Safe/Loaded 1920 DWM

[Lugerdoc]

Dwight, My observations on commerical mag bottoms: post WW1 DWM mag bodies with be tin plated with unmarked wood bottoms. Quite often the wood used for these bottoms will have a light striped grain running at a 45 degree angle to the "ears" of the bottom. The only reason I can determine that some btms were Germany marked, is to comform to US Customs laws (since 1892) requiring products imported into the US, be marked with the country of origin. I seems to me that this would more readily apply to individual spare mags imported, as the gun as a unit was also marked. The US law changed in 1923 to require that the country of MANUFACTURE be marked, thus "made in Germany". Even though these customs laws were not rigerously enforced, it may be an aid to dating the manufacturing period of some Weimar commerical & reworks. After Mauser took over the production of lugers in 1930, the tube plating changed to nickel and the bottoms to aluminum, not to exclude Mauser using up any left over DWM parts that they "inherited". IMHO, the 5 digit numbered wood mag bottoms that one sees ocassionally, are of Police origin. TH