GERMAN LUGER PISTOL LOADING & STRIPPING TAKE DOWN TOOL MAKER MARKED

Original WW2 German P08 Luger take down tool.  (Abbrechenung Werkzeug für Pistole P08). Used for pistol loading and stripping.   

Roughly, 50mm x 24mm, small, blued, tooled steel, cruciform shaped tool, with a central circular hole, and slotted edge to one side and a turn up lip to one end. 

This Lugar tool is maker marked. Came with the black leather Lugar holster that just arrived (in this weeks newsletter also) owned by SS Gunner, Waske. 

Received from the Royal Winnipeg Rifles Museum, Canada, this was from a set of German field gear with 8 pieces hanging from the belt and y-strap . We have now separated everything from the German field gear grouping to sell it separately.  This take down tool is one piece of the group of 8.   

The museum was selling off some of there museum’s items, to make room for more. The museum called it deaccessioning surplus museum artifacts.

The SS soldier who owned these pieces during WWII was SS Gunner, Waske. 

The museum numbers their items for inventory purposes and you will see that there is a very small white numbered sticker on this item put there by the museum.  They are very easy to remove.

BACKGROUND: The P08 Luger pistol was developed by George Luger who has served in the Austro-Hungarian army before gaining employment with the Ludwig Löwe & Cie armaments factory in Berlin in 1891. While employed with the Löwe firm Luger examined the Borchardt pistol they manufactured which had proven to be troublesome due to its awkward recoil and bolt return system.

Luger redesigned the Borchardt pistol with a cleaner design and systems and in 1899 the first Borchardt-Luger pistol was tested. The Borchardt-Luger pistol underwent minor modifications and was accepted by the Swiss army in 1900. Further modifications in 1902 resulted in the Luger being re-calibered from 7.65mm to the standard 9mm Parabellum cartridge.

The new Luger pistol was adopted by the Imperial German Navy in 1904 and by the German army in 1908, which led to its official designation, "P08". The P08 Luger pistol saw service through-out WWI, during the Reichswehr era and on into the Third Reich.