Pocket carry is among the most enduring types of concealed carry. Samuel Colt offered his popular pocket percussion pistols during the mid-19th century, followed by other manufacturers such as Iver Johnson and Smith & Wesson. In Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902), the Victorian-era detective Sherlock Holmes asks Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade if he is armed.

“As long as I have my trousers I have a hip-pocket, and as long as I have my hip-pocket I have something in it,” Lestrade smiles.

Holmes replies, “Good! My friend [Dr. John Watson] and I are also ready for emergencies.” 1

While these characters and story are works of fiction, the scene demonstrates the main role of pocket carry in the 19th and early 20th centuries: that of an emergency backup plan. Even though technology has certainly evolved over the last 100-plus years, pocket carry still serves the same purpose. While it may seem like nothing more than dropping a handgun into your pocket, choosing to adopt this type of carry requires a basic knowledge of — and ardent adherence to — the fundamentals.

As with every other decision in self-defense, you’re going to need to carefully weigh your options. The most efficient carry mode is a strong-side belt scabbard, but that requires a covering garment. The next best carry method is inside-the-waistband (IWB) carry. This requires only a light covering garment, since the majority of the handgun is concealed in the pants. Other carry modes that work well in certain circumstances are shoulder carry and cross-draw, but they also require substantial covering garments. Sometimes, pocket carry is the best way to go.

Your gun pocket should be free of keys, debris and any other material that might restrict your access to the firearm or cause a malfunction. I have seen one semi-automatic and one revolver tied up and rendered useless by material from a pocket. Worse yet, foreign items introduced to the gun pocket can induce a negligent discharge.

The style of your pocket determines how you will access your gun. Trouser pockets and exterior jacket pockets are usually side-loading. Jeans pockets, back pockets and interior jacket pockets are usually top-loading. Know your pockets — inside and out — because you will have to fit a holster not only to your gun but also to the pocket in which you intend to carry that gun.

The holster (which is anything but optional for pocket carry) keeps the gun separated from dust and lint in the pocket and stabilizes the pistol for a sharp, repeatable draw. Some of the best holsters conceal the shape of the handgun, but whatever type or style it is, make sure the holster is securely in place and properly positioned.

Most pocket holsters, such as the DeSantis Nemesis, are ambidextrous.

Wright Leather Works also offers an excellent unit, the Insider, for pocket carry.

You must remember that other holster types are stabilized by the gun belt, but the pocket holster is not stabilized except by compression.

Gun selection will also play a major role. My favorite backup handgun is the snub-nosed .38 Special, but I would only consider a hammerless revolver (with the hammer entirely hidden by the frame) for pocket carry. The five-shot .38 is ideal, and Smith & Wesson, Ruger and Charter Arms all offer quality “hammerless” .38s.

There are plenty of quality striker-fired pistols without a protruding hammer as well, but whatever you opt for, a firearm without an external hammer is the best choice to achieve snag-free access.

Pocket carry almost always incorporates a strong-side draw. When you begin, it is important to blade your hand into the pocket with your fingers extended.

This allows grasping the handgun and drawing smoothly. This may seem overtly and even comedically obvious, but you might be surprised how many carriers manage to get it wrong — especially those who’ve trained a bit in other modes of carry.

RIG UP RIGHT A quality pocke t holster and magazine carrier will keep both gun IfA quality pocket holster an you have practiced other types of and reload properly positioned for draws, then you have practiced grasping access during a crisis.

the pistol’s grip frame as soon as you make contact. But with pocket carry, if you make a fist inside of your pocket by immediately acquiring a firing grip, you will likely not be able to successfully draw without getting both your hand and gun caught. Instead, blade your hand in, grasp the grip frame without making a fist and, as the gun is drawn, only then affirm the firing grip. The holster will then either remain behind out of adhesion or will hook on some part of the pocket as you complete your draw. Train on this, as if you do not practice effectively clearing your holster, you will end up drawing both the handgun and the holster.

Pocket carry is useful but often misunderstood. Since almost everyone has experience with retrieving items from their pockets, all too many concealed carriers believe that drawing a firearm from a pocket is just as easy and that they can skip training on this style of going about armed. This is anything but true, and it can lead to everything from fumbling the draw to negligent discharges to being unable to draw when the gun is needed.

You won’t benefit from pocket carry if you don’t have a basic understanding of it and are not accustomed to doing it. Practice drawing the handgun from your pocket extensively before you trust a specific handgun-and-holster combination. This mode of carry is an important part of the overall self-defense picture and demands as much practice as any other type of carry despite its apparent simplicity.

(1)Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles (New York: McClure, Phillip & Co., 1903), 218.

SOURCES DeSantis Gunhide:DeSantisHolster.com Wright

■ In 1882, French inventor Jacques Edmond Turbiaux patented the unique “Turbiaux Le Protector.” The nickel-plated pistol was designed to hold either 10 .22 rounds or seven 8mm rounds. The palm pistol could easily be concealed in the user’s hand since it was not much larger than a pocket watch. To open it, the user had to rotate the top plate until it released, exposing the revolving cylinder ring. The pistol was fired by pressing the trigger against the palm. Peter H. Finnegan, of the Minneapolis Firearms Co., licensed the design in the U.S. the following year. In 1892, Finnegan established the Chicago Fire Arms Co. and continued to produce Turbiaux’s pistol. Instead of firing the traditional .22 or 8mm rounds, Finnegan’s pistol fired seven .32 cartridges. The company advertised it as being compact, light, strong, quick, safe, effective and reliable. Finnegan contracted Ames Sword Co. to produce 15,000 of these pistols to sell at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, but it failed to fill the order in time, leading to a lawsuit between the two. The pistol remained in production until 1910.

Manipulating both a hand-held light and a firearm can be difficult — if not impossible — in a high-stress, fast-moving situation. Doing so ties up both hands: one hand to hold and operate the light and the other to control and operate the firearm.

These problems don’t exist with a weapon-mounted light. Such a device will be there for you when lighting is critically reduced — without adversely affecting your ability to handle your firearm — and will also allow you to maintain a free hand for other tasks.

And since the light is mounted on the firearm, the light is always aligned with that firearm’s muzzle. That is both ideal and problematic. A weapon-mounted light is part of the weapon system and needs to be treated as such — especially when it comes to threat identification.

If you’re not justified in drawing and pointing your gun, you’re not justified in pointing a gun-mounted light. That’s why it’s important to get yourself a first-rate hand-held unit. It allows you to safely assess a situation without pointing a firearm at anything that doesn’t need a firearm pointed at it. And if you run a quick search, it won’t take you long to realize that SureFire is universally recognized for producing the finest and most innovative tactical illumination tools and equipment in the industry.

For 25 years, SureFire CombatLights with the patented CombatGrip have set the standard for hand-held tactical illumination. Optimized for use with the Rogers (SureFire) Technique, the CombatGrip allows for easy light manipulation with a two-handed grip on the handgun. The CombatGrip’s distinct profile works exceptionally well with other popular shooting techniques too.

The founder and president of Sure-Fire, Dr. John Matthews, introduced the SureFire 6Z CombatLight in 1997.

FBI Agent Bill Rogers, a top firearms instructor and the father of the modern Kydex and security holster, saw that many shooting techniques employing hand-held lights failed to utilize Sure-Fire’s compact high-output flashlights with a tailcap switch. A user could hold a SureFire 6P flashlight between the middle and index fingers of his or her support hand and turn the light on and off by pressing the tailcap with his or her palm — all while retaining two hands on the handgun. Rogers modified the flashlight by slipping a piece of bicycle inner tube around the body of it to provide traction and better leverage to operate the tailcap switch.

As a result of Rogers’ clever idea, Matthews developed a light specifically designed based on Rogers’ technique. And voila: The SureFire 6Z Combat-Light was born. SureFire engineers have since refined Matthews’ prototype.

The original CombatLight quickly caught on in the tactical worlds of law enforcement and military operations and moved from there into the privatecitizen market. And 25 years later, it’s still being updated and reissued.

The CombatLight quickly caught on within the shooting community, and successive models were also positively received, with plenty of them adopted by leading law enforcement agencies. The FBI issued a SureFire Z2 CombatLight to all graduates of the FBI Academy, and it also became a standard-issue piece of equipment for all U.S. Air Marshals.

As technology advanced over the years, the CombatLight evolved. The incandescent lamp assembly was replaced by a virtually indestructible high-performance LED. And advancements in LED technology resulted in a previously unthinkable lumen output and provided longer battery life compared to an incandescent lamp.

SureFire has two different Combat-Lights — the G2ZX and G2Z-MV. Both models feature a Nitrolon body and a hard-anodized aluminum head, and each is powered by two 123A lithium batteries. Both models are single-output and are O-ring and gasket-sealed.

They also have an IPX7 rating, which means they’re protected against immersion in water up to a depth of 1 meter for 30 minutes.

The G2ZX and G2Z-MV differ in output and beam pattern. Beam pattern is the relationship between light output and beam intensity. A tighter beam with a bright “hot spot” has greater reach.

The current G2ZX has a 600-lumen output — sent from a micro-textured polycarbonate reflector that provides plenty of reach — combined with significant surround light, while the G2Z-MV has a greater output at 800 lumens. Sure-Fire’s proprietary MaxVision Beam provides natural close-range lighting with a wide surround for target identification and improved situational awareness.

For purposes of comparison, the 6Z, with its incandescent P60 Lamp Assembly, produced a whopping (for that time) 65 lumens, which was the same output as a five-D-cell Maglite of the era.

The user interface is simple and straightforward. The G2ZX features a tactical tailcap: Push for momentary-on and twist for constant-on.

The G2Z-MV includes a click-style tailcap: Press for momentary activation, push further for constant-on mode, and click again to turn it off. SureFire designed the click switch with enough throw so that you cannot select the constant-on option unless you intentionally drive the switch button in. Both tailcaps have a lock-out feature, which is important in prevent accidental activation while you’re traveling or otherwise transporting equipment.

■ Donald A. Keller came up with the idea of the Kel-Lite flashlight while working for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department during the 1960s. He grew tired of breaking cheap units, so he devised his own tactical flashlight. Keller partnered with Frank Patti, who owned a machine shop in Covina, California, and produced a prototype in early 1968. The flashlight was rust- and corrosion-proof; included a high-intensity polished reflector, an unbreakable lens and interchangeable components; and came with a lifetime warranty. In 1969, Keller left the sheriff’s department and went into business full-time. As Kel-Lite expanded, Keller and Patti began to add other law enforcement equipment to the product line. In 1972, both left the company after clashing with the company’s general manager. In the early ‘80s, Streamlight acquired Kel-Lite, later changing its name to Excalibur. Keller continued to produce and design flashlights, starting another flashlight company, Pro-Light, in 1973, and helped to develop the Maglite flashlight and other products.

Neither the G2ZX nor the G2Z-MV comes with a pocket clip, but each light does come with a lanyard. Pocket carry without a clip necessitates dropping the flashlight loose into the pocket, lanyard protruding for an easy draw, but this is not the only option. The best pocket-carry solution I’ve found for the G2ZX and G2Z-MV is the Low Profile Carry (LPC) Clip from Thyrm. All Thyrm products are designed and made in the U.S. and come with a limited lifetime warranty. MSRP is $17.99.

SureFire is discontinuing the G2Z-MV, but fret not. It will be replaced by a new CombatLight that SureFire is understandably tight-lipped about. There are no plans to discontinue the G2ZX.

MSRP for the G2ZX is $99, and MSRP for the G2Z-MV is $132. While some components are imported, many Sure-Fire products are completely made in the U.S. and are backed by SureFire’s No-Hassle Warranty.

SureFire makes a special Combat-Light for Haley Strategic Partners: the Disruptive 3nvironments Firefly Technique, or D3FT (pronounced “deft”).

Developed by Force Reconnaissance Marine veteran Travis Haley, of Haley Strategic, the D3FT is a single-output light that features a compact design for EDC.

The flashlight has a hard-anodized aluminum body and head and a machined aluminum plunger (grip ring).

It is O-ring and gasket-sealed, and it too has an IPX7 rating. Its 500-lumen output utilizes a TIR reflector for optimal throw and surround light. It has a click-style tailcap with three options:

Push for momentary activation, press further for constant-on, and click again for off. It has a lockout feature and is designed to prevent inadvertent constant-on activation. It is powered by a single 123A lithium cell and wears a robust two-way pocket clip for easy carry. (Like the others, it too ships with a lanyard.) The D3FT is available exclusively through Haley Strategic for $169.

The CombatLight was quite revolutionary when it was introduced 25 years ago, and SureFire remains a premiere manufacturer of top-tier tools for today’s concealed carrier. The challenge facing every defender — how to operate in darkness without giving up any advantage to an attacker and without harming anyone who does not need to be harmed — will likely never truly be bested. But with units like those put out by SureFire, it is easier to meet that challenge than at any other time in human history.