I will once more deny that I collect daggers. Even though I have over a dozen of them. This hewer is the 1938 model issued to enlisted members of the Deutsche Rote Kreuz and is complete with the leather frog used to suspend it from a belt. The maker mark is not present but it is marked GES. GESCHUTZT on the base of the blade.
In order to fit my MG34 onto the dreibein I just obtained, I needed the adapter. These are quite expensive for what they are so in the meantime I hooked a shabby ground dug one that I could use for display while I find a not-stupidly-priced example.
Something I have been looking for for ages, this is the Anti Aircraft Tripod or Dreibein that was used to convert the MG34 for light flak use. usually the wooden reinforcements are long gone but this one still has them as well as being unit marked for the 56th Light Flak Company, 273rd Army Flak Battalion. This makes my MG34 much easier to display and complements the Lafette I found for my MG42.
Difficult to find in good condition as Japanese leather didn’t last and the environment in which they were used wasn’t healthy for leather. This is the front ammunition pouch for Arisaka 6.5 and 7.7 ammunition as used in the Type 38 and Type 99 infantry rifles. This one came to me still with a cardboard liner and 6×6.5mm stripper clips.
Here is a tidy, later model Type 30 bayonet. Intended for fitting to either the Type 99 series of rifles or the Type 38, this one does not have the curled guard seen on the earlier examples like this one here. The stamp on the ricasso indicates that it was made by Toyada Jidou Shoki (Toyada Automatic Loomworks), now known as Toyota.
This is my second G/K43 Rifle. The other one I have, I rebuilt from a converted sporter. This one came to me, 100% correct from a fellow collector raising funds for his next absurd purchase. The receiver is stamped AC 44, for Carl Walther Waffenfabrik in Zella-Mehlis, Goethestr. 4.
Note the stamped dot in the butt plate, the staked screws on the underside of the action and the WaaB43 stamp on the magazine (indicating manufacture by Olympia Buromaschinenwerke AG).
In my never ending quest to find and reunite medals to my family surname, usually it’s months of dross with the occasional excellent find. This group falls into the latter. This group is impressed to W.O. 2nd Class F.Birchall, 5.D.G and Lt. F Birchall, 5.D.G.
Frederick served in N.W. Europe, landing through Normandy with the Regiment in July, 1944. He fought through Belgium, the Roer and into Hamburg in 1945. After returning to the U.K., the Regiment was sent to Korea, where Frederick was awarded an MID as well as a short service commission as Lieutenant.
