Book review - Forgotten Weapons

Book Review: The US Rifle M14 – The Last Steel Warrior

May 26, 2019 Ian McCollum 2

The M14 rifle is a rather controversial arm in American military service. As Frank Iannamico’s title says, it was the last steel-and-wood infantry rifle to be adopted by the US military, and it has a […]

Book Review: The Dreyse Military Needle-Ignition System

May 19, 2019 Ian McCollum 7

Leonard and Guy A-R-West have released the second book in their series on antique military rifles, this time on the Dreyse system. As anyone interested in the Dreyse has probably already learned, there is very […]

Book Review: Basque-Made Rolling Blocks of the 3rd Carlist War

May 12, 2019 Ian McCollum 6

This new book from Mowbray is an English translation of a work originally written in Spanish by Fernando de Aguinaga and Jose Luis de Aguinaga, which clearly involved a tremendous amount of original research. The […]

Book Review: Foundations of Sniper Marksmanship

May 5, 2019 Ian McCollum 4

John C. Simpson has been teaching military and police sniper training since 1985 – nearly as long as I have been alive. I encountered him back when I filmed a video on a Confederate Whitworth […]

Book Review: La Régia Fabbrica d’Armi di Terni

March 24, 2019 Ian McCollum 21

This is no ordinary firearms reference book. This is a 900-page, nearly 12 pound tome in Italian. And not justify Italian; hand-written cursive Italian. With a substantial number of hand-painted illustrations. It is about the […]

Book Review: Système Lefaucheux

February 24, 2019 Ian McCollum 10

The pinfire system, as invented by Casimir Lefaucheux and expanded by his son Eugene, is one of the most significant corners of cartridge firearms development that has been thoroughly overlooked by collectors and firearms enthusiasts. […]

Book Review: FN Browning Pistols by Anthony Vanderlinden

February 17, 2019 Ian McCollum 10

Anthony Vanderlinden is a noted FN collector and author of a book on FN Mauser rifle as well as this volume on FN’s Browning pistols. Both are excellent reference works, with a remarkable amount of […]

Book Review: The British Sniper – A Century of Evolution

February 3, 2019 Ian McCollum 8

Steve Houghton’s newly released book “The British Sniper: A Century of Evolution” is an excellent reference on British sniper rifles, accessory equipment, and training from World War One through the present. Where Skennerton’s work ends […]

Book Review: US Aerial Armament in World War II

January 20, 2019 Ian McCollum 18

Aircraft armament is an area of firearms study that is vastly under appreciated by most people, largely because it’s difficult to study aircraft guns without the aircraft themselves (and those take up a lot of […]

Book Review: AK47 – The Grim Reaper (Second Edition)

January 6, 2019 Ian McCollum 16

The expanded second edition of Frank Iannamico’s “AK47: The Grim Reaper” is a hefty 1100-page tome which tackles the ambition goal of being a single reference for all things Kalashnikov. Ot begins with a section […]