Erfurt 1920 1918 luger
 

Hey guys I just found an Erfurt 1920 1918 sn 1652 all parts are marked 52.
Lots of blue left but very little straw. No mag safety. The E is missing from the Erfurt stamped under the crown on the toggle. Does that mean anything? The grips need a good scrubbing and are a little smooth
The front strap is marked S.Anh.161. The mag does not match. The Holster is marked II/ J.R.6. 31 The 31 is in smaller font than the rest of the numbers.

The missing E means that we'd need to see pictures.

--Dwight

Ok I will see what I can do. It literaly says rfurt on the toggle under the crown

matt welcome to the forum, it is likely it was scrubbed, buffed or abused...

Yes, welcome to the lugerforum and do the best you can to provide a good clear focus shot of the toggle stamp with the missing "E" as well as the rest of the gun. Sounds interesting...

Thanks for the welcomes.
Ed the E was most definately scrubbed, scuffed or abused off. The bluing is still very much intact on the Toggle. The crown is also missing the very left edge. I will try to take pictures tomorrow.

~~grinning~~ maybe a really close shave by a bullet :D

Matt,

I would very much like to see a good photo of the unit mark on the front grip strap. You mentioned no mag safety but does it have a sear safety?

Don, I am going to take the pictures tomorrow.
I will post them in the afternoon.
The store also had a BYF 42 gun(Mauser?) by their was not as much blue left and the mag was after market

http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload/unit_markings.jpg
Here is the front strap. This is my first gun picture posting adventure so if its sucky Its my inexperince
http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload/missing_e.jpg
The Missing E

The Crown experienced a broken "crown" for a while and this is well documented and is perhaps one, looks like the case, the missing "E" is I think just that, missing.....the ares around the "E" is not buffed or polished off....interesting.

Definitely an interesting example. Judging by the depth of the strike from very shallow on the left to very deep on the right, it certainly appears to be an error in setting up the stamping jig resulting in the loss of the "E" and a portion of the crown. I agree with Howard that it doesn't look like it was buffed off, particularly since the inspector's mark is still sharp and deep. I'll bet there is a Crown/RC somewhere on the link.

That is also an interesting unit mark. Schutzpolizei Anhalt?

Matt,

The photos are fine. Do you have one that shows whether or not this has a sear safety -- top view showing full width of receiver or left side view?

The unit marking is very interesting and probably quite rare. I have a database of nealry 1200 Weimar-era police unit marks and yours is only the second from the Schupo of Anhalt. The other one is S.Anh.10. and is reported in Jan Still's Weimar Lugers, p. 240. It was on 1916 Erfurt 7471 but was ground off. The mark was revealed by acid etching of the front grip strap, so yours is the only visible one.

Anhalt was one of the small States in the Weimar Republic. Its largest cities were the state capital Dessau (pop. 71,300) and Bernburg (34,300). This unit may have been headquartered in Dessau with responsibility for both cities. If so, it probably had only about 425 men. This would explain the rarity of this marking.

I have been researching and writing articles about the unit markings of the Weimar German police (see http://forum.lugerforum.com/showthre...threadid=11898). I eventually plan to research the meager data from these small states. As yours is the only photo of a marking from Anhalt currently available, I request permission to publish it in a future article. Unless you prefer to remain anonymous, I will credit you for the photo if you will send me your last name. You mail email me at the address below if you prefer not to post it on the forum. Thanks very much for letting us know about this rare marking.

Don, you are more than welcome to use my pictures. I will take more when I ca
The gun does a a sear safety but no mag safety.
There is an c/RC mark on the right side of the gun just above the proof marks. The barrel has only a very tiny s over a 2 on the left side.
There is also the LP08 sight cut on the the receiver.

Matt,

Very enlightening. The Erfurt misstamp certainly appears to be an authentic mistake.

The Artillery sight notch is as expected on a 1918 Erfurt. An instruction from the German army required this on late Erfurt production, even though Erfurt only produced LP-08 in 1914.

It would be interesting to see pictures of the entire gun, and closeups of the markings. Barrel markings are of particular interest.

--Dwight

I will work on creating a photo album of my luger of the next couple of days.
Strangely my interest in Lugers comes from a picture of my Dad carrying a Luger in Vietnam.

Matt, sounds nice, and I'd love to see a scan of your dad in nam with a luger :)

Here's some more pics!
http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload...ted2_copy1.jpg
http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload...ted2_copy1.jpg
http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload...ted2_copy1.jpg

I agree that it's not a reblue. I think it was a broken or mis-aligned die. The broken crown reported on 1917 Erfurts is almost a mirror image of the crown on this one. Broken on the opposite side.

Ok so I ran 2 magazines through it today. Man are those sights tiny!
But the piece shoots very nicely.