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Looks like somebody cut up Grandpa's DEWAT 1928A1.


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>Was a registered dewat a way to save the $200 stamp money?? My thompson was a registered dewat at one time but it was a Cali gun and that was required there.<

 

Your “Cali” Thompson was DEWATed for sale as a non-gun, legal for private possession as inoperable without registration, if it was one of the many thousands imported for the new and optimistic retail commerce in war mementos in the early 1950s. Many of the importers deactivating MGs and selling them were in CA, but the DEWAT requirements were not state specific, but applied to all states since NFA’34 was federal law.

My first real MGs were DEWATs purchase in late ‘56 and ‘57 from the Ellner Co and another outfit, both in CA and both priced at $15.95, a lot of money for a 12 year old in ‘56. DEWAT Thompsons could be found for $19.95. My grandmother bought me a DEWAT 1909 Hotchkiss Portable LMG from Numrich Arms in 1957 for Cristmas be ause I asked her for it.

The DEWAT program was started by the dept of the army for GIs to legally keep their MG trophies when bringing them back to the US and supervised by the treasury dept who administered the NFA’34. MGs required registration for legal private possessoion and the DEWAT arrangement was an option to keep the MG if the owner did not want to register it. Registratiion was free, but once registered, sale of the MG required the $200 transfer tax to change the name of the registrant. Many did not want a live MG so had them beeech welded and barrel welded to the receive to treasury specs. The GCA ‘68 Amnesty created at opportunity to register an MG. Any MG with a complete receiver was regarded as requiring registration so many DEWATed MGs were registered. Of course many also were not registered. After the end of the first 30 day Amnesty period, any MG with a complete receiver that was not registered was contraband.

After the end of the Amnesty, the federal laws governing the manufacture and registration of MGs for private possession remained in effect, allowing 18 years of new MGs being manufactured and registered until May of ‘86 when this practice was outlawed. However, any registered DEWAT can be reactivated to live fire because it is considered “live” due to the complete receiver through the established paperwork process. There are many registered DEWATs still in private hands and also many unregistered DEWATs, so just because an MG has a welded barrel doesn’t mean that is or is not registered. While ATF enforces the tax confidentiality of the personal information of a current registrant, it is absurd to enforce this stupidity for MGs no longer in the possession af a specific registrant or registered to a dead person, but they do. This makes it extremely difficult to move an MG into the transfer process when the owner is not the registrant or doesn’t know the name of the registrant, especially from estates. Since people are scared of ATF and often have no idea of the rules, it is very simple to cut up an MG or destroy it without making any effort to find out if it is registered. There are ways to find out if a serial number is in the NFRTR, but extremely difficult to find out the name of a registrant. Thus, thousands of registered MGs that are in estates and possessed by owners who are not the registrant and may not even know of the registration requirement remain in limbo and will never be released back into the collector market until ATF allows access to the name of a registrant associated with a particular serial number. This ‘28 could easily be one of those. And, if it is registered, the serial number of that registration is still valid! FWIW

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>After the ammesty, something like the auction gun was ineligible for transfer.<

 

True ONLY if it was not registered. If registered it was legally eleigible for transfer and also forreactivation at any time.

 

A comment above suggests that prior to the 68 Amnesty, one could buy an AR15.......,etc, etc register, and fix it later or tweak it or whatever. Hypothetically true, but it could be registered as an MG anyway. Any individual could also import an MG and register it. Plus, no one was getting away with anything like that because there was no interest in converting semis to full auto except for those in the industry looking to design and build MGs for sale to LE, govt, etc. There was no such thing as a conversion part, a rsgistered sideplate, registered tube, or sear or any of the fictitious MG designations fabricated by ATF after the 68 Amnesty. These designations were ATFs ad hoc method to comply with the demands of those who understood the federal MG manufacturing and import laws, and. wanted to be able to legally make new MGs to register and sell, and insisted that ATF come up with rules to facilitate their legal manufacture.

Many years ago, I owned a couple of sideplate BMG 1917a1s that has been reassembled from parts with new made sideplates and registered by the Pueblo Arsenal in CO in the mid 1960s. They were sideplate guns, but only because they had been damaged and new sideplates had to be made and ass,evled to get them up and running.. They were handstamped with RIA IDs and serials and registered because the arsenal wanted to sell them, which they did. However, at that time there was no designated sideplate considred to be the legal MG. That idea was still well in the future. FWIW

Edited by Black River Militaria CII
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Black River Militaria CII,

 

I was hoping you would weigh-in on this topic. Your knowledge of the pre-1968 rules and history of the Dewat program are insightful and much appreciated.

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Black River Militaria CII,

 

I was hoping you would weigh-in on this topic. Your knowledge of the pre-1968 rules and history of the Dewat program are insightful and much appreciated.

 

^^^^^^THIS^^^^^^

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