H.P. 495. --The Book, and The Gun

[Dwight Gruber]

OK, lets try this again.

Here's the grip strap marking on my 1920 Commercial Police.



The closese I've been able to come to ID-ing it from Gortz&Bryans is HP. (no period after the H), the Prussian Senior Service Police Academy. There is no listing for H.P. . My question is, were armourors consistently attentive to the regulations, or is it known that the odd period appeared or disappeared in the course of stamping these numbers, or were there misunderstandings or misinterpretations of the regs? Is it necessary to apply common sense in the interpretations of these markings? Or is there an H.P. (with the periods) which I have missed somewhere?

This is a straight question, I am not trying to promote WAGs here. G&B (p. 103) lists the Allenstein Landjagerei school as LSAI (no periods), and on the next page illustrates this with a picture of such a pistol marked LS.AI. (note periods). So, obviously, it happens. How do those of us with little experience go about interpreting these markings in the face of such evidence?

As long as we're on the subject of this gun I have another question. This gun has the unit marking stamped on the right side of the receiver.



I've never seen anybody point this out on their unit marked guns. Was this common? Uncommon? Anybody else's Luger stamped in this fashion?

For the record, here are pictures of the entire gun. Its easily 95%, strong straw, nicely made (its a Commercial, after all). Magazine is matching #2. Only sad down-side is ground off stock lug, so I got a pretty good deal on it.

--Dwight