mac

Frank provided good advice. This 90 year old pistol may have 90 year old wood grips and the grips will not take the recoil shock of being fired. The right grip in particular has a thin wood rib on the back that breaks easily when old or subjected to stress. I see broken grips often and you can tell by "wiggling" the right grip. If it wiggles, it may well be broken on the back. The finish on the 1911 DWM's was beautiful and durable so it is quite possible it has survived. It may have been an officer's, trainer's or administrator's pistol and seen little use but to hang on a clothes hook in an office. The officers who surrendered in WW2 often turned in old lugers in holsters that they may have carried for many many years.


The holster is a much later date, of course. It should not be stored with the luger inside. The leather becomes oil-soaked and/or the luger metal finish is worn or corroded by chemicals/moisture in the leather. The leather should not be messed with except to brush off dust. Any soap, oil, goo or other stuff you slather on it will darken and devalue it substantially. To date, there is no known treatment that aids this kind of leather but there are multitudes of treatments that will damage it.


The luger sounds like a great gun but shooting it is rolling the dice in an expensive way. I have seen lugers that could have been safely fired had the grips been switched with some replacements for shooting purposes and the firing pin replaced with a generic new pin for the same purpose. Unfortunately, broken firing pins and broken grips (these are serial numberd to your pistol if original) take that $1100 pistol and make it a $350 conversation piece. That IS how much a broken firing pin or ruined grips will lower the value.


Tell your buddy he MAY have a luger worth over $1000 but only an inspection by a luger expert can be sure..


Dave