All, Very interesting discussion on a very unusual marking. I am going to have to think about this a bit but the first thing that comes to my mind is that the catalog this pistol is listed in may have misread/misprinted the marking. More than a couple of times I have spent time researching a marking only to find out is was reported incorrectly. Other questions are:
1) Is the "R" a Roman font or a Script? Script would indicate "Reserve" such as Ostasiatiches Reserve-Jaeger-Bataillon, Waffe Nr. 3
2) Is the "3" a small number indicating a weapon number or is it nearly the height of the letters?
I do not believe it is a Offizier-Reitschulen. These schools were at Paderborn, Soltau, Dresden, Sprottau and Beeskow. If there were a school in a town beginning with a "J" it would be a different story.
Likewise I agree with George A. that the Deutsche Ostasiatiches activity was nearly dead in 1915.
Is there any way to confirm this marking? w/r Jeff Noll
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