits available on the web to try to piece that end of the story together.


By all directions, I mean getting the story from the points of view of himself, the villagers he lived around, his men, the multiple governments that chased him for years and the national government of India. And then being able to look down at that collection of information and see what seems likely to be the truth of the matter, or more likely the multiple truths of the matter. So perhaps you won't get that perspective from one book, no matter how well written, but maybe it will elaborate what's available on the web about this latter day bandit.

And the first question is, where is the good movie, or how about just plain decent movie, made on the story of this guy's life? The story has been out there, and it's a fugitive hunting trail that in real life has only been mirrored by far shorter-lived villians on the run in America: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Scarface, Bonnie and Clyde or any number of international criminals and terrorists.

Being a firearms enthusiast, in looking at various images of VEERAPPAN contained all over Google images and in various news stories about him, mostly I saw him holding either some kind of bolt action heavy calibered carbine variant of probably British hand me down variety, as well as as FN/FAL variant rifles. I'm not knowledgeable at all about the old British bolt action rifles, except to know that many of them, although looking unweildy and very heavy, do look very cool with the full understocks that extend sometimes all the way to the end of the barrel.

The above pictures and those on the previous posts show most of what seems available in terms of pictures of these outlaws. It seems interesting that none are carrying at least knives, not to mention some sort of sidearm being the wanted fellow he was. He's either got a hunting rifle or an assault rifle. The most interesting picture I could find was a collage of pictures of NEERAPPAN and his huge moustache, in one of the images he's holding some sort of submachine gun I don't recognize.

So in any event, some firearms and edged weapons details about this part of the world for the last 50 years or so would make an interesting addition to this history of the King of the Jungle.

This story here at the Times of India says that at the time of his death, he had several grenades, 2 AK-47 rifles, 1 SLR rifle and a "pump-action gun". http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/How-Veerappan-was-shot-dead/articleshow/890783.cms?flstry=1

The AK-47 is everywhere.

And perhaps my British-Italian based fellow weapons blogger ROB might have some knowledge of the guns and knives and handguns of this area and what kind of arms that these folks were fighting with.

Here's an interesting article I found in the HINDUONNET about the search for him before his capture/death. I bolded and reprinted the article to save a jump, but also because it provides some interesting prose of the area's media.

http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1823/18230420.htm

THE STATES
An endless search

The Tamil Nadu and Karnataka police forces continue the hunt for Veerappan even as the Central government withdraws the Border Security Force unit that was assisting in the task.

RAVI SHARMA in M.M. Hills and Kadambur

ALTHOUGH there is little doubt about the intent or intensity of the efforts of the Special Task Forces (STFs) of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka which are after Veerappan, the fact is that they are nowhere near the forest brigand.

All that the police know is that the brigand could be holed up either in the jungles, which have been his home for nearly three decades, or in a safehouse, protected by 'friends'. Informed sources say that Veerappan could be in the vicinity of the Kadambur and Gudialathur forests in Tamil Nadu's Erode district. In fact, Veerappan's intelligence network is superior to that of the police. Two diaries the police recovered in January this year following an encounter with his gang had entries indicating that he knew almost all the "secret" call signs of the police.

The only success that the operations have had in the past nine months on the Tamil Nadu side is the arrest by the 'Q' Branch of the Tamil Nadu police in Thanjavur in September of three members of the Tamil Nadu Liberation Army (TNLA) - Andril, Amritalingam and Selvan. According to the police, the trio were part of the gang led by Veerappan that abducted Kannada film actor Rajkumar and three others in July 2000. The police claimed that both Rajkumar and his brother-in-law Govindaraj (who was also abducted) had identified the trio during the identification parade held in the Coimbatore central prison in September. They also claimed that the trio had admitted their guilt and said that they had come to the forest in an attempt to establish a base jointly with Veerappan.

The Karnataka STF has taken into custody two persons, Basavananaik and Geetha from Hangla village near Bandipura in Karnataka, for interrogation. Basavananaik was initially arrested in September by the Karnataka Forest Department for poaching in the Bandipur National Park. Later he was taken into custody by the Karnataka STF. He is accused of aiding Veerappan in the kidnapping of a scientist, forest personnel and two wildlife photographers from the park in 1997. According to informed sources in the Karnataka STF and the Karnataka Forest Department, Basavananaik has been allegedly supplying foodgrains to Veerappan.

Geetha was arrested from a hamlet near Hangla. It was alleged that she provided information to the Veerappan gang on Rajkumar's movements prior to his abduction in July 2000. Geetha has her relatives living in Gajanur from where Rajkumar was kidnapped. According to informed sources, Geetha confessed that Veerappan had promised her Rs.1 lakh and one acre of land in exchange for information on Rajkumar.

According to informed sources, the Rajkumar abduction was the culmination of a series of crimes committed by the Veerappan gang and the TNLA trio. Their joint operations started in January 2000 with the looting of Rs.16,000 from the farmhouse of K. Subramani of Kanakundur, on the periphery of the Kadambur forest. Later, the gang's attempt to loot the Onnamatti estate in Karnataka failed. The gang stayed at Talawadi for two to three months with the intention of looting the farmhouse of Rajkumar. Later, with the help of a few local people who provided information on Rajkumar's whereabouts, it kidnapped the actor.

IN the first week of October, nearly 600 personnel of the Border Security Force's (BSF) 117 Battalion, requisitioned in December 2000 for operations in the aftermath of the Rajkumar abduction, were withdrawn by the Central government following criticism that it was not doing enough to catch the Veerappan gang. The Centre had sent seven companies of the BSF to assist the STFs in combing operations. The BSF personnel set up camps at Palar and the Malai Mahedeshwara Hills in Karnataka, and at Satyamangalam, Varattup- allam and Gundripallam in Tamil Nadu.

However, the usefulness of the BSF, personnel of which were deployed for the first time between 1993 and 1995, was in question with many of its own officers questioning the need for its deployment. Joint Commander of the STFs and former Tamil Nadu Director-General of Police Walter Issac Dawaram said soon after the BSF was deployed: "It (the deployment of the BSF) is all nonsense, a stunt. There is no need for a big army to catch Veerappan. I don't understand what the BSF can do. They don't even know the language." The exercise soon turned out to be meaningless as the BSF had no mandate to operate independently. It is the second time that the BSF has been withdrawn after prolonged inactivity.

Even as the top brass of the STFs are hopeful of catching the brigand, the operations in recent times have attracted criticism. For instance, sections of the Tamil Nadu STF are criticised for being preoccupied with duties related to the local body elections in October. On the other hand, the Karnataka STF under Inspector-General of Police Kempiah has more or less maintained a low profile. Besides dearth of information, the Karnataka STF is constrained by a lack of political will on the part of the Karnataka government (Tamil Nadu has also been guilty of this) to carry forward operations. The successive governments in Karnataka, including the current one led by S.M. Krishna, have been of the view that Veerappan is a Tamil who operates in Tamil Nadu and so catching him is primarily the business of the Tamil Nadu government.

Indications are that the present team of STF officers, especially of the Tamil Nadu STF (revamped after the Jayalalithaa government took office in May) led by Dawaram, Additional Director-General of Police K. Vijaykumar, Deputy Inspector-General of Police Tamil Selvam and Superintendent of Police Periyiah, is arguably the best to have been assembled by the State. All the officers are believers in the 'hands-on theory' and prefer to spend time in the jungles with the troops rather than plan strategy from the confines of an office. Surprisingly, in spite of making little headway in the operations for about 10 months, the morale and motivation of the Tamil Nadu STF's 700-odd personnel are still high. The force has been further strengthened with the arrival of about 200 men from the Tamil Nadu Reserve Police, who will make up the shortfall after the departure of the BSF personnel. According to informed sources in the Tamil Nadu STF, there is good coordination between the two STFs, and the one-upmanship which plagued the operations when Dawaram was previously at the helm of affairs in the early 1990s has been under check.

THE STFs have adopted a three-pronged strategy to catch Veerappan "systematically": comb the forests; interact more closely with the tribal people and others who inhabit the forest and the peripheral villages; and set up more STF camps, most of them inside the jungles.

Since the area where Veerappan is thought to operate in currently is quite large - over 6,000 sq km of deciduous forests, most of them reserve forests with ravines, river systems, peaks and valleys, and stretch from Tamil Nadu's Hogenekal in the east through M.M. Hills, Bandipur and Biligiri Ranga Hills in Karnataka up to the Nilgiri ranges in the west - the key to pinpointing Veerappan's whereabouts lie in strengthening the intelligence network.

It is with this idea in mind that the STF has begun to woo the tribal people and residents of the villages in the area. However, unlike what it did in the past, it is not only offering money to the people but trying to address their day-to-day problems. An STF officer said: "The aim is to interact with them and win their confidence. When we meet them we do not straightaway pose the question 'where is Veerappan', but rather ask what their difficulties are and then try to solve them as best as we can."

Since the operations restarted on the night of June 28, teams of STF personnel have interacted "qualitatively with villagers from nearly all the 206 mother (main) villages" and studied their problems. The problems mainly pertain to lack of civic facilities such as inadequate availability of water and sporadic supply of electricity; dearth of teachers in local schools; non-issuance of ration cards; difficulty in getting permission to gather minor forest produce; and paucity of medical aid and medicines. The STFs have divided these into immediate, short-term and long-term ones. While the immediate problems are those that can be rectified by the STF, the short-term and long-term ones require the intervention of various government departments.
However, the tribal people and other residents of the M.M. Hills and Thalamalai, Bargur and Kadambur forests are sceptical of the "get-friendly" moves. Nearly five months of the exercise has also proved that people are reluctant to come forward with information on Veerappan. The common refrain this correspondent came across was that they had no time to think of Veerappan, and that the STFs would never catch him.

The get-friendly move suffered a jolt when on October 18 Rani, a villager from the Kadambur forest, complained that a Tamil Nadu STF Inspector attached to the STF's Kadambur camp, Rajarajan, molested her on October 16. Earlier, the STF had taken in for interrogation Basavaraj, a villager from the Kadambur forests, on the suspicion that he was helping the Veerappan gang. Basavaraj is the brother of Anandraj, Rani's husband. According to police sources, when Basavaraj failed to return to his village, Rani was coaxed by Shankar, an activist who works among the tribal people, to lodge a false complaint. The police also claimed that during an inquiry conducted by the Kadambur Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) in the presence of the villagers, Rani had confessed that she had made a false complaint. However Rani later gave a fresh complaint to the DSP, Satyamangalam. An inquiry into the charges was conducted by a revenue official and the report is pending with the Tamil Nadu government.

Meanwhile, in order to strengthen the intelligence gathering network and put 'pressure' on the local police, several police stations in Tamil Nadu, located in the vicinity of areas frequented by Veerappan, have been brought under the direct control of the STF. These police stations include those at Bhavani, Andiyur, Satyamangalam, Bhavanisagar, Vellitirupur, Talawadi and Hasanur. For more effective combing operations the core area has been divided into 12 sectors and all these are searched simultaneously on a daily basis with around 70 to 80 STF personnel operating out of camps in the jungle and doing shifts of 20 to 25 days in each sector.

The joint combing operations have been described as an effort to give confidence to the STFs and familiarise themselves with the terrain on both sides of the border. From October 30, the joint combing has been extended to Sultan Bathery, Bergi, Bandipur, Moyar and other areas. Informed sources said that joint combing is the only answer since information pertaining to Veerappan is not coming through. Moreover, the STFs have placed seven platoons of 26 men each in the Bandipur, Maddur, Gopalswamybetta and Moyar regions.

On October 28, a meeting of senior officers of the STF decided to renew the joint combing operations. The idea is "to sanitise and then dominate the forests and squeeze the gang into a corner from where it could be engaged in an encounter". Said an officer: "We will get him in under three months." Added another: "An intelligence breakthrough is the key. Once we have that we are sure of catching him." However, the effectiveness of the combing has come in for criticism. Many people say that it is akin to looking for a needle in a haystack. But equally true is the fact that there is no alternative strategy available to the STFs.

Given the record of the STFs, the criticism is not unjustified. In late January 2001, the Tamil Nadu STF got information that Veerappan and his gang had barged into the house of a tribal family in the Chemmanthimalai forest on the Tamil Nadu-Kerala border and demanded that a meal be cooked for them. But by the time the Tamil Nadu STF top brass sent a team to the spot, three to four hours had elapsed and Veerappan had left the place, still unaware that the police knew about his movements. (Veerappan was on the downslopes 2 km away from the police party.) Two days after the incident, an intelligence gathering party of the Tamil Nadu STF accidentally came across the brigand and his gang. According to personnel who were present at that confrontation, Veerappan beckoned a member of the STF party thinking that he belonged to a group of wood cutters. The constable, who had his AK-47 camouflaged in a gunny bag, panicked and shot wildly in the air, and the magazine got emptied in one burst.

In November 1998 Veerappan was sighted "face to face at a distance of 150 metres" by the Karnataka STF, but he slipped away. In late January 1999, a suspected hideout of Veerappan, at Needipuram in the Kolathur reserve forests, close to Mettur dam, was raided. However, Veerappan, who is equipped with night vision binoculars, sensed the movement of STF personnel at around 3 a.m. and escaped.

The factors that have prevented the STFs from catching the brigand are simple, yet unsurmountable. His excellent knowledge of the terrain, the support (either out of fear or out of sympathy) of the residents of the 200-odd villages (populated in sizable numbers by people belonging to Veerappan's Pada- yachi/Vanniyar community) on the periphery of the forests where he operates, support from tribal people in the forests and from locally influential politicians, the lack of long-term, sustained and coordinated efforts by successive governments both in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, and in recent times support from members of extremist organisation such as the TNLA and the Tamil Nadu Retrieval Force, have all added to Veerappan's luck. He has eluded the BSF, the Karnataka STF, which has been looking for him since 1993, and the Tamil Nadu STF, which has been deployed almost continuously since 1995.

Veerappan's periodic attempts at taking hostages, chiefly granite quarry owners and forest personnel, have also proved lucrative. They have not only brought him much-needed respite when he was cornered by the police but also a bounty with which he could buy himself friends. While several police officers advocated sustained combing operations, other people felt that the anti-Veerappan operations should be stopped considering the amount of time and money spent on them. On the other hand, sympathisers of Veerappan, such as Tamil Nationalist Movement leader P. Nedumaran and Kolathur Mani (both had negotiated with Veerappan in the aftermath of Rajkumar's abduction) have made no bones about their opposition to any action against Veerappan. Both have been demanding amnesty for the brigand. They also expressed their willingness to negotiate with the brigand on behalf of the two State governments. But will the two government agree? More important, will Veerappan bite?