In 1855, Prussian customs officials discovered a shipment of 3,000 Colt 1851 Navy model revolvers (and their accouterments) hidden in bales of cotton being shipped from New York to Russia. Prussia was a neutral power […]
On the eve of World War One, the Royal Horse Artillery and Royal Flying Corps had both adopted the Webley Self-Loading Pistol, chambered for a special .455 caliber semi-rimmed cartridge. With the needs of wartime, […]
In 1961, Heckler & Koch introduced a new light machine gun based on their roller-delayed blowback system as a companion piece to the G3/HK91 rifle. While the German military was quite happy with its MG3 […]
My recent video proposing a particular set of definitions for three generations of submachine gun design generated a lot of comments about the H&K MP-7 and FN P90. I focused largely on the first and […]
Having taken a close look at this original Erma EMP submachine gun yesterday, we are out at the range with it today. Like several of the interwar SMGs, the Erma was designed with a magazine […]
Developed by Heinrich Vollmer in the 1920s, this quite distinctive submachine guns was marketed by the Erma company starting in 1932 and sold quite well internationally. This particular example was used by the German police […]
In 1904, a man named Orlando Scott from Ontario filed a patent application for a safety device for breechloading rifles and shotguns. His idea was basically a spring loaded grip safety in the fore-end of […]
The MP-18,I was most likely the first true submachine gun to see combat use, issued in the final months of World War One to German Sturmtruppen. These guns were originally fitted with 32-round drum magazines […]
Submachine guns have gone through a distinct evolution over the past one hundred years. Today we will look at these changes, specifically identifying: – 1st Generation guns from World War One and through the 1930s […]
Rollin White was the inventor who patented the bored-through cylinder in the US, and sold an exclusive right to this patent to Smith & Wesson. They would use it as the basis for their own […]
© 2025 Forgotten Weapons.
Site developed by Cardinal Acres Web Development.