Doc Savage Manual

Apart from the pun in the name, the Manual of Bronze is a slim below-comic sized volume, a totally unique object printed by Millennium Comics in 1992, during the brief time they had the Doc Savage comics license.

Millennium's work can be pointed out as the single most accurate interpretation of Doc ever, remembering details scattered through 150+ novels, like how Long Tom had a gold tooth that, whenever it was knocked out, he'd vow to get the guy responsible. Their comic adaptation of Repel (aka the "Deadly Dwarf") is one of the most artistically successful ever, and maybe one of the showiest, featuring Doc's archfoe, an evil gay millionaire midget who insists his henchmen walk around shirtless (yes, really).
The Doc Savage Equipment Vest or Utility Vest,more than like looked something like this.

The Manual of Bronze includes detailed character bios on Doc, the Gang, and a few selected villains (including the aforementioned Deadly Dwarf), and it's even a scrapbook of Doc Savage art by different artists, a prospect that must have been a lot more tantalizing before the invention of Google Image Search. My favorite is Adam Hughes, and here's why:

It's worth owning for no other reason than it's intimately researched and complete and shows diagrams of gadgets and equipment like Doc's Helldiver, the Fortress of Solitude, etc. I didn't care for the Supermachine Pistols' out-there design; since the machine pistol later on became a reality in the form of the uzi, wouldn't it stand to reason they'd look something like that, only with a curled magazine?
Actually,the drawing is inaccurate to Lester Dent often describes.Whatever Dent was describing,more than likely resembled a standard Tommy Thompson Machine Gun of the 1930's,but shorter.Jim Steranko's reconstruction has a front handgrip that can swing down for more steady aiming using both hands. It also has interchangeable barrels which includes a silencer/flash suppressor as described in the quotation from Red Snow, and an extended barrel for increased effective range.

The Super-Machine Pistol appeared to use a small bullet -- likely a .22 caliber. We are also told that the usual type of bullet used was a "Mercy bullet" which was a hollow metal shell that contained a rapid acting anesthetic liquid. In Brand of the Werewolf, we are told that one mercy bullet had enough anesthetic to render an average 70 kg man unconscious for around 30 minutes.

A hollow-shelled bullet would not penetrate well at all, which was a positive thing in a non-lethal bullet. But it would still need to deliver its payload through the skin and into the bloodstream. I submit that the most likely anesthetic used was a ketamine derivative dissolved in Di-Methylsulfoxide (DMSO) solvent. If you touch DMSO to your little finger, you will taste it in your mouth in less that 30 seconds. Ketamine is a very rapidly acting agent that renders a person unconscious within seconds but does not suppress respiration or blood pressure. In fact it supports cardiac and respiratory function. Its effects last for about 20-30 minutes. It would be most effective if the mercy bullet penetrated the skin, but if you got this mixture on your clothing and it touched your skin, it would be rapidly absorbed and would still knock you out in just a few moments.


In the Super Sagas, they describe other types of bullets:

-Regular Ball ammunition

-Explosive bullets that could bring down "a small house"

-Tracer bullets that burn brightly and can be tracked with the naked eye day and night

-Incendiary bullets that could light fires on flammable targets



We can speculate about other types of ammunition as well:

-"Death Cap" ammunition: Just like a Mercy Bullet but with 100 mg of hydrogen cyanide dissolved in DMSO. Even getting the liquid on your skin from one bullet would be rapidly fatal. They were designed for special commando operations. The shells were pointed and designed to penetrate more deeply than mercy slugs. You could never confuse the two becasue they looked so different frm each other. Eventually "Death Cap" pistol rounds would become standard issue for designated U.N.C.L.E field agents

-Steel-Jacketed Ball ammunition: For military use. These would meet the requirements of the Geneva Convention.

-Hollow Point: Expands on impact to deliver a maximum kinetic pulse.

-Armor Piercing: Using a tungsten carbide or hardened steel core, these could penetrate light steel plates that were one-half inch thick. Effective even against most modern light body armor.

-Ultra High Velocity ammunition: Delivers more kinetic energy knock-down power than a .38 special round. In either ball, jacketed ball, or hollow point forms.

-Bird-Shot round: Fires a spray of smaller projectiles like a shot gun. Most useful for small game.

-Sabotted Flechette rounds: High velocity nail-like sabotted flechettes designed to penetrate between the fibers in a bullet proof vest or heavy clothing. These can be tinged with poisons. A drop of ricin toxin on one of these flechettes hitting anywhere in the chest or head would cause almost immediate death.

-"Memory" Ammunition: This is an exotic alloy bullet that has "memory". On impact, it "remembers" to expand itself into into an enlarged disc or lattice work shape that does extensive damage in side the body.

-"Smart" Bullet: An exotic alloy which remains hard when striking soft tissue but becomes soft on hitting a hard surface. This type of bullet does not expand in the tissues and is more humane than a hollow point. But it also will completely discharge its kinetic energy if it hits a wall preventing ricochets and further penetration. It is considered safer in a crowded urban environment.

-Piezoelectric Shock rounds: Based on the electric rounds invented by Hareton Ironcastle for the ill-fated Maple White Land expedition in 1918. The initial shock of the discharge in the pistol is converted partly into an electrical charge by the exotic alloy bullet and an electric discharge is released on impact into the target. It has an effect similar to a TASER. The shock is only ~10,000 volts, but it can knock a man out if you hit him just right with one round or in several places at once. The exotic metal alloy that Ironcastle first used was very heat labile, so he could not use a standard gun powder. Contrary to popular belief, gun powders do not explode. They combust rapidly releasing large amounts of hot gas that push the bullet out of the gun while the flame heats up both the gun and the bullet in the process. Ironcastle developed a "cold gun powder" that released large amounts of gas adiabatically without heating either the bullet or the gun. It produced no flash and gave off a popping sound instead of a sharp report. The rifle that fired this special shell was dubbed an "air gun" but this was a misnomer.

-Silent Ammunition: Used for special operations. Uses any kind of projectile with Ironcastle's "cold gun powder" and a silencer. The powder charge could be set for subsonic muzzle velocity which might obviate the need for the silencer.

ADDENDUM: During World War II, Doc redesigned his Super-Machine Pistol to fire a higher caliber 9mm round for use in military operations. The variant ammunition included mercy bullet, jacketed ball, armor piercing, explosive, piezoelectric, incendiary, tracer, and sabotted flechette. All of these rounds, except the tracers, also came in silent ammunition form. After the war, Doc reverted to the .22 caliber Super-Machine Pistols again.

In any case, if you like to clip and save diagrams from comics about vehicles and gadgets (and I sure do), this is for you.

What's more, this is the only book of its kind thus far made for Doc Savage. Perhaps one day we'll get a more detailed illustrated reference. Until then, this one will have to do.