Submachine Guns
Romanian Orita Model 1941/48
The Orita SMG was designed by a Romanian Army Captian Marin Orita in 1941, and went into service in 1943. It was used primarily in Southern Europe in late WW2 with Romanian forces. It was […]
Submachine Guns
Prototype
Bechowiec: Polish Teenager Makes a Resistance SMG
The Bechowiec (or Beha) is a fascinating SMG produced in small numbers in southern Poland under German occupation during World War Two. It was made for use by the Bataliony Chłopskie (Peasant Battalions) by a […]
Submachine Guns
Błyskawica: The Polish Home Army’s Clandestine SMG
The Blyskawica (“LIghtning”) is an SMG developed in occupied Poland to be issued out to Home Army units during Operation Tempest; the liberation uprisings planned for the advance of the Red Army into Poland. The […]
Prototype
Frommer Pistolen-MG Model 1917: A Crazy Villar Perosa Copy
After encountering Italian Villar Perosa machine pistols in the field, Austro-Hungarian troops requested a similar weapon. The project was given to FÉG to work on, and the result was the Pistolen-MG Model 1917: a pair […]
Submachine Guns
Leningrad’s Emergency-Production PPS-42 at the Range
Yesterday we looked at the history of the PPS-42 and how it was developed into the much more common PPS-43. Today we are taking it out to the range – the only time one of […]
Submachine Guns
Born in the Heart of Besieged Leningrad: the PPS-42
One would think that the Shpagin PPSh-41 was as simple as a submachine gun could get, but that wasn’t the case in World War Two USSR. Barely had the PPSh gotten into real production than […]
Modifications
The Added Safety on German Inter-War SMGs
Police in inter-war Germany used a variety of submachine guns, and sometimes added a distinctive extra safety mechanism to them. No patent or documentation ha been uncovered (that I am aware of, anyway), but the […]
Submachine Guns
An Early .45 ACP Reising Model 50 at the Range
The Reising was adopted by the US Marine Corps and used in campaigns through 1942 and early 1943, and it garnered a pretty poor reputation for reliability on the islands of the Pacific. However, it’s […]
Submachine Guns
First to the Fight: The Marines’ Reising M50 SMG
Eugene Reising developed a .45 ACP submachine gun in the late 1930s that was basically the opposite of the Thompson – it was light and handy, fired from a closed bolt with a delayed blowback […]
Accessories
Thompson SMG Cases: Police, FBI, and Secret Service
The Auto Ordnance company made a couple different types of cases for the Thompson SMG, and today we are going to look at two of the most common and one exceptionally cool type. The two […]