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24 comments to "Infamous Weapons."

biltmore
June 21st, 2007 at 2:07 am
“When news of the war souvenir broke in May 2004, reporters asked President Bush if he planned to give the pistol to the next Iraqi president. No, he said, it “is now the property of the American government.” The gun is kept in a small study off the Oval Office, and according to one White House visitor who late spoke to Time magazine, the president “really liked showing it off. He was really proud of it.”"

Man … that paragraph makes me freaking sick to my stomach. So he pretty much just stole the gun then huh? I cannot wait untill this guy is out of office. He’s no better than a poacher, showing off is trophy. What a sneaky thief.
Gert Verhoog
June 21st, 2007 at 2:46 am
Thanks for yet another interesting list! One small point: Gavrilo Princip’s assassination of Franz Ferdinand started world war I (one), not II (two).
Rusedal
June 21st, 2007 at 3:27 am
The assasination of Franz Ferdinand precipitated World War I, not II.
Sig Nelson
June 21st, 2007 at 4:45 am
small type in the story: The assasination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand led to WWI, not WWII.
Jimbo
June 21st, 2007 at 5:27 am
Abraham Lincoln was most likely NOT killed by the bullet. His doctors kept probing his brain with metal rods trying to locate the bullet. The more they probed, the worst he got. The rods were doing 10 times the damage that the bullet ever did.

Many people are alive today with bullets in their brain.
Mark
June 21st, 2007 at 5:27 am
“…was used by Gavrilo Princip to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand and precipitate World War II.” You mean World War I.

“The gun that Lee Harvey Oswald [wiki] allegedly used to assassinate President John F. Kennedy…”

Good grief. “Allegedly?” The commie shot JFK, get over it.
Rober
June 21st, 2007 at 7:25 am
“…The gun is a single-shot flintlock, made by Philadelphia gunsmith Henry Derringer. Itâ€™s tiny - just six inches total in length with a 2 1/2″ barrel - but itâ€™s powerful, firing a .44-calibur bullet.”

The gun shown is not a flintlock, rather it is a caplock.
Sid Morrison
June 21st, 2007 at 7:50 am
Rober is right! A flintlock is easily identifiable — the hammer has a little clamp that holds a piece of flint. This bad boy takes replaceable caps.
Tim Mosley
June 21st, 2007 at 9:42 am
Lots of errors here, Uncle John.

Oswald’s rifle was not a .38 caliber, but was actually a .30 caliber, and even this is wrong since the actual cartridge was a metric cartridge of 7.65 mm.

And it seems to me that Booth’s pistol was actually a .41 caliber, not .44, as .41 was a very common derringer caliber of that era.
Lasse
June 21st, 2007 at 9:45 am
Actually, ww1 lead to ww2, so maybe its not a typo.
Tony
June 21st, 2007 at 10:36 am
Actually, the Manlicher-Carcano is 6.5×52mm, not making it a .30 caliber, as stated in other posts. .30 caliber rifles typically are designated as 7.62mm x ?. Several examples of this are the 7.62×51mm (.308 NATO), 7.62×39mm (SKS, AK-47, etc), and the 7.62×54mm (Mosin-Nagant and Dragunov).
roger
June 21st, 2007 at 10:52 am
biltmore, you’re right. He should give that pistol back to Saddam. Saddam bought it with his own money, and he deserves to have it back.
Tiago
June 21st, 2007 at 10:59 am
i was going to say WW1 not 2 .. but i see its been taken care of =)
Heather
June 21st, 2007 at 11:02 am
Why are Americans obsessed with guns? I looked at the comments to see if anyone said they couldn’t care less about which gun did what, but no, you’re all in a discussion about them. Apologies if you are not Americans, but can’t you see that from the UK it looks like you all go round murdering each other, because guns are so easy to buy.
Jester
June 21st, 2007 at 11:47 am
Get off your high horse, Heather. In case you didn’t read the article (obviously not) it’s GUNS FROM AROUND THE WORLD. THROUGHOUT HISTORY. And can’t you see that from the US, whiny little pissants who want to moralize everything they can get their grubby little hands on look like complete idiots when they spew out their little comments on everything. (Not that I feel that is the case in the UK, and apologies to all the normal Brits over there who enjoy light reading about HISTORY like the rest of us!)
Alex
June 21st, 2007 at 12:36 pm
I’ve never thought that Neatorama readers are so into weapons! Thank you to Gert Verhoog, Sig Nelson, Mark, and Tiago for pointing out the typo. That was my mistake. My thanks to the Neatorama editor who fixed it (whoever you are!)

I must admit I don’t know anything about guns, but I’ve double checked the Oswald rifle details on the post against the hard copy. Here’s some more info about the infamous rifle.

Rober and Sid Morrison, I’ll defer to your expertise in identifying flintlock vs. caplock. I can barely tell the difference between flintlock and the flintstones, but that is what’s on my hard copy. I’ll let the article stand, but people will be able tell from your comments.

Tim Mosley, regarding the caliber of the Booth gun, wikipedia had it listed as .44 (as did the hardcopy of this article). Now, I’m not sure either was right, but I’ll let the article stand - with your caveat in the comment.
Sid Morrison
June 21st, 2007 at 3:25 pm
Heather -

Last time I checked, Sarajevo, Italy, and Sadaam’s spider hole are all well outside the US. There is nothing wrong with privately owned guns; in fact they are valuable tools to protect people’s freedoms both from oppressive governments and from forces without.

You mention you are from the UK. I’m assume that you are too young to know much about the many thousands of civilian Brits (including many women and old men) who made up the British Home Guard (Local Defence Volunteers) during the Second World War. There was an extremely real threat that the British Isles would be invaded (read about Operation Sea Lion — the Nazi plan to do just that). Whilst that never came to be, the Home Guard was ready with their own weapons (read GUNS!) to slow the Germans down and impede their progress wherever possible. This wasn’t “busywork”, but the real deal — government owned weapons were in very short supply (lots left on the beach at Dunkirk unfortunately), so those privately owned rifles, shotguns, and pistols were one of the big things ensuring your nation’s freedom. Read about how dire Winston Churchill considered the situation in his 6 volume history of the Second World War. Private gun ownership was there to protect your freedom. Fortunately, the RAF stopped the Luftwaffe first, but that was a monumental upset — far from a “given” at the time.

Straight talk from Sid.
Tim Mosley
June 21st, 2007 at 10:58 pm
Ok, I looked it up.

The derringer WAS a .44 caliber, BUT Booth had loaded a .41 caliber ball, which is the part I remembered. Seems to me to be a deliberate attempt to baffle scholars.

This info may be found on the FBI’s website, where modern day tests on the Booth derringer were conducted to learn more about the actual assassination.
Heather
June 22nd, 2007 at 5:44 am
OK, I assumed that this was a mostly American site and all the posters were keen on the ins and outs of the weapons - maybe I didn’t actually read the article.
William S. Dean
June 22nd, 2007 at 6:28 am
Actually, the Booth Derringer, as others have noted, was a percussion firearm, not a flintlock. A percussion cap was fitted over a pierced nipple (yes, that is the correct term) to ignite the powder in the barrel breech and fire the weapon.

However, although the FBI purportedly examined the weapon and bullet in 1997, the bullet was determined to be too corroded for any reasonable ballistics testing, so it “probably” was a .44 caliber lead ball. You can check these facts @: http://wesclark.com/jw/booth_pistol.html
Adroni
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:06 am
In regards to the Booth pistol. It is common to load muzzle-loaders with ammunition slightly smaller in diameter than the actual caliber of the weapon. The ball is wrapped in a lubricated patch that takes up the excess space and ensures a proper gas seal.
Tim Mosley
June 22nd, 2007 at 11:55 am
One final word:

Henry Derringer’s surname was actually spelled Deringer. His imitators who later cashed in on his fame merely changed the spelling to Derringer to evade the weak copyright laws then in place. Deringer did indeed conceive the “derringer” and produced the first model, but his imitators quickly overwhelmed him and it is their imitations - and altered trade name - that are remembered today.
Fodder
June 23rd, 2007 at 10:26 am
For Mark - â€œThe gun that Lee Harvey Oswald [wiki] allegedly used to assassinate President John F. Kennedyâ€¦â€

There is still some question as to whether that rifle was used to assassinate Kennedy. That Mannlicher-Carcano is one of the worst rifles ever built, most were damaged by sabotage during WWII and no one was ever able to replicate the assassination with that particular long gun.
J farmer
June 23rd, 2007 at 1:15 pm
“Man â€¦ that paragraph makes me freaking sick to my stomach. So he pretty much just stole the gun then huh? I cannot wait untill this guy is out of office. Heâ€™s no better than a poacher, showing off is trophy. What a sneaky thief.” quote
What is wrong with you? its just a gun! If the police take your illegal gun its theirs!
There is a BIG difference between a poacher and someone giving you a gun as a gift. Do you know what a poacher is? thats a poor analogy.
I am tired of the thought we will stop senseless killing if we get rid of guns. Well we will always have people killing other people,get ride of guns then get rid of knives, then poison ect..
The problem is stupid people who don’t know the first thing about a gun or gun safety, keep it locked up keep it unloaded and up out of reach of kids. treat a unloaded gun as if it is always loaded.
By the way a unloaded gun on a wall collecting dust is one of the safest guns to have, far different than the killing of a rare animal. Get over it!!!!

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