[Darwin]

I hope this falls under Allied pistols used during WWII. Anyway, I just acquired two FN 1922 pistols that have Chinese police markings on the front grip strap. These pistols have features indicating pre-war manufacture. These are supposed to have been used by the police in Shanghai. I haven't yet been able to get the Chinese markings translated but have a resourse and will attempt to do so. Also, the letters GM and a three digit number, assumed to be an issue number, appear with the Chinese markings. The GM and the issue number are not together so the GM is not part of the issue number. The serial numbers are 245xxx. Anybody have some information on these?
Thanks,

Darwin

http://www.browz.com/darwin
(I lost 40 pounds in 60 days in a safe and health manner and I am still losing weight. Is that something that you would like to know more about? Ask me.)

 

[Jan C Still]

Darwin
Sounds interesting. Do you have any photographs?
Jan

Jan C Still
Site Owner - Operator

 

[Darwin]

I no longer have a digital camera but I just visited my neighbor who works with a lady who grew up in China. He took some pictures of the markings and will email them to me in the morning. Unfortunately, I didn't think to have him take any additional pictures. I will post the markings in the morning. In the meantime, I'll attach a photo the seller sent me.

Thanks.

Download Attachment: P9080161.JPG
92.06KB

Darwin

http://www.browz.com/darwin
(I lost 40 pounds in 60 days in a safe and health manner and I am still losing weight. Is that something that you would like to know more about? Ask me.)

 

[Darwin]

Here are the pics of the markings on the front grip strap.

Download Attachment: FN1922-247.JPG
40.24 KB

Download Attachment: FN1922-368.JPG
39.25 KB

Also, later last night, I discovered that the barrel on one of them has proof markings that were discontinued in 1924. (Crown over R and Perron proofs). Maybe that gives us a relative date. The two pisols' serial numbers are only 273 numbers apart. So, maybe this gives us a time frame of 1924 when these pistols were produced and delivered?

I also forgot to mention that of teh four magazines that came with these pistols, the base plate was also marked GM.

Darwin

http://www.browz.com/darwin
(I lost 50 pounds in 90 days in a safe and health manner and I am still losing weight. Is that something that you would like to know more about? Ask me.)

 

[Darwin]

I got the information about the meaning of the Chinese characters. Looking at the picture that has all 4 characters, the left most small one is a kind of shorthand version of the character for Shanghai. The second one is apparently difficult to translate but loosely means "unit" or "police". Of the large characters, the left one is the same character as the small one meaning Shanghai but in a different writing style. The second large character means "guard".

I love this kind of stuff. I also learned from another source that the pistols may have likely been produced in the mid-30's. The one barrel may have been in a bin for sometime after it was proofed.

Darwin

http://www.browz.com/darwin
(I lost 50 pounds in 90 days in a safe and health manner and I am still losing weight. Is that something that you would like to know more about? Ask me.)