Mauser automatic rifle

[scani]

Paul Mauser tried some seventeen rifle designs during the period 1898-1914.
According to known sources such as Rough Forged and Mauser Pistolen, his (semi) automatic rifle development could be divided into five stages:

1. C98, short recoil+flapper lock
2. C02, long recoil+rotary bolt
3. C06, short recoil+“seesaw” swinging bolt
4. C06/08, short recoil+flapper lock
5. Modell 1908? fixed barrel, inertia delayed blowback (the most representative model is FSK.16)

However, I just saw a paragraph from a 1903 newspaper mentioning a previously unknown rifle called “Mauser 00”.

Source: https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/...ext=&andtext=&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1

According to the description below, it could fire fully-automatically!

Does anyone have a photo of this “1900” rifle? Is there a record of this rifle from Mauser Oberndorf’s archives?

 

[scani]

Additionally, I wonder if there were any Mauser semi-automatic rifles used in combats before the Great War.

This report claims that Mauser (semi) automatic rifles were found during 1899 battle of the Second Boer War. Could these be Mauser C98 trial guns sold by export companies? Or used guns given to foreigners when they were discarded after trials ended?

 

[chrisftk]

According to the description below, it could fire fully-automatically!

Does anyone have a photo of this “1900” rifle? Is there a record of this rifle from Mauser Oberndorf’s archives?

My guess is that "automatic" was an antiquated usage here that doesn't mean "full auto" in this case (think: the Johnson "automatic" rifle). More like "automatic loading" (you don't have to cock a bolt, etc..)

FalGrunt may know if such a thing existed, but given the difficulties designing even a semi-auto rifle in this time period (Paul Mauser lost an eye testing a self-loader, IIRC), a full auto was very likely not under consideration in 1900.

 

[scani]

My guess is that "automatic" was an antiquated usage here that doesn't mean "full auto" in this case (think: the Johnson "automatic" rifle). More like "automatic loading" (you don't have to cock a bolt, etc..)

FalGrunt may know if such a thing existed, but given the difficulties designing even a semi-auto rifle in this time period (Paul Mauser lost an eye testing a self-loader, IIRC), a full auto was very likely not under consideration in 1900.

The report claims that “the soldier simply pulls the trigger and the weapons continues to fire until all of the cartridges in its magazine are used up”. It can’t be semi-automatic in this situation.

 

[chrisftk]

The report claims that “the soldier simply pulls the trigger and the weapons continues to fire until all of the cartridges in its magazine are used up”. It can’t be semi-automatic in this situation.

That would be interesting if anything turned up on it then-- where was the article published? I couldn't find any mention of it in any sources I have.

 

[scani]

That would be interesting if anything turned up on it then-- where was the article published? I couldn't find any mention of it in any sources I have.

I attached the link below the screenshot

 

[Guillaume d'Orange]

My guess is that "automatic" was an antiquated usage here that doesn't mean "full auto" in this case (think: the Johnson "automatic" rifle). More like "automatic loading" (you don't have to cock a bolt, etc..)

FalGrunt may know if such a thing existed, but given the difficulties designing even a semi-auto rifle in this time period (Paul Mauser lost an eye testing a self-loader, IIRC), a full auto was very likely not under consideration in 1900.

The author means « automatic » as he talks about the Cei-Rigotti.

 

[chrisftk]

I attached the link below the screenshot

Thanks-- I must have missed.

Not to be dismissive; I think it would be cool if you stumbled on something that turns out to be unknown previously! Given it's a newspaper article from 1903 I'm a bit skeptical of the accuracy. I think it's very likely a misidentified semi auto. (though it'd be odd that a semi auto would be sent overseas to South Africa)

I mean after all, my local rag published this in 1909..... A legendary flying monster died by drowning in a vat of moonshine!

 

[biggymu]

Thanks-- I must have missed.

Not to be dismissive; I think it would be cool if you stumbled on something that turns out to be unknown previously! Given it's a newspaper article from 1903 I'm a bit skeptical of the accuracy. I think it's very likely a misidentified semi auto. (though it'd be odd that a semi auto would be sent overseas to South Africa)

I mean after all, my local rag published this in 1909..... A legendary flying monster died by drowning in a vat of moonshine!
View attachment 349945

And your paper can be verified with other sources. It was famous from New Jersey to Virginia. Poor Snallygaster, I’ve almost drown in a vat of moonshine myself over the years.

Snallygaster – Winged Creature of the Northeast – Legends of America

For centuries, a large winged beast known as the Snallygaster is said to have terrified the people of Frederick County, Maryland.

www.legendsofamerica.com

 

[chrisftk]

And your paper can be verified with other sources. It was famous from New Jersey to Virginia. Poor Snallygaster, I’ve almost drown in a vat of moonshine myself over the years.

Snallygaster – Winged Creature of the Northeast – Legends of America

For centuries, a large winged beast known as the Snallygaster is said to have terrified the people of Frederick County, Maryland.

www.legendsofamerica.com

Lol... if it were whiskey I could see the temptation.

It's quite the tale around here. The moonshine vat supposedly happened about 15 minutes from me. The area was very German back in the day... The name came from a corruption of the German Schneller Geist aka: fast ghost.

Funny enough we heard about this story in grade school when talking about local legends.

But I digress. The media, as ever has been fair to middling in its reliability. True then and true now.

 

[MichaelWC]

This is just my two cents on both articles. let's start with the article from 1903. The article is kind of vague on the description of a rifle but still intriguing. The author may have been confused of the name or model. I found information on the British Army testing the 1900 Mondragon. The other part of the article does talk about Cei-rigotti. There was 1900 model Cei-rigotti. From a distance the rifle does look like a Mauser semi-automatic rifle.


Now on to the Second Boer War article. Now I talked to one of my friends from South Africa. He is more well-versed about the Boer War than I am. He also knows a lot about the battle of magersfontein. He's never heard of any type of automatic rifle being used at the Battle.
He did say there was a early Maxim used. I'm also kind of convinced that the weapon found at the battle wasn't a Mauser. Mostly because the article says "presumably it is a Mauser patent" and Mauser put in a US Patent #639,421 (P. Mauser; Recoil Operated Firearm; December 19, 1899) December 19, 1899 was eight days after the Battle of Magersfontein. That would have bad PR on Mauser's part.

I just don't think a prototype semi-automatic rifle would have made its way to the Boer Republics. I say that because at the time Mauser Oberndorf am Neckar was part of DWM. I don't think DWM or Mauser would have sold prototype weapon.

 

[Stan]

I would agree with the technical use of terms such as "Automatic" in a period newspaper article must be taken lightly. How versed was the author on technical aspects, etc.? Don't know when the term "semi-automatic" became common in usage, but most printed references to self loading pistols were labeled as "Automatic" pistols for many decades! Even today the press and can't seem to use proper terms/facts regarding firearms, starting right with the president!

 

[scani]

I would agree with the technical use of terms such as "Automatic" in a period newspaper article must be taken lightly. How versed was the author on technical aspects, etc.? Don't know when the term "semi-automatic" became common in usage, but most printed references to self loading pistols were labeled as "Automatic" pistols for many decades! Even today the press and can't seem to use proper terms/facts regarding firearms, starting right with the president!

The term automatic was widely used to call all sorts of auto-ejecting firearms before the 1950s. It was also used to call semi-automatic, France used “Fusil Automatique” to specially call semi-automatic rifles. Italian Revelli-Beretta semi-automatic carbine was even designated “Moschetto Automatico (automatic carbine)”, a term later used on SMGs.

 

[Cyrano4747]

Newspapers from that era are such a mess when it comes to technical details. A friend and I have chased a lot of rabbits in old newspapers and they almost never lead anywhere interesting.

Off the top of my head:

- reporting was often second hand, based on correspondence with people who were out there
- technical terms were often misunderstood or misused or just suffered from people with less than an engineer's understanding relaying information
- certain brands became almost a generic for the weapons being used by one side or another. Somewhere I've got a canadian newspaper article from the late 19th century talking about the Turkish government buying "mauser cannons." My guess is that they were Krupp, the writer didn't know the difference between German arms firms, etc.
- sometimes people just made crap up
- not every paper was well staffed, well funded, or had high editorial standards. Lots of smaller ones (and even a few bigger ones) would try go cover big stories on the basis of someone on staff knowing someone who knows someone who they can write a letter to. So on the one hand you've got Keith Murdoch writing scathing exposés from the trenches of Gallipoli, and on the other you've got some small town paper in Manitoba where the editor knows a guy who knows a guy who is a secretary in a Australian minister's office and can relay some dirt. It's this kind of thing that the phrase "it is stated" in that article has me sniffing. They never say stated by whom, which makes it really unsupported rumor.

Basically, I'd take a random newspaper article with a grain of salt when it comes to the nitty gritty particulars. Not quite as bad as a random Tweet today, but not far from it either.

 

[Cyrano4747]

To give a concrete example of how this can get all wonky, I did a bunch of archival research about a decade ago on the Soviet occupation of Germany after WW2. There was a minor scandal when the weekend edition of a local paper (Paper A) in rural Thuringia re-printed an article from a larger (but still regional) newspaper outside Frankfurt* (Paper B) that reported that a young child somewhere else in the Soviet Zone was complaining about the quality of the instruction and how many children were falling behind (Paper C). This was immediately after WW2 so the schools were a mess, and no doubt that the kid were falling behind, but it was an embarrassment and got official scrutiny, which then showed up in the archives.

It turns out the initial cause of all of this was a letter to the editor in Paper C that a school kid had written in response to an article about how bad schools were in the WESTERN zones. The kid was a refugee originally from the Rhineland and felt some regional pride, so he wrote a letter about how a bunch of kids in his class were failing basic tests too, and that everything was a mess. It's because of that connection that the western paper, Paper B, picked up on it, but they ended up magnifying the severity of the issue in the east for their own reporting, then the other paper- Paper A in Thuringia - picks up on that article and reprints it in a way that makes it look like an even bigger issue.

So basically in this dumb game of newspaper telephone this one kid's letter to the editor about how his class was kind of rough turned into what amounted to an inflammatory expose on how messed up the schools were as a whole, which led to a no-BS ministerial investigation that generated all the paperwork that let me untangle it 70 years later.

There is a temptation to treat period newspapers as a primary source, and they can be useful in some areas, but they can be incredibly problematic and frequently just plain wrong.


*this was early on in the occupation when there was still a lot of communication between the Western Allied and Soviet Zones. The hard border we think of existing under the BRD/DDR years wasn't really an issue at this time.

 

[Fal Grunt]

I saw on gun boards talk about Automatic Mauser rifles and a full auto model. I can say 100% Mauser tried to convert a few of their various semi auto rifles into full autos but Never went into production as All Mauser Models designed by Paul needed greased Cartridges and the full auto versions did Not function well with these rounds. Extraction was the biggest issue with All of Paul's self loaders. I have many of the original development documents from Paul Mausers self loaders as well as 120 glass plates showing most of the variations. Only the 1915-16-17 Flieger models were tried out during WW1 mostly by Balloon flyers but Mauser Never sold more than 600 units! Had Paul ever known about Fluted Chambers then his very first model a Recoil operated rifle of 1898 would have run very well!

Here is a Mauser internal doc from 1910 that describes 3 Self Loading Mauser rifles with non recoiling barrels set up for R fire = Full Auto.

Mauser also made up a few Sporter Self Loaders also with scope set up etc. Unfortunately only a few were ever sold in open market etc. I have lots of great pics of these.

Here are 3 glass plate pics including the example I own. 2 pics of the very first short recoil C 98 then 3rd pic a Model 1908 the first prototype with a Fixed Barrel = most models before this the barrels and receivers recoiled about 12-15 mm. In my example 1908 this system has its lock -unlock system working in the top plate with sliding function to operate system. Again Greased rounds were used as Paul Mauser had not learned about the much later Fluted Chamber concept etc. The C 98 would have worked Well with fluted chamber and had similar concept as a C 96 pistol etc. These glass plate pics were used in 2 German magazine articles on Mauser Self Loading rifles. I want add that No C98 prototype self loading rifles were never sold to any land .

Regards, Jon

 

[Amberg]

Only the 1915-16-17 Flieger models were tried out during WW1 mostly by Balloon flyers but Mauser Never sold more than 600 units!

Would you please be so kind to review your Mauser files (sales / orders) from around May 1911.

According to Erhard Vollmer, in:
Die deutsche Gewehr-Industrie
Zur Erlangung der Doktorwürde einer Hohen staatswissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Eberhard-Karl-Universität zu Tübingen vorgelegt von Erhard Vollmer
Druck von Sehl und Ludwig, Düsseldorf 1913,
(The German Rifle Industry
For the attainment of the doctorate of a high faculty of political science of the Eberhard-Karl-University of Tübingen presented by Erhard Vollmer
Printed by Sehl and Ludwig, Düsseldorf 1913)

the Prussian Army already ordered some Mauser semi-auto rifles in May 1911.

Quote:
"On May 15, 1911, the Prussian Army Administration placed a trial order with Mauser-Oberndorf for 2,000 automatic rifles of Geheimrat Mauser's latest invention."

I can not imagine, that the Prussian Army really ordered 2,000 pieces. Likely a printing error. Maybe 20 pieces!?
It would still be interesting to find out more about this order.

Thanks

 

[chrisftk]

I saw on gun boards talk about Automatic Mauser rifles and a full auto model. I can say 100% Mauser tried to convert a few of their various semi auto rifles into full autos but Never went into production as All Mauser Models designed by Paul needed greased Cartridges and the full auto versions did Not function well with these rounds. Extraction was the biggest issue with All of Paul's self loaders. I have many of the original development documents from Paul Mausers self loaders as well as 120 glass plates showing most of the variations. Only the 1915-16-17 Flieger models were tried out during WW1 mostly by Balloon flyers but Mauser Never sold more than 600 units! Had Paul ever known about Fluted Chambers then his very first model a Recoil operated rifle of 1898 would have run very well!

Here is a Mauser internal doc from 1910 that describes 3 Self Loading Mauser rifles with non recoiling barrels set up for R fire = Full Auto.
View attachment 350058
Mauser also made up a few Sporter Self Loaders also with scope set up etc. Unfortunately only a few were ever sold in open market etc. I have lots of great pics of these.

Here are 3 glass plate pics including the example I own. 2 pics of the very first short recoil C 98 then 3rd pic a Model 1908 the first prototype with a Fixed Barrel = most models before this the barrels and receivers recoiled about 12-15 mm. In my example 1908 this system has its lock -unlock system working in the top plate with sliding function to operate system. Again Greased rounds were used as Paul Mauser had not learned about the much later Fluted Chamber concept etc. The C 98 would have worked Well with fluted chamber and had similar concept as a C 96 pistol etc. These glass plate pics were used in 2 German magazine articles on Mauser Self Loading rifles. I want add that No C98 prototype self loading rifles were never sold to any land .View attachment 350063View attachment 350064View attachment 350065

Regards, Jon

Thank you Nathaniel and Jon! You confirmed my suspicions here.

 

[scani]

Would you please be so kind to review your Mauser files (sales / orders) from around May 1911.

According to Erhard Vollmer, in:
Die deutsche Gewehr-Industrie
Zur Erlangung der Doktorwürde einer Hohen staatswissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Eberhard-Karl-Universität zu Tübingen vorgelegt von Erhard Vollmer
Druck von Sehl und Ludwig, Düsseldorf 1913,
(The German Rifle Industry
For the attainment of the doctorate of a high faculty of political science of the Eberhard-Karl-University of Tübingen presented by Erhard Vollmer
Printed by Sehl and Ludwig, Düsseldorf 1913)

the Prussian Army already ordered some Mauser semi-auto rifles in May 1911.

Quote:
"On May 15, 1911, the Prussian Army Administration placed a trial order with Mauser-Oberndorf for 2,000 automatic rifles of Geheimrat Mauser's latest invention."

I can not imagine, that the Prussian Army really ordered 2,000 pieces. Likely a printing error. Maybe 20 pieces!?
It would still be interesting to find out more about this order.

Thanks

That’s a wonderful piece of info. Could you please take a photo/screenshot of this paragraph?
In addition to the well-known 1915/1916 Flieger Selbstladers / Selbstlader-Karabiners, it seems that German flying troops also equipped a purpose-built model with pistol grip and inclined butt stock during WWI.

 

[Amberg]

I'll dig out the book and post some photos.

A fellow collector from France, who unforunately is no longer member of this forum, had some great period photos showing the different variations of the Mauser semi-auto rifle in use with the imperial air force.
I very well remember one photo showing a Mauser semi-auto with a stock similar to the one shown on the attached photo.

And ....
decades ago a Mauser manual on the semi-auto rifles sold on ebay.com
Out of sheer ignorance/stupidity I did not place a bid on it.
The manual showed the variation we all know and a rifle with full stock (like on the G98) and bayonet lug, as shown in #16, but with the large mag.