For example, although mostly unknown outside the country, one of Australia’s most famous Bushrangers (i.e. This was to be the beginning of a career that would lead to his revolvers becoming some of the most respected in the world. in Birmingham and by 1839 had left Hollis to set up a shop of his own. In 1830 he was apprenticed to gunmakers Hollis Bros & Co. William Tranter was born in 1816 to a blacksmith named Thomas Tranter and his wife Mary. 45 ACP at around 100 fps less: a quite satisfactory dose of stopping power with which to make one’s “close encounters of the unfriendly kind” much less dramatic than they might otherwise have been. So to put that in perspective almost twice the bullet weight of a. Subsequently the cartridge cases were made in the modern method using drawn brass and the gunpowder load was able to propel a 400 grain bullet at a useful 725 fps. 577 Manstopper cartridge began life using the quite primitive coiled brass cartridges with a gunpowder load and approximately 400 grain lead bullet traveling somewhere north of 650 fps. Tranter “Manstopper” revolver, right side view. 45″ would be a great advantage so something a tad larger was called for. However, back in the Victorian Era, field experience showed that a more powerful cartridge than the typical. 455 Automatic cartridge, which was still a bit less potent than the American. 455 Webley revolver during the First World War, along with the Webley Automatic pistol and some Colt M1911 pistols chambered for the slightly more powerful. These were thought to be good enough for most situations and indeed the British Army would still be using their. 45″ caliber typically firing a lead bullet around 200 gn – 250 gn at around 650 fps or so. The popular British revolver cartridges of that era were of. In short a British Army officer needed to have a sidearm of sufficient power to not just kill but to stop in his tracks the opponent coming at him: and in case the revolver proved to be ineffective the officer would need to draw his saber in good time and get to work with that in the hope of emerging from that encounter alive. These were all places where a British officer’s adversary would be likely to be physically fit, and fanatically determined to use whatever weapon was at their disposal to cause the aforementioned British officer to meet his Maker in the nastiest way possible. British Army officers of the Victorian Era were required to do active service in the far flung reaches of the British Empire which included significant chunks of Africa, India, and such places as the Sudan and Afghanistan.