Revolvers are regaining some lost popularity, but some of the common knowledge from 20 or 30 years ago
hasn’t yet been recovered.
I’ve reached the age where I occasionally forget what other people don’t know. More accurately, I’ve forgotten what I’ve forgotten. Some of the things I’m seeing newer shooters struggle with were so thoroughly baked into my training decades ago that I stopped thinking about them. They weren’t instinctive; they were simply the accepted way of doing things when I learned them.
That’s particularly apparent to me when it comes to revolvers. The wheelgun has made something of a comeback as a defensive handgun, and I’m happy to see more people talking about, carrying and training with sixguns. At the same time, I’m seeing some remarkably inefficient — and occasionally downright sketchy — reloading techniques demonstrated in the popular media by people who ought to know better. In most cases, I suspect the problem isn’t a lack of interest or effort. It’s simply that somewhere along the way, the way we taught people to run a revolver changed—or stopped being taught altogether.
I learned differently. My revolver training came at a time when police officers and serious defensive shooters routinely spent a lot of time learning how to run a wheelgun. The techniques were drilled until they became second nature, and I hadn’t thought much about any of it in years because, to me, there was never much mystery to reloading a revolver. Watching these more recent demonstrations reminded me that what I considered basic knowledge isn’t necessarily basic knowledge anymore.
So, let’s go back to how we were taught to do it “back in the day.”
The Old Guys
I was pretty much the last generation of police officers who grew up with revolvers as duty guns. In my case, that meant the classic Smith & Wesson Model 19. By the time I attended the police academy, I had already been issued the “cutting-edge” Smith & Wesson 4506, but during the couple of years I worked the road as a sheriff’s deputy, all my training and qualifications were with a revolver. I suppose you could call me a “wheelgun-native” shooter, although I’m not sure such a distinction belongs on a business card.
I am, however, proud to point out that unlike some of the Johnny-come-lately experts demonstrating these techniques, I’ve actually pointed an actual revolver at actual bad guys during actual police work. That doesn’t make me an authority on everything involving revolvers, but it does mean I have some firsthand experience in circumstances a lot more complicated than days on the square range.
Terminology
Before getting into technique, it helps to make sure we’re all singing off the same sheet of music. First, the basics: there are three kinds of handgun reloads—a speed load, a tactical load and an administrative reload.
A speed load is the one you must perform. You’ve fired the gun empty and need ammunition RIGHT NOW in the middle of a fight. This also touches on one of the legitimate disadvantages of carrying a revolver for self-defense. Even a very well-practiced revolver shooter is going to be slower getting six (or whatever) more rounds into a cylinder than a comparably skilled shooter will be swapping magazines in a semi-auto. If you choose a wheelgun for defensive use, you should understand its limitations rather than pretending they don’t exist.
A tactical load is different because it happens when you can reload, rather than absolutely having to. Perhaps there has been a lull in the fight; you’ve fired several rounds and want to start the next few minutes of your life with a full cylinder. In fact, I’d argue a tactical reload is even more important with a revolver because it’s much slower and you’re probably starting with fewer rounds than virtually any modern defensive pistol.
Finally, there’s an administrative reload. This is what you do on the range when nothing really matters except safety. Under those circumstances, it doesn’t really matter how you get the cartridges into the gun, but that doesn’t mean you should practice poor technique. If you spend hundreds or thousands of repetitions doing something one way because you’re thinking, “I’ll do it properly when it matters,” you’re kidding yourself.
Brent is a huge proponent of the support-side revolver reload (in this case, using his left hand for a right-handed shooter).
By using this hand position, the revolver is cradled with the cylinder locked out and immobile. Now you can run,
jump and scramble without having to figure out where the holes are!
Strong or Support?
There are two basic ways to manipulate a revolver during a reload. A strong-side reload keeps the revolver in your shooting hand while your support hand performs the reload. A support-side reload transfers the revolver to your support hand, allowing your shooting hand to manipulate the ammunition and the gun during the loading process.
I strongly favor the support-side technique; it’s the method I was taught and practiced during my police training. Proponents of the strong-side reload will point out that you don’t have to completely give up your firing grip and that it can be fast when performed by someone highly proficient. The problem, at least to me, is what happens to the cylinder once you open it and start moving around.
A revolver cylinder is a floppy thing when it isn’t locked into the frame. On a square range, with your feet planted and your hands working exactly as you command, it’s not much of a problem. But a defensive reload may happen while you’re moving, running, fighting or ‘merely’ trying to keep your balance on a loose, slippery or uneven surface. I can also guarantee you’ll be dealing with an adrenaline dump that might leave your hands shaking like a toy poodle on meth. Now you’ve got to line up a half-dozen fresh cartridges with a cylinder that is moving around at the end of your arm.
A strong-side reload allows you to keep a firing grip on the gun, but at the cost of the cylinder not being anchored
in one static location. If you’re standing still, this works fine, but a real-world fight involves lots of movement.
You might be able to get a finger into the cylinder opening to stabilize it — or you might not, because keeping a semblance of a firing grip makes it awkward. Worse, the cylinder could even relatch itself while you’re trying to get everything lined up.
This is also why the support-side reload was traditionally taught to police officers back in those days when we rode dinosaurs on patrol. It wasn’t because somebody decided it was the fashionable way to reload a revolver; instead, hard-won trial and error proved the technique provided a more stable platform for manipulating the gun under less-than-ideal circumstances.
The Speed Load
The basic speed-load sequence isn’t complicated, but it needs to be practiced until you don’t have to consciously think about every step. Start by opening the cylinder with the thumb of your shooting hand. Immediately transfer the revolver to your support hand and use a couple of fingers — typically the middle and ring fingers — through the frame to hold the cylinder open against its stop.
To empty the revolver of spent cases in a support-side reload, you simply invert your hand, use your thumb
to push on the extractor rod, and gravity helps all the empty cases go to the ground.
Next, turn the revolver upside down so the muzzle points toward the sky. This is where gravity becomes your friend. With the gun inverted, use the support hand to operate the ejector rod and force the empty cases out of the cylinder.
If one of the cases sticks, you can use the palm of your shooting hand to smack the ejector rod and give it some additional persuasion. Keep in mind, however, that if the case is really stuck, this probably isn’t going to be particularly pleasant, so you may have just created two problems instead of one.
Once the empties are out, invert the revolver again so the muzzle points downward. The shooting hand can then bring the fresh ammunition to the cylinder. A speedloader is the optimal choice for a true speed load; speed strips are less handy, and loose cartridges are the last choice because you’re introducing more individual manipulations into a process where speed and simplicity are the objectives.
After the ammunition is inserted, close the cylinder firmly with the support-hand thumb, transfer the revolver to the shooting hand and go back to work.
The Tactical Load
A tactical reload starts much the same way. Open the cylinder and transfer the revolver to the support hand, but instead of inverting the gun, keep the muzzle pointed down. Operate the ejector rod enough to lift the fired cases partially out of the cylinder, then use the shooting hand to pluck out the empty cases and replace them with fresh ammunition.
This is where a speed strip becomes particularly useful. A speedloader is fast, but it also encourages you to dump the entire cylinder and replace all six rounds, even the unfired ones. With a speed strip, you can replace only the ammunition you’ve shot. This is the reason experienced revolver shooters often carry both a speedloader and a speed strip.
This is a normal daily ammunition loadout for many revolver carriers — the speed loader is for speed reloads,
the speed strip is for tactical reloads, and a couple of spare rounds in the pocket allow for a secondary tactical
reload and serve as backup.
A couple of loose rounds in your shooting-side pocket aren’t a bad idea, either. However, there is a considerable argument to be made that all “crisis” reloads should simply be treated as speed loads. If you’ve dumped several unfired cartridges onto the ground in the process, you can always retrieve them later if there’s truly a lull in the fight.
Of course, those cartridges may have gone underwater, landed in mud or rolled into a sewer grate. At that point, you’ve essentially thrown away perfectly good ammunition, which makes the argument for a tactical reload a bit more compelling.
If pressed for a non-negotiable answer, I lean toward the speed-load approach. My concern is that if I’m in a genuine fight, I have no idea how much manual dexterity I’ll have. Imagine trying to pluck individual cartridges from a cylinder while your fingers are doing the Macarena, then seeing your spare ammunition supply become six individual pieces of litter.
If you prefer to retain unfired rounds and replace only the empties, there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. The important thing is to understand the difference and practice whichever method you intend to use.
There’s that word, “practice.” Do I need to say it again?
There’s another consequence of using the support-side reload that isn’t immediately obvious. If you’re transferring the revolver to your support hand and using your shooting hand to manipulate the ammunition, your reloads need to be readily accessible to your shooting hand.
That’s the opposite of what we’ve traditionally learned with a semi-auto pistol. Spare magazines normally ride on the support side because that’s the hand we’re going to use to retrieve them. With a revolver, the process is reversed. If the gun is going into your support hand, the speedloader or speed strip should be where your shooting hand can easily reach it. This is why the typical police duty belt of the revolver era had its double speedloader pouch on the same side as the holster.
Don’t Play Catch
There’s another old habit that needs to die: Don’t dump the empty cases into your hand.
This was a common practice taught to police officers, particularly on the range, and the reason was understandable. Academy instructors didn’t want a firing line full of recruits constantly bending over to pick up brass, so trainees were sometimes taught to eject the empties into their hands and retain them during the reload.
Unfortunately, there were instances in which officers killed in the line of duty were found still holding those empty cases. The story was repeated for years as something of an apocryphal warning, but there were enough actual examples to demonstrate that it wasn’t simply an old cop story. A habit learned on the range had carried over into a life-or-death situation.
;
Let the empties hit the ground.
I know some crusty old revolver shooters will disagree with me on this, and I know there are range circumstances where catching your brass is convenient. That’s fine. But don’t practice defensive reloads by keeping the empty cases in your hand simply because you’re worried about cleaning up the range afterward. If you want to police your brass, do it after you’ve finished practicing the real-world reload skill.
Moon clips are thin steel rings that hold ammunition and allow it to be fired in a properly sized revolver.
They primarily come in 2-, 3- and 6-round versions, with the 6-rounder often called a “full moon clip.”
Whatever size, they essentially function as a speed loader.
Practice Like You Fight
The administrative reload is where most of us get lazy. While there’s nothing wrong with a casual administrative reload, don’t confuse it with practicing a defensive reload.
If you carry a revolver for protection, frequently (I say “always”) practice the same support-side reloading technique you’ll use when it actually matters. Learn where your ammunition lives and how your hand finds the speedloader or speed strip without searching for it. Above all, practice the sequence until you don’t have to consciously work your way through it.
The goal here isn’t to become the world’s fastest revolver reloader. It’s to eliminate unnecessary decisions and movements so the process remains functional when your concentration, vision and manual dexterity aren’t at their best. As trainers are fond of saying, “Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.”
What We Forgot
Ultimately, as I set out to write this story, it was eye-opening to realize I had forgotten what I had forgotten. Revolver reloading wasn’t something I figured out on my own, nor was it an instinctive skill that somehow developed through years of shooting. It was simply part of the accepted, state-of-the-art training I received when revolvers were still a normal part of defensive handgun instruction. The techniques were taught, practiced and reinforced until you didn’t have to think much about them anymore.
Then revolvers largely disappeared from police holsters, semi-autos became the dominant defensive handgun, and some of that institutional knowledge disappeared with them. Now the wheelgun is “back,” and we’re having to rediscover some of what used to be standard practice.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Every generation gets to relearn some lessons, and the current interest in revolvers is an opportunity to preserve knowledge that otherwise might continue to fade.
If you’re going to carry a revolver, learn how to reload it properly and practice the technique until the mechanics are familiar and almost automatic. You may never need to perform a reload in a gunfight—and I sincerely hope you don’t—but if you do, that’s a lousy time to discover you’ve forgotten something you never knew you didn’t know.
