Commercial Production During The Nazi Control?

[Mac Cat]

That was an interesting read and accurate from everything I have read about WW-II in Germany. German made guns were reliable exports.

The SIMSON family was forced to give up control in 1938 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simson) because they were a Jewish family. The company made all kinds of war weapons, cars, BMW motorcycles, bicycles and street cars.

The German Gun Law banned Jewish gun merchants in 1938.

I would say that the average German had easy access to rifles and shotguns, but probably not pistols.

[Edward Tinker]

Originally Posted by Mac Cat

That was an interesting read and accurate from everything I have read about WW-II in Germany. German made guns were reliable exports.

The SIMSON family was forced to give up control in 1938 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simson) because they were a Jewish family. The company made all kinds of war weapons, cars, BMW motorcycles, bicycles and street cars.

The German Gun Law banned Jewish gun merchants in 1938.

I would say that the average German had easy access to rifles and shotguns, but probably not pistols.

Sorry, wiki is wrong - we got our information from Simson records and and other documents.

In May of 1933, the Nazi Party appointed Sauckel to the post of “Reichsstatthalter (Governor) of Thuringia”. This ultimately led to the demise of Simson and Company, because Sauckel immediately set to work to uncover the “misdeeds” of the Jewish-owned enterprise. He launched a crusade. An investigation by the district attorney was undertaken, using thirty accountants, who ruled that the company had cheated the government and evaded income taxes. But despite a 14-month investigation, the interrogation of 100 witnesses, and the inspection of over 50,000 invoices, no incriminating evidence was ever found.

Nevertheless, Arthur Simson and four of his leading employees were indicted for corruption. On April 14, 1935, Arthur Simson was jailed in Berlin’s Moabit Prison. To soften him up, the Gestapo also arrested his nephew and successor, Dr. Ewald Mayer, and Ewald’s brother Georg. After seven months, Arthur Simson was promised his freedom if he admitted his guilt and signed over all rights in his company to Fritz Sauckel. Under duress, Simson signed, posted bond, and was released.

Fearing that the confiscation of his company and his fortune was only the beginning, on Sunday, the 9th. of February 1936 he and the Mayer brothers crossed the border to the safety of Switzerland and from there emigrated to the US. From that time on, in the Simson family the day of their escape was celebrated as a second birthday, although it also signified the end of the family’s involvement in the Company they had founded. Arthur Simson died in Los Angeles in 1969 at the age of 87.

In 1936, Gauleiter Sauckel, proud of his “blow against the international Jewish conspiracy”, renamed the Simson factories as “Berlin-Suhler Waffen- und Fahrzeugwerke”, abbreviated BSW. When Wilhelm Gustloff, the leader of the Swiss Nazi Party, was assassinated, the factories became the core company of Sauckel’s “Wilhelm Gustloff Foundation”. Some who did not believe in Hitler’s thousand-year Reich gave BSW another meaning—“Bis Simson Weiderkommt”, or “Until Simson Returns”!

After the confiscation, the Nazis substantially increased the production of war materiel. From 1937 to 1944, annual production increased from 20 million to 71 million Reichmarks. Among other products, BSW produced five different anti-aircraft guns, the machine gun MG42, and the rocket launcher “Püppchen”.