Exceedingly Rare Bank-Issued Walther PPK with Green Bottom Magazines
Hey guys! I've got a walk in Wednesday. Actually, it didn't walk in, I'm going to show you this gun. I've been trying to get this gun to show it to you. I don't own it, but I know who does. So I borrowed it for just a short period of time.
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Wondering what I'm coming with Now?
So this is the gun that I wanted to show you today. Now it says this is actually a boxed bank gun. So the black box-- Well, you know, you've seen all the boxes I've been showing you. And now you're thinking what the heck is he bringing me now. This is very early. So this is in the early 1930s. It says PP but it goes to a PPK. Let me come up close and personal. And you can look over my shoulder and check it out.
A 1930 Bank Gun
So this box go it goes to a bank gun. I have shown you one before, but it was a long time ago. And so they're completely different. It says PP but it is for a PPK. We can't read this right here but this serial number does not match the gun. If we look inside, you'll see the target, says octone that means attention! Usually there's a manual that goes in here, it's not there right now but here is the test target.
They fired a 22 caliber bank gun into this. And you can see the serial number 778664. And that is the number that is also here, barely readable. So it's 778664. So this is early 1930 or '31. The test target is from 33, so either they issued it later or I'm off on my date. I'll have to look that up. But there's the test target. And there's a second one here. And again, it's a 25 caliber. Now this test target looks like it was from later, maybe '38. It's hard to read that, May.
The Red Magazine
But here's what's interesting about this gun, and this is the part that I wanted to show you. You've probably heard of the red magazine. In fact, when I talked about magazines, I think I never even showed you the green magazine. Here, let me get the red magazine for you. So the red magazines are more common. I see probably 10 of these red magazines. This is the actual color, you can see it has no lip, so they're early, again 1930s. And the theory was -- By the way, I think they went to bank guns. But now I'm beginning to think they also were presentation guns.
And I'll tell you why. On the red bottoms, about half of them are PP 7.65. And about half of them are nickeled or verchromt. You can see how early this is it has the open follower, as opposed to this one which is the closed follower. So this is really early. And let's say I've had about ten of these, five of them were nickeled and many of them are numbered for the bank right here. The bank guns are numbered right here. So they were for bank guns, but I'm thinking they' were also for presentation guns, because I did get this gun at one point. I've shown this to you before, absolutely gorgeous. And you can see how beautiful the red bottom is with a nickeled gun. And this is original factory nickel.
So this is just a beautiful gun. And this would make sense that the nickeled magazine goes with a nickeled gun, and that's probably why I can conclude that the red bottom, notice how this is discovered that's from light. This was in bright light, which discolored it. About half of them are on nickeled gun. So my conclusion and this is just my theory, not documented, theory is that these went to presentation guns, but also bank guns now. The red bottom went to 7.65.
I don't own It
The green bottom went to 22 caliber. Now let me show you the green bottom. Now we're back to the green bottom. And as soon as I show you this green bottom, there are 100 people out there who say I will pay you whatever you want for that. Because people ask me all the time, say put me on the waiting list. I don't even own a green bottom at this point. I borrowed this one because it's so rare, extremely rare.
The Green Bottom
So the green bottom went to a 22 caliber. You can see this is a 22 caliber magazine. The bank guns were pantographed serial numbered on the slide in a vertical way, not horizontal like you would normally see. So there's the serial number.
This went to a bank because of the pantographed slide, this was done at the bank Arsenal, by the way, not at the factory. So you can see that that was numbered after the finish, you can see the white halo effect around it. Whereas this was done at the factory and is blued over. So you can see the difference in the two numbers. Now with the bank guns, they are numbered on the right hand side of the magazine bottom. This green magazine bottom matches the gun. And in fact, it has two matching mags. So we have two matching mags in 22 caliber. So we know the green went to a 22 and the red went to 7.65.
My Opinion
Now, here's what I think is going on. Any good banker is fastidious in everything they do, they keep track of the money and they keep track of their guns. At night, they would lock them in the safe. My conjecture would be they would put be put in a rack and the magazines were stacked side by side, maybe right below or right beside. Now, when the bankers came in in the morning, you grabbed your gun, and you wanted to make sure you get the right caliber. So my theory is and I think it's a good one because it's mine. The 22 caliber were green and the 7.65 were red, and therefore you knew which magazine to grab, in case there was any question.
I wouldn't need the color Coding
Now for me, I can tell right away. I don't need the green and the red; I can see the difference right away between a 22 caliber mag and a 7.65. But I think for the bankers, and again, if this went to a bank gun it would be numbered right here and I have seen the red ones numbered here. So that basically I just wanted to show you a gun with two matching green magazines. This is probably the only one in the world. If anybody else out there knows of one or has one, let me know and you could probably name your price. People will pay just about anything to get these, especially if they're obsessed with Walther's like I am.
Really Rare Find
So this is a really rare find. I did borrow it from a friend of mine just to show it to you. Because I thought it was really cool.
Was that Educational?
Hey, thanks for watching. I hope you found that educational. I know I did and as I said I had to bring it to you. Now you are not going to believe what I'm going to show you next because we are packing up to leave, headed out the door for the Show of Shows.
Show of Shows here we Come!
Starting tomorrow Wednesday, July 21st we actually get into the Show of Shows and we will be set up. I mostly there to buy but I will film from the show because a lot of you are not able to go, they usually hold it in February, they canceled twice in a row because of COVID. If you're not able to go we'll bring you the show and send that out to you as soon as possible. And also a lot of the Europeans were not able to come.
There's a huge contingency of people from Russia, England, France, Germany, Switzerland, from all over Europe, but they weren't able to get in this year. Again, flights were shut down from those countries. So I am excited about going to the show. I'll get some clips of what goes on there and send it out to you real soon. So make sure you like and subscribe to our channel because there's more coming at you.