Third Party Press

1933 Mauser Banner - DRP SS??

Coogan

Active member
BBOTW indicates specifically that the DRP marked Mauser Banners were rifles actually intended for SA and SS use.

Is this true? I know Law had some serious errors in his book, but he does reference the actual letter. I was quite surprised when I read it.

I have a nice rifle in my sights (1933, all matching but cleaning rod, beautiful bore and lightly sanded stock) and will buy regardless as the price is a good deal.
 
SA/SS and DRP

Thats an assumption that has never been proven and is really linked to Lossnitzer and his interview with Leslie Field. The DRP and DR cartouched rifles were shipped to the Reichsbahn and Postschutz and were used by said security arms of each organization.

As a caveat, Jon Speed has said on at least one occasion that alot of what Lossnitzer
said in interviews must be taken "with a grain of salt" with numerous points being overstated and embelished.

The verified SA and SS connection can be found with the ChdA and GrBB marked Banners. The ChdA marked rifles were sold to the head of training for the SA and we now have corraborating period documentation to back this up. The GrBB Banners are the scarcest of the group with only 3 complete examples documented. "Gruppe Brandenburg" was a joint SS/SA detachment organized in the early 1930's - hence the cartouche "GrBB".

From an earlier thread on the Chda Banners:

It is now verified and documented that the Ch.d.A. represents the Chef des Ausbildungswesens, with 10693 rifles sold to the SA ChdA in 1934.
As soon as I can scan pertinent documents I will post them up here. Also documented are generic Standard Modell sales to various SA gruppen
(SA Gruppenführer Schlesien, Gruppenführer Hayn, Dresden and Obergruppenführer Heines, Breslau to name a few).

In additon, some verification of sales to Reichsbahndirektion, Berlin and Oberpostdirektion, Berlin.
 
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I would also say, that the Police organizations of the interwar period were as scrutinized and regulated as the German Army during the disarmament period 1920-1926, - after 1927-1931 (the end of all disarmament efforts in Germany- long before Hitler came to power...) the German Police were probably under more scrutiny than the German Army (though never inspected to any appreciable degree).

There were a few sticking points after 1927 pull out of the IAMCC, and the Police was probably the main remaining issue. It was never really resolved, - the Germans dancing around all the main unresolved issues (most over a centralized command & control structure).

Anyway, by 1933 there was no one to hide the rifles from, and if you were going to hide rearmament or covertly arm a paramilitary group (which was one of the issues outstanding after 1927, probably the least important issue & least argued over..) you would have to be a raving lunatic to use German Police organizations as cover.

Bottom line, no way the DRP/DR rifles were used to arm the SA/SS paramilitary groups; the Postschutz was greatly expanded in the early Hitler period, and easily could have absorbed the known production ranges documented. (The massive expansion of the Postschutz was far more of a violation than arming some SA/SS thugs.. and would have alarmed the French far more..)

This was covered in the MRJ in some detail a couple issues back.
 
Guys, thank you for the detailed insight. As I stated I was skeptical of Laws claims despite his reference to "documentation".



As a side note, I am beginning to have doubts on the rifle I was looking at. All the pictures I could find of known correct Banners from 1933 do not have serialized bands - this one does. Even though it is just the last 4 digits of the serial number, my Spidey sense is now kicking in. I will need to research further....
 
Numbering of bands, screws and buttplates.

The following is a small section from our work in progress (Volume 1) regarding those
extra numbers.

Serialization of Bands, Rear Sight Parts, Buttplate and Trigger Guard Mounting Screws

As stated above, the Banner K and Standard Modell rifles as shipped from Mauser Oberndorf, had no serial numbers applied to front and rear bands, the triggerguard mounting screws and the buttplate. Normally the rear sight ramp will be numbered on some Banner K examples, with the remainder of the sight parts lacking any applied serial number. At some point after the rifle was issued, serial numbers were added to these parts by the controlling authority, these being maintenance depots within the railway and postal organizations. These added numbers are found on Banner K rifles issued to the DR, DRP and Ch.d.A. Since there were external stock serial numbers present on both the DR and DRP issued rifles, no addition of an external serial to the stock for these rifles was required. No external stock numbers have been reported on either Standard Modell or Banner K’s issued to the Ch.d.A. This does not rule out external stock serial numbers applied due to a major rework or repair (Heerszeugamt routing).
 
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Interesting. The piece I am looking at has the last three (not four as i previously stated) numbers on the bands and last two on the trigger guard screws.

The rear sight ramp is numbered as is the rear sight leaf and slider.

Not being anything close to an amateur on early Mausers, I did not get any odd feelings on the numbering until after I started looking for reference examples. Today I took a closer look at the rifle and did notice that the added numbers had a font that was VERY close to the original die set used. They did not look like a hump job and your reference reinforces my gut feelings.

I'll get some pics tomorrow. If they would help with Volume 1, let me know.
 

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