That gun was my first exposure to a piece that is, to this day, a gold standard for rimfire autoloading handguns. It was a Colt Woodsman.

The Design

You really can’t go wrong with anything designed by the DaVinci of guns, John Browning. The Colt woodsman is just another typically great product of that brilliant man’s mind. The Maestro’s rimfire pistol design borrowed a few traits from the 1911, including the slide and grip angle, but differed in having no grip safety, no external hammer, and only a short slide that didn’t cover the barrel.

The new handgun wasn't a martial pistol. It was intended for plinking, casual woods use and target practice, so John Browning reckoned, didn’t need these features as a martial sidearm would. The first model of the Woodsman (the pistol actually didn’t go by that name until 1927 and was originally called the “Target Model”) was introduced in 1915, four years after the famous Colt-Browning 1911.

See Related: Sunday Gun Day Vol. II Ep. XXV - How One Mormon Gunsmith Changed the World

Browning’s design was, as was normally the case, excellent, and the gun quickly picked up a following, not just in the shooting sports, but also in literature. No less an author than Earnest Hemingway, a shooter and outdoorsman himself, mentioned the gun in his 1938 book “Hemingway on Hunting.”

The Gun

The first series of the Woodsman was built from its introduction in 1915 until Colt switched to war production in 1941. Three models were made:

The Target Model, with a 6” barrel and adjustable sights.

The Sport Model, with a 4 ½” barrel and fixed sights – adjustable sights were available as an option.

The Match Target Model, introduced in 1938, with a heavy barrel and an improved, enlarged grip.

After the war, Colt took a few years to bring the Woodsman back, but that finally happened in 1948. The second version of the pistol retained the same three basic variations as the first series, but the new gun’s frame was slightly heavier, and the company added a slide stop, a magazine safety, and a 1911-style magazine release on the frame at the rear of the trigger guard.

Finally, in 1955, the final version inexplicably moved the magazine release back to the rear of the grip behind the magazine well. The company also introduced a budget model, called the Challenger.

The Woodsman was an expensive gun to produce, though, and production finally – and sadly – ceased in 1977.

Any gun as successful and highly regarded as the Colt Woodsman will inspire some competition. In that, three guns stand out.

See Related: Sunday Gun Day VIII - Five Pistols You Should Shoot Before You Die

Ruger

In 1949, while the second version of the Woodsman was on sale, a new company led by two guys named William Ruger and Alexander Sturm brought out the first in what would be a long, long list of firearms. Their Standard Model, as they called it, was a sleek little .22 autoloading handgun with broadly similar lines to the Woodsman, although the Ruger offering used a bolt inside a tubular receiver instead of the Browning-styled slide. The Ruger pistol was reportedly designed along the lines of the Japanese Namu service pistol, and unlike the Woodsman, the basic Ruger Standard design, upgraded and modified, is still being manufactured today. It’s a clean, solid, reliable design, and in 1949 it had the benefit of being cheaper than the Woodsman. My father ordered one by mail in 1955, and it’s still in the safe today, as reliable and accurate as ever.

High Standard

While this company made a range of guns, including revolvers, shotguns, and rifles, and was even a contract manufacturer of the M2 .50 caliber machine gun. But they also produced some great .22 semi-auto pistols intended for the bullseye target market, those being the High Standard Victor, Supermatic, and Supermatic Trophy. These guns have been out of production since 2018, so plenty of used guns are available – and the prices can be surprisingly low, making this an interesting pick for the shooter on a budget.

Smith & Wesson

In 1957, Smith & Wesson introduced the Model 41, a dedicated target pistol in the .22 long rifle. Like the Woodsman, the Ruger, and the High Standard, it was a single-action-only autoloader; unlike the others, it was a dedicated target gun. In 1957, Smith & Wesson brought out the Model 46, a simplified, less expensive version of the Model 41. The Model 41 is on the heavy side for a rimfire holster gun, but its accuracy is unquestioned – and, like the Ruger, you can buy a new Model 41 today.

One of my oldest friends has a Model 41 that he has owned and used for plinking and bulls-eye paper-punching for many decades. It’s heavy for a rimfire pistol but very accurate; it does have the idiosyncrasy of being fussy about ammo, preferring premium, target-grade stuff like CCI Green Tag.

Today

There are plenty of Woodsman pistols on the used gun market. Around 690,000 of these guns were built in total, meaning that if you want one, you can find one, although the older pre-war models seem to command a premium on the various online gun auction sites. It remains as it was, a fine, reliable piece, whose very name conjures up days in the deep woods, seeking whatever game there might be.

Best of all, as we noted above, the Woodsman inspired some other great .22 rimfire autoloaders; aside from the Ruger, Hi-Standard, and Smith & Wesson models named, the .22 pistol market is, today, an embarrassment of riches. With many of these guns, you just can’t go wrong.

But the Colt Woodsman, designed by John Browning, is still, after more than a century, among the best ever, and is a gold standard against which all the others must be measured.