Bill Jordan was my close friend. He was a career Border Patrolman, a Marine combat veteran in World War II and Korea and a great trick/exhibition shooter. We met in the 1970s and renewed our friendship when I began writing for gun magazines. We hunted together, stayed in each other’s homes and generally had a good time. Most people tended to have a good time when they were around Jordan.
The other interesting person in this scenario is a fella named Carl Hellstrom. He was hired by Smith & Wesson during World War II to get the firm’s military production up and running, which he did in very short order. The leadership at Smith & Wesson was so impressed with Hellstrom that, shortly after the war, he was asked to come back and head the entire corporate operation. To the best of my knowledge, Hellstrom was not a gun guy. Rather, he was a manufacturer, and a very good one.
In an attempt to update the company’s product line, Hellstrom sought out savvy gun folks and asked for input. When considering police revolvers, he naturally turned to Jordan. And, Jordan knew exactly the new gun that he would like to see. He told Hellstrom that the revolver should be a .357 Mag., built on the company’s medium-size K-frame, which would make it lighter weight for officer comfort. It should have a heavy 4-inch barrel and adjustable sights for greater accuracy. And, it should also have a shroud under the barrel to protect the ejector rod from damage.
Due to the recent war effort, stronger steel was now available, and Smith & Wesson took advantage of that development. Hellstrom and Jordan visited during the summer of 1954, and the new police revolver was a reality by Nov. 15, 1955. This new revolver was called the Combat Magnum, and the first gun off the line went to Jordan.
Jordan went on T.V. and demonstrated his fast-draw techniques with the Combat Magnum. He called it the “Peace Officer’s Dream.” Smith & Wesson sold 5,000 of the guns in the first six months, and it quickly became one of the company’s best sellers.
In 1957, Smith & Wesson decided to number its guns instead of naming them, and the Combat Magnum became the Model 19. In 1963, it offered a 6-inch version, and a 2.5-inch gun arrived in 1968. The Model 19 went stainless in 1970, being called the Model 66.
When I went to work as a peace officer, in the late 1960s, you just simply weren’t with the program if you weren’t packing a Model 19 in your Don Hume Trooper holster, another Bill Jordan design. It became the issue revolver for numerous law enforcement agencies, not the least of which was the U.S. Border Patrol and the Texas Rangers. The revolver had a great, smooth action and was quite accurate. Our pistol team used the 6-inch gun in competition, while we carried the 4-inch version on patrol. I killed my first whitetail buck with my Model 19.
The gun pictured with this month’s column is one of three Model 19s I own. This one is actually a pre-Model 19, having been shipped in 1956. It is probably a police gun, and I wish I knew its history. Outside of a bit of holster wear, this 69-year-old revolver is still tight and accurate.
In the early days, the practice was to shoot qualifications with .38 Spl. target wadcutters and save the more powerful loads for the street. However, police trainers began to suggest—and rightfully so—that an officer ought to qualify with the same ammunition that he would use on the street in an actual gunfight. And that began to cause problems in the Model 19 (and stainless Model 66). Guns were sustaining damage such as cracked forcing cones with a steady diet of magnum loads, especially the 125-grain magnum load. It turned out that the handguns were best used with standard .38 Spl. +P ammunition.
In my experience, these K-frame are best used with something akin to .38/44 loads from the 1930s: a 158-grain bullet running about 900 to 1,000 fps. Smith & Wesson is currently offering an updated version of the Model 19 and, while I haven’t personally tested it, I understand that many of those early problems have been overcome.
Bill Jordan passed away in 1997, but I am sure he took great pride in the revolver that he helped design. There is no way of knowing just how many police officers and legally armed citizens’ lives have been saved through the judicious use of their Model 19/66 revolvers. That’s a pretty good legacy, and a fine revolver in anybody’s book.