OK, here’s something that’s on display in the Special Forces Branch Museum on Ft. Bragg. It is little visited by the public (and it is currently scheduled to be torn down and reconstructed elsewhere on post as the SF, Civil Affairs/Military Government, and Psyops/Military Information Support tri-regimental museum). But for the time being it is an entertaining look at the history of US special operations, as characterized by Special Forces, from SF predecessor organizations to today.
And this gun is featured there, in a display on the OSS Detachment 101 war in Burma against the Japanese.
Best guess is some kind of homemade, jungle workshop weapon. (Ian at Forgotten Weapons made a similar guess, but an exact ID on this piece eludes him, too. If a gun beats us and Ian, then it’s something seriously weird).
The gun has extensive tool marks and appears to have been made by hand out of steel. The second picture shows the display the gun is in. The display is innocent, at least this week, of any explanation of what the gun is and who the hard-looking dude in the b&w photo in the background is.
As always, you can click to embiggen. The right-hand picture is really huge at full expansion.But it still doesn’t tell us what this pistol is.
So… beats us, beats Ian, but we’re guessing it won’t beat you guys. What is it?
Kevin was a former Special Forces weapons man (MOS 18B, before the 18 series, 11B with Skill Qualification Indicator of S). His focus was on weapons: their history, effects and employment. He started WeaponsMan.com in 2011 and operated it until he passed away in 2017. His work is being preserved here at the request of his family.
3 thoughts on “What is it?”
Looks like a handmade copy of the Eibar generic “Ruby” pistols.
A strange choice to copy, but we’ll pull up a few pictures and see. They were once very common and widespread. Somebody in Pakistan copied the Beretta 34 perfectly, so maybe there are more guys confident in their gun building than designing skills out there.
Gentlemen,
As only 1500 of these were actually made it is no wonder that it was so difficult to ID. The reason it was the only weapon on display at the museum without a discription is that we couldn’t ID it either. Thanks to MSG (ret) Tommy Galbaith, we now know it is a Japanese Type II Hamada chambered in 8mm Nambu. Said to be a copy of the Browning M-1910 designed by Bunji Hamada. Hope this helps, and thanks to all for your interest the museum.