Pistols Taken From the Walther Factory in April 1945
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Courtesy of Legacy Collectibles, we have a variety of pistols to look at today which were taken as souvenirs by American GIs when the Walther factory was captured in April of 1945. Walther was making PP, PPK, and P38 pistols right up until US soldiers walked in, and there were a wide variety of complete guns and miscellaneous parts accessible in the factory. Army forces secured the arms within a week or so of the town of Zella-Mehlis being captured, but by that time plenty of first-wave soldiers had take the opportunity to secure a trophy pistol (or several). These range from complete and proofed guns ready to ship out to major completed sub-assemblies put together (resulting in mismatched and unproofed guns) to complete dog's lunch guns made of completely mismatched, unfinished, and reject parts put together by soldiers themselves or by factory workers in exchange for a few dollars or trade items.
To see more about Legacy, check out their TH-cam channel:
/ @legacycollectibles
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N. Oracle #36270
Tucson, AZ 85704
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Walther Waffen Verkaufsstelle
(literally Walther weapons selling place)
The sign was for an outlet store right at the factory
The term "kid in a candy store" springs to mind !
Yup. Canadian troops too. There was a German writer who commented on that during WW I. "The Germans, French and British fight for Honour. The Canadians fight for Souvenirs"
"Sir, a man fights for what he lacks the most."
@@Sicarius888 And Canadians desperately need souvenirs :)
I mean for brits germany isn't that far away so the souvenir is probably less tempting but if you're from over here it'd probably get alot more interest
Well they were giving up years (possibly the last years) of their lives to go fight somebody else's war. Seems they are entitled to something besides a boat ride home.
Canadians: Polite until souvenirs are involved.
*permanently borrowed*
*liberated*
*reallocated*
They will be like both of ours, we’ll just keep them at my house.
Or STOLEN. "War Trophies" always seems like stolen to me. I guess if the tables were turned the Americans would've said the same thing. Yeah right.
@@marcogram1216 They were making guns for a regime that started a World War and slaughtered over 11 million people. If all we did was take a few pistols from them, they should count themselves lucky.
The older i get, the more i realize what a beautiful gun the Walther PP is.
same here! It looks a lot more dignified than those Accessory-overloaded Showpieces you see today.
Same here, my man. It's absolutely a beautiful blowback handgun.
Weird how i hate 380 but love 32 pp’s
@@jonmeray713 Same here. The .32 PP is one of the finest little pistols ever made.
I agree, in line with the 08!
That Franken-PPK is definitely coolest.
I agree, in the white with rare grey grips!
Don’t you mean Frankena-PPK’s Monster?
I like mixing parts. The effect is striking looking at all those different German productions.
About twenty years ago at Ohio Gun Collectors Assoc. annual display show, (when the show was still at the IX center next to Cleveland Airport) there was an original German wooden shipping crate a GI had brought home containing 20 P-38's. I don't remember if they were from Walther or Mauser. Unfortunately the GI had been convinced by some friends to part with two of the pistols after he came home, but the case still contained 18 mint condition P38s. The case of pistols was not for sale, it was part of a historic display only, and It was very impressive.
I remember seeing that display also.
Probably had to part with them, one for the government and one for his “buddy”, to keep them both “preoccupied”.
Believe it or not, During WWII my father's infantry division was to spend a few hours in Ulm at the Walther factor.. They spent four days there! He grabbed a few P-38's and a few spare barrels. He mentioned some GI's in his unit filled as many as four duffle bags with goodies!
I own one of these. A Walther PP that looks exactly like the one in the video. When I researched it I found that some G.I.'s referred to these as "Cigarette Guns", because as Ian mentioned in the video they paid the liberated foreign workers ( many of which were Polish and had been slave laborers for years at this point) in cigarettes to assemble guns for them. I treasure this piece of history and was delighted to see a video on these forgotten weapons!
I would love to see pictures of the gun you have, This is really cool history.
"Being American everything we occupy is liberated." lmao
At least it is mostly true in the case of Americans. Because, Russians also try to call themselves liberators- while they enslaved large part of Europe after WW2.
And looting is taking souvenirs.
@@NeblogaiLT ikr
@@NeblogaiLT the Soviets, for all their flaws, in my opinion did the lion's share of the fighting and dying and I have much respect for them because of it.
@@pihlrau to the victor go the spoils
I love vids like this, Ian. The stories behind how a particular weapon came to be in private hands is, to me, more fascinating than how that weapon came to be designed and made in the first place.
i do like both,
to know the reason it was made give us background understanding why xxx have xxx reputation, for example why m38 carnaco rifle have bad reputation nowadays turn out people who shot it dont know what the real cartridge dimension that rifle should be using.
or why these ww1 machine gun have top fed magazine and high rate of fire not make sense for ground use but turn out it was designed as airplane gun which is make sense for that purpose.
it remind me of an comment on old Ian vid that say top magazine gun are crap, they should just stick with bottom fed one without knowing the history and the original purpose of the gun.
It'd would be kinda interesting to have a TV series focus on something like that - i imagine a tour guide in the present day, walking through a museum, stopping by one of the guns above and then telling the story - then the show cuts back to, in this case '45 and shows the story and the life of the person that found the gun.
@@Skyfox94 This would be such a great series. I hope Ian gets that opportunity but with that I would be afraid we'd see these videos possibly go by the wayside.
they were fucking stolen - remarkably fascinating
If they hadn't been "fucking stolen" they would have been melted down to make Volkswagen bumpers or some shit, so, there's that.
I personally think the alloy frame unmarked ppk, almost in the raw, is absolutely gorgeous in its own way.
My dad was in the 11th Armored and told me stories of the taking of Zella-Mehlis and the Walther works. He remembered seeing GI's coming out of the showroom carrying engraved and plated pistols. He's gone now, so it's nice to see things like this that remind me of him.
Franklin Posner
My great uncle was in 11th Armored Division. George Hjelt.
He told me about liberating the Walther plant when I was a boy. He passed age 80 in 2001.
So, these were not taken from the factory, but merely liberated.
They always dreamed of being free.
@@marshaul and still dreaming.
when I was 12, my Schwinn Sting Ray was liberated from me.
@@iatsd the older bros raided the compound of the thief, beat him to a pulp and returned the property to the rightful land.
The traditional word for this soldierly pursuit is "looting". It is a venerable tradition, has been practiced nearly universaly among soldiers world wide ever since the first conquering army was orgaized and doesn't look to be ending any time soon...
www.google.com/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6739763/amp/US-troops-looted-personal-possessions-massacre-deployment-2009.html
It might be cobbled together from various parts-bins... but that PPK looks rather interesting to me. And while I'm usually not a huge fan of light colour metals/grips on handguns (except perhaps an ivory handled, nickel-finish Peacemaker), this gun looks kinda pretty.
It makes me wonder whether the GI 'commissioned' it, or a worker who built it was deliberately picking flashy or special bits to build a 'gucci' example. I mean, you might end up with a rare piece or two at random, but a rare frame, extractor, grips AND safetly lever?
And a trigger that looks like it has had the heck used out of it. That seems at least a little odd.
I'm taking these for erm "evaluation purposes "
Assembled by captured......well liberated workers lolol
Probably the first time they were happy to assemble one of those guns since the Nazis enslaved them. Yankee comes in, gives me my freedom, and offers me a pack of Luckys to put together a pistol? Fuck yes my dude, let me whip that up for you.
@@mmclaurin8035 It's more than likely that the initial occupying troops just regarded everyone working at the factory as captured enemies - after all, they were assembling the weapons being used against them. It was probably a much less happy arrangement, possibly at gunpoint.
The romantic idea of "liberating the workers" almost certainly came later.
@@kw9849 Ian said they were on site for like a week. I'm sure that the soldiers knew the score there pretty quick. They probably figured some Polish guy (or gal) who is constantly thanking them for showing up that is working in a German firearms plant wasn't there by choice, so I'm sure they straightened that out pretty quick. German workers were probably eyed more cautiously, but by that time the Nazis use of slave labor was becoming much more well known.
@@cowmaneater1243 Boy are you wrong
@@mmclaurin8035 People of all nationalities were used as slave labor including some US POWs.
The grips on that "Franken PPk" are AWESOME!!!! That grey green is sweeeeet!!!!!
Okay but that mix match ppk is beautiful. Those grey grips are awesome!
Fascinating... I wonder what number of cigarette packets would have got you one of these?
One Uncle of mine got a Ruby .32 for a carton of Chesterfields.
58
Ohhh come on we all seen FURY you know what they were giving up for a chocolate bar.....
😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣
@@zzxxooooxxzz4964 ...Actually, I *STILL* haven't seen it yet! LOL
@@jeanbaptistevallee4500 Geez! That's a LOT less that I would've thought!
The grey gripped PP is Beautiful
That PPK is super cool. Scrounging the last available parts from 6 forgotten contracts into one weirdo gun.
11:12 RKAUFSSTELL is probably Verkaufsstelle ("point of sale")
Looks like the sign used to read "Walther Waffen Verkaufsstelle" (Walther weapons dealership) so it would have been some sign that was 'liberated' from a dealership and damaged on the way to the US.
This was great and I really appreciate the glass piece at the end.
Love the speckled gray "camo" grips.
What an interesting bit of WWII history. Thanks, Ian! Of the three pistols on display in the video, my absolute hands down choice is the way too cool "model of mish-mash" Walther PPK 'Gray Ghost.'
this sub series on the Walthers was very interesting Ian! thank you
Love storys like this..... cody you and youre channel are truelly one of a kind !!
Im always happy to see videos about guns from Suhl, my place of birth , or Zella-Mehlis, the town next Suhl.
I own also a Walther PP from 1941, it was a gift from my father.
Thanks for your videos and greetings from Suhl,Thüringen.
Definitely one of the more fascinating presentations ever, thanks Ian
Love your videos and turned my son into them because he is a history buff about these things. Continued success and great content to you sir.
Very nice , my mothers late life husband had a couple weapons he brought home . A Luger that he said was only dropped once ,and a beautiful Stoger 16 ga shotgun . Thanks !
I really like these history videos. Not so much about the gun, but how the gun came to be up till this point in time for all of us to see. Love the backstory! Please more of this Ian!
Ian: I was in Germany ( 58-60). Purchased 2 Post War Commercial P-38's, with Consecutive Serial #'s. They were $62.50 Each. I took them to H. & H Zehner,in Neiderad, Germany and had them engraved with Oak Leaf and my Monogram,and new Walnut grips. The engraving and grips cost at the time, 440DM ($110.00 -US) Serial #'s were 003073-E & 003074-E. Was told the "E" was ment for export. Only Ammo they have fired was a 50 rd. box of Geco Ammo, also from Germany. My best souvenier from Germany.
Great video .. as usual... awesome historic video
Can’t wait to see the value of these pistols
That Durell one is oddly beautiful. I love the coloration and finish.
Great video as always Ian!
Super interesting as usual. I’m not even a gun nut. Your way of presenting stuff is simply great.
Those gray grips are just badass. That is the coolest of the bunch IMO.
so much great content on this channel. this is an especially cool one.
Really interesting presentation. Thanks!
Love these models and the video as always
Thank you! Once again,I learned something very very cool!
A rare instance of mismatched serial numbers actually making a gun more valuable
Keep it up man love the vids
I gotta say that wood grip is a just as nice as the Bakelite one.
We should be grateful to those soldiers for salvaging these historic guns as well as for their service.
God, every night you are my favorite channel to watch for a long time now. Ian never disappoints. I suppose I should do the Patreon thing.
Awesome video Ian!
Love the story and the guns, thanks!
I have a Walther PP with those exact grips and same stampings along with the "AC" letters
Thank you. I love your videos.
I am a Walther proud owner and can say with total confidence, having almost all brands but Springfield, that their guns are the best money can buy.
thanks for showing those
I work in a factory as a mechanic and I can second the fact that nothing gets thrown away…it all gets thrown into a bin somewhere. Makes sense they had a bunch of mish mash parts and assembled them hell I do that in the modern day so
Great Video! This is what I like to watch!
Very interesting video (as always) - thank you Ian. I have 45 AC P38 w/ mismatched grips (one black one brown) and mismatched frame and slide serial numbers. It does have proof marks. There are no import marks. Now I have a good idea how it was likely captured. Thank you.
Legacy Collectibles haul has been epic. Congrats on getting the access Ian. MORE!
Love ur channel and the historical aspects, just rewatched the episode when you on Sons of Guns, hoping you do a video on that silenced dart gun conversion for a 1911
th-cam.com/video/7Bgb4SGTgDY/w-d-xo.html
@@ForgottenWeapons I must've missed this episode, about to watch it. Thank you for replying, and for the link, Please keep up the great content!
That video is what prompted them to ask me to be on the show. :)
@@ForgottenWeapons that's awesome, I found ur channel by accident a year ago, scrolling through recommended vids at 2am, (typical TH-cam story) And I I realized, "I know that guy!" Lol. Being a history dork myself, you gained a subscriber. I enjoy ur channel, and thanks again for replying!
‘byf ’ slidemarkings are from the Walter factory at Oberndorf. Famously three German gentlemen knicked two precision milling machines from the factory. One was a Mr Heckler and another was a Mr Koch. When the Germans were allowed to make weapons again they started up as Heckler and Koch. A legend was born
My issue sidearm was a P38 with black plastic / bakelite grips, an 8 round mag and extremely accurate.
I also bought a Manhurin manufactured Ppk in 9mm short which was a fantastic pistol. The finish was good but not exacting standard like the Walther Ppk.
Me learning history from Ian:
Ian: these were obviously made in *obscure country I’ve never heard of.
Me: obviously
My father currently owns a Walther PPK that belonged to the Kriegsmarine (if I'm not mistaken) and that my grandfather managed to purchase from a WW2 veteran during the late 40s. Or at least that's the story he told me. It truly is a beautiful, well made gun, good to handle gun.
Occupation... liberation... souvenir..... pillage.... same difference, right?
Depends who wins.
@@TomFromTH-cam
Not really....
Spoils of war, all’s fair.
Liberation is when the occupation troop grant more freedoms than the previous controling authority.
@@calvingreene90
Or when the occupation troop is called "US army" and the captured area contains vaste ammounts of oil fields ;D.
Great video.
Hey! Legacy collectibles! Great new channel.
Very interesting pieces. That P38 had a nice finish considering it was produced at the end of the war.
Super cool video
All soldiers are really good at getting souveniers.
The bronze coloured frame of the first p38 looks very good with the blacks and the grays.
At 4:15 in the video, you can see indications how the serrations in the slide were cut. They were cut all at once by a single tool. There are tell-tale irregularities in the serrations that are perpendicular to the direction of the serrations. Of course, it would be ridiculous for the serrations to be cur one at a time in production.
I personally knew a GI who was there when the Walther factory was captured. He told me that the workers had fled, but that there was a short running firefight among the machinery, by local militia in defense of the place, but it was more for show than serious and the Germans quickly surrendered. My friend, captured his P38 from an officer that surrendered to him, and that the pistol itself was thrown in the mud, where he retrieved it. He said much of the factories roof was missing, there was bomb damage, but that Walther was up and running right up until they arrived. It was raining hard. Today that pistol rests with his son, a war bring back.
I purchased a P38 cigarette gun last year with some interesting features, nothing like the PPK here but it's got a hammer still in the white and no acceptance marks.
Just got my first p38 from a late friend of mine collection, he had about 30 something of them.
My Dad was in Pattons 3d army's heavy artillery and told of having shelled an area in which a Luger factory was part of the target. He said he had a knapsack half full of various pistols he picked up when they mopped up the area and were looking for buildings they might use as quarters. As he was part of a mechanized outfit weight was no problem he just kept it in the guns tractor. (the 155 long rifle) When the war was over he was informed by an officer that the paper work would take at least a month to process to bring back these weapons. So he took the backpack and left it in a vacant house. The last time he saw them or that officer they were both leaving in the same jeep!
By the looks of the comment section here Ian should make a quick video about the whole 'arms liberation' thing throughout the years, maybe point us a good book that gets into that topic.
TH-cam unsubbed me from your channel. No idea why. I watch a couple of your videos every week.
My favourite firearm channel,
Great pieces of history!!
My step-father was one of those who strolled through the Walther factory and assembled a pistol. Though I have seen it many years ago I have no idea where it now is.
oh man, what amazing war-loot
The last one was probably a result of "Hey, I've got a bottle of whiskey. And I'm willing to swap it for the nicest souvenir it can get me!" moment.
"hey guys"
love hearing that.
Outstanding video lesson sir. Thanks for posting!
As a guy who lives in Zella-Mehlis I think the video is very interesting... By the way, the last few leftover buildings from the Walther factory were demolished this summer...
Thanks for interesting video. Would you consider do informative one about "war trophies", what were rules regarding them and how they changed during past century?
I believe after WW2 they started doing the DEWAT stuff, where you could take just about any weapon home as a trophy, provided you filled out the paperwork and the weapon was deactivated to a certain standard. I think they stopped that though to be honest. Aside from that I think most other things were kind of a just don't make a big deal of it.
And of course there were guys who ignored the rules and just mailed it home. My father knew a guy who went to Vietnam, would mail a stereo or something similar home every few weeks. Of course it was what was inside it that he wanted, not the stereo. Im sure lots of guys were doing that.
Beautiful guns
My mind's eye is laughing watching 50 grunts and a few officers wandering around with pistol handles bulging out of their pockets, smirking at each other while they give lip service to the honor of doing what they're supposed to do with all of these captured guns lmao hey if we have to float across the ocean to save you guys, we're leaving with a few guns. don't @ us
I really like the wooden grips on that PP
Personally I find these guns far more interesting than the mass produced stuff this is real history
Reminds me of a certain Russian capture K98 I have that has a receiver with some markings oddities. It has the bcd factory code for Gustloff and a 4 stamped under that, but only a 4, suggesting an incomplete date marking. It's also missing most of the proof marks that you'd expect and I've never found a serial number on the receiver, so when we bought it (my dad and I) and in our records it goes by the mismatched barrel's serial number instead. Also has some other interesting features, like a laminated stock with a significant gouge, right where your support hand would be, suggesting a shrapnel hit. My suspicion is that it was assembled by the Russians from a mix of new parts and parts of rifles that were in for repair or captured and put into storage for handing out to friendly revolutionaries at a later date, as with many of the Russian capture K98s.
Gustloff Werke (bcd) marked all their 1944 guns just with a "4" instead of 44. Rumor has it that BCD 4 guns were made at a concentration camp.
@@B52Stratofortress1 Considering who was running Gustloff, I wouldn't be surprised. Still, there are a number of proofs missing, so who knows what the real story behind it was.
Those plastic grips with mottled color are made by changing colors and the two colors mix until the old color plastic is expended. I
Usually only takes under a dozen to switch colors
I like to imagine thet the 53 marking on the last gun was put there buy the worker who assembled it, as a serial nr. of the line of miss-matched guns he made for the Soldiers who wanted a to take home a gun.
I think the mishmash one is very nice looking.
dont have factory guns but have battle field pick up from my grand father
Utterly fascinating!!
I've always considered the P-38 to be pleasing to the eyes.
I actually came across 2 P-38's from March and April of 45, picked each up for just over $200 each. I almost tripled my money to collectors. One was all matching but the finish was messed up on one side and it was phosphorus instead of salt blue. The other was non matching but was put together for a GI.
7:00 I actually find the late production the one with the better looks, mostly because of the wood grip
I have a P.38 stamped AC 45 that I inherited from my grandpa. He was stationed in Germany after the war and picked it up at some point during that time. Unfortunately he’s passed and I don’t know any details on how it made its way into his hands. Cool little piece of history though!
I'd love to see a similar HSc from when the Mauserwerk was liberated :)