Oh dear me... such a tempest in a teapot.
X-Breath: If I survive and get back to Arizona I'll make a list of books that cover the background and history of John Browning's pistols in general, and the 1911 in particular. But be aware that some of them are out-of-print and can be very expensive.
During the years the 1911 was under development there was a lot of internal bickering going on within the Army. The Ordnance Department was determined to ditch the revolver and move on to an automatic pistol. The Cavalry however were determined to stick with a six-shooter – the Colt model 1892 and in particular, the model 1909. As the trials continued the horsebackers never failed to throw up any objection they could think of, real or imagined to whatever Colt and Browning came up with, and within the Army they had enough influence to be the tail that wagged the dog.
Now if one had the model 1909 revolver, they pointed out. It could be holstered during an emergency with the hammer cocked, and so long as the trigger wasn’t held back the hammer could fall, but as it did so the trigger would follow down and Colt’s famous “positive” hammer block would prevent a discharge. Not so with Browning’s early pistols, although the half-cock notch was supposed to stop the hammer from going all of the way down. Most of this business was disgruntled nit-picking.
All the Army requested from Browning was a manual safety, but if you study the whole picture you might have noticed that prior to 1910 none of the Browning designed pistols that had exposed hammers and could be thumb-cocked had any kind of manual safety, although some later ones did have a grip safety – but that’s another story. On the other hand all of Browning’s pistols that had internal hammers or strikers, the models 1903/08 Pocket Pistol and 1908 Vest Pocket Pistol being examples.
Had manual thumb-operated safeties that also locked the slide when they were engaged. Since this was true without exception, why would Browning change when the Army required him to put a “safety lock” on the 1910 prototype?
I could go on, but I haven’t had my breakfast – or morning coffee...
But rest assured that Tuner (not to mention the poor Old Fuff) have done their homework. Also notice that in a later Spanish Star design the manual safety was modified to block the cocked hammer, not the sear, and that the safety can be engaged regardless if the hammer is cocked or fully down. Had Browning not been a bit ticked off about the Army’s ridiculous (?) demands the safety might have been designed differently.