WHAT DOES H.P. MEAN? REALLY?

[Don M]

Once again, I have relearned a lesson about jumping to conclusions! In the course of researching Weimar Prussian police school unit marks, I ran across a number of pistols and holsters with H.P. marks and very quickly interpreted them as belonging to the H�¶here Polizeischule (Senior Police School). I reached this conclusion despite several â??red flagsâ?� indicating these were not typical Prussian police pistols:
â?¢ The stock lugs were ground off several of the Lugers.
â?¢ Although the unit marks on the front grip straps were in accordance with Prussian orders, these marks were repeated on the right side of the receivers and on the spines of matching magazines of several of the Lugers.
â?¢ Indications from other collectors that there were some doubts about the Prussian provenance of these pistols.

When I assembled a table of all of the items with presumed Prussian police school marks, these H.P. marks really stood out. Of a total of only 21 pistols (out of nearly 500 in my database of police marks) tentatively identified as having police school marks, six of these (30%) had H.P. marks. Iâ??m not certain what the Senior Police Schoolâ??s function was but speculate that it provided advanced training for police officers who had graduated from regular Polizeischulen and had served in the Schutzpolizei or other operational units. If so, these officers would have their own assigned weapons and would almost certainly bring them with them. The Senior School would therefore not need a large inventory of weapons, even in comparison with other schools. The preponderance of H.P. marked weapons in this table was inconsistent with this.

The database information I was using is listed in the following table which includes five Lugers, one Model 1914 Mauser, four Luger holsters and one mag, all with H.P. marks:

<a href="http://forums.lugerforum.com/lfupload/hpmarks.jpg" target="_fullview"><img src="http://forums.lugerforum.com/lfupload/hpmarks.jpg" width="400" alt="Click for fullsize image" /></a>
The light finally came on when I was made aware of a contribution by Garland Barnes to the June 1989 AUTOMAG regarding Luger HP07 and holster HP04 listed in the table which included: â??Capture papers indicate it was taken from a police officer in Bingen (italics mine), Germany on March 27, â??45.â?� Bingen was in the state of Hesse, not Prussia. It seems reasonable to believe that police officers who were not conscripted into the army would have stayed in the districts to which they were assigned. That this man was identified as a police officer by his captor may mean he was in a police uniform rather than an army uniform. This would suggest that the officer, his weapon and his holster were Hessian, not Prussian.

I believe the above is strong evidence that H.P. does not stand for H�¶here Polizeischule and is not Prussian. If this is true, what does it mean? I'm wondering if it might stand for â??Hessische Polizei.â?� This is admittedly highly speculative but there are two bases for this:
1. It fits the abbreviation â??H.P.â?�
2. There is a tenuous analogy with police unit marks ( S.L.Pol. ) of another independent Weimar state, Sachsen (Saxony), which have been authoritatively identified as â??S�¤chsische Landes Polizei.â?�

While on the subject, note that all the H.P. marked Lugers in the table are u-block 29 DWM pistols produced in 1929 or early 1930. This of course means that they could not have gone into police service until 1929, at the earliest. These examples also begin with a low weapon number, 148, indicating this number series probably started for Lugers in about 1929. This suggests that Lugers were not used by the Hessian police prior to this. If true, what weapons did they use? The one M1914 Mauser may be a clue. Its Imperial-era serial number makes it old enough to have been placed in police service as early as 1919 - 1920. Its weapon number of 774 either means it was from an earlier series of numbers or it did not enter police service until after the Lugers. I prefer the former explanation.

I understand this topic was debated by collectors in the past and that similar conclusions were drawn. If anyone has any information on these discussions, data on additional H.P. marked items (Lugers, Mausers, holsters, mags) or comments on the above discussion, please reply to this post or email me at dermaus@aol.com.

[Vlim]

Hi,

H.P. as Hessische Polizeischule makes sense and perhaps the people from the Hessian Policeschool archives may provide additional material.

An additional option for the H.P. mark is 'Hilfspolizei', the name given to groups of SS and SA men who were added to the police organization after a 1933 decree by Goering. They remained in service as 'additional police forces' until a reorganization in 1936.

It would make sense to arm these hilfspolizei or 'police helpers' with used/refurbished/reworked weapons from NSDAP party possession.

[Don M]

Gerben,

Thanks for your suggestions. I'll stew them into the mix. I never thought of the "P." as Polizeischule. Is there a reason to prefer this over Polizei? Do you have any contact information for the Hessian police historians?

[Herb]

Don, I believe you might find the following information of interest. I found it in Vol IV of Ltc. Thomas M. Johnson's book "Collecting the Edged Weapons of the Third Reich". The information was provided by the noted German pistol collector Reinhard Kornmayer who discovered a copy of 'Vorschriften fur die Polizei Preussens Nr. 40a. (Regulations for the Prussian Police No. 40a), dated 1932 and dealing with administrative weapons regulations. Among the rules is found a section dealing with official police property markings.
e) Markings of Weapons, related equipment and bicycles:
42. Markings will be applied to all weapons, related equipment and bicycles of the municipal police, the detective force and the rural constabulary....

43....Application of markings is to be effected locally on occasion of routine weapon inspections, through the proper technical officer.

44.Markings will consist of letters and of Latin and/or Aribic numerals.

LETTERS indicate property of a municipal police department....,A detective police force or a rural constabulary unit within a particular Administrative District (including Greater Berlin), or of a police or constabulary academy.

ROMAN NUMERALS indicate police duty locations.

ARABIC NUMERALS indicate weapons issue numbers.

Governors of the Admisnistrtive Districts will allocate Roman numerals for police duty locations only when more than one exists in the respective district.
(Appendix 10 will list letter codes of the Administrative Districts)

45. Weapons, etc. will recieve consecutive numbers for each municipal police location, or each police academy, or rural constabulary and their academies with in the jurisdiction of each Administration District. (See Appendix 11 for placement of markings)

46. (ommitted-refers to bayonets)

47. Examples:
"S.Br.1.365" stamped on a Mod.98 carbine: weapon of the municipal police(S=SchutzpoliZei/Municipal police) of Administrative District Breslau (Br.), belonging to municipal police duty location 1, as designated by the Administrative Governor; weapon number 365.

"L.Br.63." on a Luger pistol: handgun of the rural constabulary (L.=Landjageri/rural constabulary) of Acministrative District Breslau (Br.); weapon number 63."

The document goes on with discussion of edged weapons. Of greater intrest is the contents of Appendix 10 to paragraph number 44 which is a listing of the numbers and designations of the various districts, 55 in all. I won't list all of them here but will provide individual information if anyone needs it. Relevant to this discussion I find that the letter H. is present and represents entry #22 Administrative District of Hannover. Entry #39 representing the Senior Police School is HP. All letters are consecutive and none have a period between them, only at the end. Perhaps this will be of some help to you and your detailed research.

[Don M]

Ed, I agree that P. could conceivably stand for either term. The difference would be that "Polizei" would mean operational police forces while "Polizeischule" would, of course, be a school. I believe there would have been many more weapons assigned to operational units than to schools so, on the basis of probability of survival, I would think these would be "Polizei." However, I have been wrong before!

Herb, thanks very much for your extensive reply. I have used the translation of the same 1932 orders in G�¶rtz & Bryan's "German Small Arms Markings" extensively in my research on Weimar police marks. In fact, it originally led me astray on this identification (my fault, not theirs).

[Vlim]

Ed,

I agree. It appears they have been 'demilitarized' for sale on the open market. This led me to think about possible 1920s customers interested in refurbished ex-WW1 side arms. Paramilitary organizations are a good candidate. As the SA and SS were later (in 1933) pushed into the police forces, it could explain why these weapons turned up there.

[Don M]

Ed,

Check the table in my post for the H.P. Lugers known to have stock lugs ground off.

Gerben,

Is there evidence available to indicate that grinding off stock lugs "demilitarized" Lugers? Since these Lugers were not manufactured until 1929-30, they could not have been altered to suit "1920s customers."

[Vlim]

Hi Don,

There isn't as far as I know. But it certainly would have been a quite useless thing to do on sidearms that remained in police/military use.

So the most obvious reason for grinding off stock lugs is to make them less 'military' in appearance.

To my knowledge there is no specific law or rule that outlawed stocklugs on pistols on the German commercial market during the Weimar era, so it may just have been a 'cosmetic' issue, again pointing towards commercial (private) use. And the paramilitary party branches were (until 1933) private.

[Don M]

Gerben,

Where can I go to find out more about the Hilfspolizei?

[Vlim]

Hi Don,

Take a look at the webside of the Hessian Police ( www.polizei.hessen.de ) under 'wir uber uns' / 'geschichte'.

A small extract from an article published there:

"
Die Frankfurter Polizei im Nationalsozialismus

Den Nationalsozialisten gelang es daher �¼berraschend schnell, den Sicherheitsapparat �¼berall in Deutschland in ihre H�¤nde zu bekommen. Schon am 22. Februar 1933, nicht einmal vier Wochen nach der Macht�¼bernahme, ernannte der damalige Reichskommissar f�¼r das Innenministerium in Preu�?en, Hermann G�¶ring, die uniformierte Kampf-, Schutz-, und Propagandatruppe der NSDAP, die Sturmabteilung (SA) zur Hilfspolizei. Damit waren Terror und Willk�¼r staatlich sanktioniert. �?berall in Deutschland stand die Polizei unter dem direkten Einfluss der SA. Alle Grundrechte der Weimarer Verfassung wurden von den braunen Machthabern ausgehebelt und somit �¼ber Nacht illusorisch. Wohnungsdurchsuchungen und die Verhaftung politischer Gegner oder Verd�¤chtiger waren nach dem Reichstagsbrand vom 27. Februar 1933 an der Tagesordnung. "

Article by Kurt Kraus, Frankfurt

LWR/ap/28.10.2004

[Don M]

Gerben,

Thank you very much for this reference! It will take me a while to labor through translations but this site clearly is a source of very useful information. In addition to information on the Hilfspolizei, I see that it confirms the legitimacy (at least currently) of the terms "Hessische Polizei" and "Hessische Polizeischule."

[Roadkill]

Excuse the syntax errors, I have about ten minutes here at work and no dictionary.

rk

'The Frankfurt Police during National Socialism"

The NSDAP made sure surprisingly quickly that the security system came under their control. Already on 22 Feb 1933, not even four weeks after taking power, declared the Reichscommissoner at the time of the interior ministry in Prussia, Herman Goering, that the uniformed combat, security, and propaganda troops of the NSDAP, the Storm Troops also, were to be part of the Hilfspolezi. By this action terror and "Willkur" were offically sanctioned. Everywher in Germany the police were under the influence of the SA. All of the basic rights of the Weimar regime were crushed by the brown power controllers and overnight made into illusions.
Residence searches and the capturing of political
opponents or undesirables became a daily occurence after the Reichstags fire in Feburay 1933.

[Don M]

rk, thanks very much for saving me the effort of translating. Now, if I could just get you to translate the rest of the website! (kidding!)

[Dwight Gruber]

Don,

It would be a useful test of Gerben's demilitarization conjecture to know if Garland Barnes's captured H.P. has a ground stock lug or not.

--Dwight

[Don M]

Dwight, I agree. Does anyone know Garland Barnes? I checked with NAPCA and he has not been a member for a number of years and they have no contact information for him.

[Don M]

So far, we seem to have three candidates for H.P.:

1. â??Hessische Polizeiâ?� â?? In addition to the speculations in my original post, a visit to the Hessian Police website (www.polizei.hessen.de) confirms the legitimacy of the term, at least in present-day Germany.

2. â??Hessische Polizeischuleâ?� â?? Also found on above website. My sole reason for preferring 1. above to this is simple numbers. I doubt that the police school would have a large inventory of weapons in comparison with the operational police forces. My database includes 5 Lugers and accessories of 4 others with H.P. marks. The largest number of weapons in the database from any one of the Prussian police schools is 3. The city of Berlin and 12 of the 14 Prussian provinces all had populations equal to or greater than Hessen. I think the number of surviving marks is much more in line with operating police units than a school.

3. â??Hilfspolizeiâ?� â?? These SA-based units that were formed in 1933 are a possibility and I havenâ??t done much research on them. However, if my guess is correct that the M1914 Mauser with H.P.774 is a weapon used prior to obtaining Lugers, the H.P. mark very probably predates 1933.

Overall, I still lean toward #1 but the jury is clearly out. I would be particularly interested in learning if there are other non-Lugers out there with this mark.

[Don M]

I have an alternate theory that may explain the ground-off stock lugs on these Lugers.

The organization represented by H.P. was apparently very meticulous, almost paranoid, about marking its property. Every major piece of a Luger rig was stamped with a property mark: frame, receiver, both mags and holster. Perhaps removal of the stock lug was yet another means of identification.

[Don M]

CORRECTION!

I have just determined that the DWM listed as HP10 in the table in my original post has the serial number 33v -- not 33u. This adds an interesting twist. It appears that these Lugers may have been assembled in 1933-34 by Mauser from parts transferred from BKIW in early 1930. I'm no expert on Luger production history and would appreciate comments from those who are.