That battle was over in 1901 when Ohio born General Frederick Funston captured Aguinaldo on March 23 of that year at Palanan. Yet the development of an improved .38 caliber round was high on the list "must do's". Hoping he could convince the US Army to adopt it, a man by the name of Daniel B. Wesson designed the .38 Smith & Wesson Special cartridge. It contained 3.5 more grains of black powder (typically18 grains to 21.5 grains) than the .38 Long Colt and increased the projectile weight by 8 grains because of its flat base bullet. (Jihad this!) By keeping relation between the bullet and groove diameters to a much tighter tolerance, the previously required expansion of the bullet’s skirt on firing was no longer necessary. Weight increased as did strength.

Mr. Wesson, was unfortunately, a bit late, for the Army had already got their hands on a .45 caliber round for handguns of the future. By the end of 1899, the .38 Smith & Wesson Special cartridge, together with the new S&W Military & Police revolver, was introduced to the public. Soon most police departments in the United States adopted what became more popularly known as the .38 Special, where it remained the premier law enforcement handgun cartridge until the 1970s, when the .357 Magnum began to replace it as a service round . Only a minority of US police departments now issue or authorize use of the .38 Special revolver as a standard duty weapon, most having switched to the higher-capacity and faster-reloading semi-automatic pistols in 9mm Parabellum. Though I know a few lawmen who still carry their .38 as a backup.

Smith &Wesson, introduced their 38/44 revolver in the 1930's using, in it's heyday, the 158-grain lead bullet as the most commonly employed projectile. Unfortunately and too frequently, this bullet would yaw 180 degrees in living tissue and end its travel in the body base forward, making it a poor performer in soft tissue. Since it does not expand, and could travel 21 inches in soft tissue, the problem of exiting the target and hitting an innocent bystander was ever present.

When expanding hollowpoint ammunition was developed, the .38 Special’s wound ballistics potential began an upswing. In the beginning, these bullets were driven at such high velocities that they invariably over expanded and thus under penetrated. (Don't you hate when that happens). But in recent years, thanks to research at the Army's Wound Ballistics Laboratory at the Presideo, they are now producing bullets that reliably expand to no more than twice their original diameters at moderate velocities up to +P velocities.

If you have the P85 Police Undercover .38, one of the .38 Special ammunition you can stuff into the cylinder of your weapon is Federal’s so-called “FBI Load.’” This features a 158-grain lead hollow-point bullet with a muzzle velocity of 880 fps from a 4-inch barrel. This bullet will reliably expand to .59 caliber, at this velocity and somewhat less, and penetrate into soft tissue as much as 13 inches. Certainly a good ammo for self protection as opposed to simple target practice. Another up and comer is the banging