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In 1914 the standard side arm of the British Army was the top-break Webley revolver in either Mark IV or Mark V configuration. The Mark VI version of the Webley was formally adopted for use by both British and Commonwealth forces on May 24th, 1915. All three models were chambered in .455 Webley, which had been their service caliber in various black and smokeless powder incarnations for some 23 years.

The first of the .455 Webley series of cartridges, the Mark I, was designated as Britain’s official military handgun round in 1891. With a case length of .855 inch, the Mark I cartridge held a meager 18 grains of black powder. That conservative charge expelled a 265-grain, hollow base, lead bullet from a 6-inch revolver barrel at a lethargic 600 fps. In 1897 it was succeeded by the Mark II round, which retained the same 265-grain lead bullet but substituted 7 grains of cordite as the propellant. Because the more efficient cordite required less volume to achieve the same power as black powder, case length of the Mark II cartridge was reduced to .760 inch. Even though the Mark II round was nearly one tenth of an inch shorter than its predecessor, the chambers of all Webley .455 revolvers were bored long enough to accept the original Mark I cartridge.