Beretta 1934 questions

[stew47]

Well I could use some wise advice. I've always had good luck here. I have a beretta 380 1934 that was my dads and became mine when he passed. I always thought it was terrible and I couldn't hit broad side of barn. Well after professional training and plenty of rounds through my carry firearms I see I was incorrect. It is very accurate even with poor sights.

Anyways my question is what is proper way to carry as far as manual of arms. Cocked and locked? I don't anticipate carrying this particular firearm much I would like to know the proper way. Thanks again!

[Brian D.]

Let me do some reading on that model and get back to you. In the meantime, try to figure out if the gun has its firing mechanism (often that would be the firing pin) blocked when the safety is applied. If not, then the gun likely isn't drop-safe; that would make me very leery of carrying it with a round chambered.

[Brian D.]

Okay I'm back the search was easy for once. The safety blocks movement of the trigger but not the sear. So carrying it cocked and locked is pretty much off the table imo. Plus, the lever must be turned 180 degrees from 'safe' to 'fire', quite the parlor trick under stress. And if you wanted to carry it chamber loaded, hammer down, you'd have to manually lower the hammer, something else I'm not fond of.

That leaves chamber-empty. You make the call on that one.

[stew47]

Thank you Brian! After posting this I found a thread on the high road that basically called for carrying condition 3 mag loaded, empty chamber and safety disengaged. I'm gonna say I wouldn't carry this one unless my other carry guns got lost, stolen or whatever. I just wonder if that's how they were always carried. It was Italian issue military side arm for some number of years and police issue for quite a while as well. Lol oh who knows but it's neat trivia. We sure have it good these days. Thank you for your research I didn't even consider drop proof and I should've.

[Brian D.]

Not to overgeneralize but for many years European military carried sidearms more as an indicator of status than for actual defensive use. Hence their looks were more important than utility as a weapon.