[Ron Wood]

To paraphrase Mark Twain, rumors of the demise of the Russian Luger are greatly exaggerated!

Albert has done a fine, and to much extent plausible, analysis of the origin of the Model 1906 Luger with the crossed rifle chamber inscription. I would like to pursue his lines of reasoning.

The lengthy historical account of Tsar Ferdinand I and his military connections is quite well done. When I first started to read it I immediately thought of the highly detailed “histories” furnished by some gun sellers to hype their fabulous wares. But that is not the case here. We did have to wade through quite a bit of background to get to the noteworthy connection of Tsar Ferdinand I with the 54th His Majesty the Tsar of Bulgaria Infantry Regiment. The Imperial era pretty much marked the end of military knighthood and the age of warrior kings. Nearly every crowned head in Europe was the honorary/titular “commander” of one military unit or another. Probably at the top of the heap was Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany, “commander” of the 1st Leib Hussar Regiment, and his sister Princess Victoria Louise, “commander” of the 2nd Leib Hussar Regiment. The actual commander of the Hussars was Field Marshall August von Mackensen, who earned his rank. (Sorry about the digression…the Leib Hussars and old Mack are favorite subjects of mine!) Anyway, such honorary commands were largely an excuse to get dressed up for ceremonial occasions and few, if any, of these honorary leaders had much actual “field” command duty. So Tsar Ferdinand’s active involvement in procurement of a special lot of Lugers for Bulgarian officers in the 54th is speculative at best.

Regarding the use of a national crest on Lugers of the Imperial era, let’s take a look at the crested examples. The Swiss, Bulgarian and American Eagle Lugers do indeed sport likenesses of their respective national crests. However, the contract Lugers of Germany, Portugal (CI, M2, Royal Navy, R.P. Navy) and Bolivia, while bearing chamber markings, do not have a national emblem. The Dutch, Brazilian and Mexican contracts have no chamber markings. So across the board, the use of a national crest on a contract Luger appears to be an exception (or at least the minority) rather than the rule.

Now let’s address those pesky rifles. In the light of the foregoing paragraph, there is no reason indeed to associate the crossed rifle Lugers with a particular nation based on the presence of the rifles alone. As has been discussed, it is most likely that the crossed rifles indicate intended use by infantry. However, reluctant recognition of the type of rifle, albeit still with reservations, favors identification as Mosin-Nagant. A number of people, me included, have no hesitation in this identification. So one would wonder why Tsar Ferdinand would choose a rifle that only constituted 13% of the total long arms inventory to be the insignia on the chamber of Lugers intended for the Bulgarian officers. The type of rifle notwithstanding, why would he choose to arm his officers with this variant when he had at least 4,450 lovely Lugers with the national crest on hand? I have difficulty in visualizing Tsar Ferdinand pandering to the Russians by equipping his officers with a Luger that would not be readily identified as Bulgarian, particularly since he already had the aforementioned Bulgarian Lugers.

We arrive at last at the lynchpin about which much of the Bulgarian connection revolves: the Cyrillic markings. It has long been acknowledged that the safety marking on the crossed rifle Lugers is Bulgarian. Reasons for this have ranged from “unknown” to “…it is possible that the order from Russia gave the wrong markings, or else the German die cutter and inspector had tangle with something equivalent to out Tennessee Corn (the liquid type) and stamped the frames with the wrong die. Being from Tennessee, I am inclined to accept the latter reason” (a bit of tongue in cheek by Harry Jones in 1959)! John Walter in Luger, an illustrated history of the handguns of Hugo Borchardt and Georg Luger , 1875 to the present day (1977) stated that “The surviving ‘Russian’ weapons are actually of modified Bulgarian type, owing to the non-Russian safety marks”. In his later book The Luger Book (1986), this notion is amended to; “It is popularly believed that the surviving Russian guns are of ‘Bulgarian’ type, owing to subtle differences between the two languages. However, as linguists have now pointed out, there was no difference at all between Russian and Bulgarian until the former was modernized in the early 1902s.” He was off by a few years on the date of the standardization of the Russian alphabet, and obviously he was referring to the safety markings as having “no difference at all” as there were certainly considerable differences between the two languages! This explanation of the identical safety markings was provided to me independently by an older Russian gentleman who indicated the word was the same in both language and meant “fire”. This was long before either he or I was aware of Walter’s writing (my earliest exposure to the Russian Luger and its markings was via Harry Jones’ book Luger Variations (1959)). Much later (a couple of years ago) I received further reinforcement of this notion from a student of Russian who did translation work. I showed him examples of Russian and Bulgarian Model 1906 Lugers. He quickly identified the Russian extractor as “a Russian word meaning “a charge”. It is pronounced "zar-yad". It's actually written in old Russian (pre-1917)”. He was unable to decipher the Bulgarian extractor marking. Then looking at the safety markings, he thought for a moment and stated “Actually, the markings on the Russian safety are in Bulgarian. As far as my Bulgarian goes, it is pronounced as uh-go-n (with soft "n" at the end) both in Russian and in Bulgarian”. Not a lot of authority in that pronouncement, but it does suggest that the safety marking is sufficiently bilingual for a modicum of recognition, even for a non-Bulgarian speaker. Another troublesome aspect, to me, regarding the two different extractor markings is why in the world would Tsar Ferdinand abandon the logical “ПЪЛЕНЪ” (loaded) marking already present on the Bulgarian Lugers and substitute “ЗАРЯДЪ ” meaning “a charge”? (I have always felt was a dumb thing to write on an extractor anyway, everybody else marks the extractor “loaded” in their respective languages)

The enigma of a Bulgarian marking on a Russian Luger may very likely end up to be as “norme” has postulated. The Bulgarian frames very well could have been leftovers in anticipation of additional sales. DWM is notorious for not throwing anything away, to wit, the Swiss and Brazilian “proofed” barrels found on some American Eagle Lugers. The end recipient, who still remains unknown, may have been satisfied with the approximate ‘bilingual’ safety marking if the price was right. That is a stretch I know, but not totally out of the realm of possibility.

So in summary, I find no compelling reason to proclaim the Russian Luger is now Bulgarian. I do not feel that this is an “ego” thing; I just believe that the preponderance of “evidence” favors a Russian connection. The evidence on either side of the argument is all circumstantial; there is no “smoking gun” (pardon the pun) that conclusively comes down on one side or the other. The collector community still needs to weigh what has been discussed and decide which camp to support. Unless and until something truly definitive is discovered, the controversy will live. But as for me…it’s Russian!

I thank you all for enduring this epistle, and I particularly thank Albert. He has provided much food for thought and intellectual stimulation. Let us choose up sides without acrimony!

Sincerely,
Ron Wood