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Gangster Gun, Serial # Revealed !


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OK, I have clearance to post the video that I took of the serial number unveiling. It is in 3 parts. Part one has an introduction, and shows us removing the barrel. Part two shows the grip mount being removed, and the hidden serial number being exposed for the first time since 1921. The third video shows Colt Chopper and me looking at Gordon's book for the serial number information.

 

 

 

 

 

Enjoy!

 

David Albert

dalbert@sturmgewehr.com

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An historical moment. Wonder if the ghost of Lebman & Nelson were there.

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This is very cool.

 

I bet Frank G is wishing he had done some research into this gun instead of making a quick buck off of it. Realistically IF this turns out to indeed be the gun in the Little Bo pictures-what would it be worth given the history behind it? How can you put a price on something like that?

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I was playing around today and looking at the photos Colt Chopper put out and compared the was the grind was shaped on both. From what I can tell, it is shaped the same. I would just about put money that the gun that is the same one, the one closest to the 1907 Winchester.

 

Mike,

 

That's what I was thinking. The grind marks could almost be looked at like a fingerprint. I would be interested in gijive's opinion on this.

 

Colt Chopper,

 

Could you take photos of it at the same angles in the Little Bohemia photos?

 

David Albert

dalbert@sturmgewehr.com

Dave and others,

 

Obviously, Colt Chopper's "Chopper" is a Lebman gun and the photos of at least two of the the guns recovered at Little Bohemia were Lebman guns according to Sandy's information. The method of obliterating the serial number on the guns is unique in that most defaced serial numbers encountered have a deeper divot where the numbers were ground off. For example, St. Valentine's Day Massacre gun # 7580 and three others I have witnessed that were taken from Peter Von Frantzius' shop and are currently in the possession of the Chicago Police Department. Von Frantius' gunsmith used a different grinding method than Lebman, which could be construed as a signature.

 

Although, the Lebman guns exhibit the same signature grinding, making a positive comparison from the available photos would not be possible. The guns exhibit the same "class" characteristics of the grinding method, but the individual characteristics of the grinding marks would have to be microscopically examined and that is not possible from the available pictures. I am not trying to dampen anyone's enthusiasm here, the gun is certainly a Lebman gun and may have passed through the Dillinger gang's hands at some point, but I don't think it is likely the gun was recovered at Little Bohemia. My reasoning for this is that I believe the FBI would have confiscated all the guns recovered at Little Bohemia for testing at their crime laboratory, firing test bullets to possibly link them with unsolved homicides. One of their Agents was killed in the Little Bohemia debacle, I don;t think they would have turned over any of the confiscated guns to the local law enforcement agencies after the shooting.

 

I think a more likely scenario is that the gun was abandoned after an aborted Bank Robbery or in an abandoned get away vehicle or hideout, when it was recovered by a local law enforcement agency who kept it for their own purposes and registered it properly. Defaced serial number guns were always registered with a new IRS issued number. The FBI only recently returned confiscated guns to agencies after decades of retaining them in their laboratory. I don't believe they were in the habit of releasing firearms during the Hoover era, when this gun was obviously registered by someone.

 

I think finding the agency that sold or consigned it to the dealer that Colt Chopper purchased it from will be the key to uncovering the mystery.

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What Chuck says is very true, since we believe the Lebman guns were most likely shipped to the Nelson group in St Paul, whether this one made it to Little Bohemia lodge via Nelson is still unclear. There is the possibility Carroll, Hamilton or possibly Riley took off with the Thompson and it went ???.

If what Joe Pinkston wrote about 6 Thompsons recovered after the battle is still yet to be determined by some FBI files.

We need further provenance - FBI confirmation, IRS registration something like that.

As I said before it took 4 of us ( 3 in law enforcement) over a year just to track down just 9 Dillinger Thompsons.

I'm sure we'll get there with Chopper's Tommy, patience......

I'm personally leaning strongly toward it's a Nelson Thompson, but we shall have to find out.

At this time, I'm stalled on this project. FOIA or agency confirmation needed. It's really in Colt Chopper's hands now.

Super fun project for me, taxing on this old noggin.

 

 

OCM

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I was playing around today and looking at the photos Colt Chopper put out and compared the was the grind was shaped on both. From what I can tell, it is shaped the same. I would just about put money that the gun that is the same one, the one closest to the 1907 Winchester.

 

Mike,

 

That's what I was thinking. The grind marks could almost be looked at like a fingerprint. I would be interested in gijive's opinion on this.

 

Colt Chopper,

 

Could you take photos of it at the same angles in the Little Bohemia photos?

 

David Albert

dalbert@sturmgewehr.com

 

Probably done on a pedestal grinder with a 1 1/2 " inch widthe wheel. no safety shield back in the day. Strange they left the bare metal.

 

Great story !!!!

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Just got off the phone with an excited Colt Chopper, looks like he found the FBI file stating that his gun was part of a shipment to St Paul from Lebman to Jimmy Williams. Everybody knows who Jimmy Williams was !!!! Real name was Lester Gillis. Hint: part of the Dillinger gang....

He can come on and go into details.

 

Congratulations. Amazing find.

 

OCM

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I have not weighed into this thread yet but after my chat with Colt Chopper yesterday I want to say he has really done the research. He has more work to do but he really did a great job with the material he had at hand so far. Kudos to another Thompson researcher, Colt Chopper, also caretaker of a very interesting piece of history.

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I've offered my " first born Male child " to Colt Chopper, in exchange for his Nelson Thompson- Unfortunately the bastard found out I'm 70 years old !

Missed another one. Jack is a great guy, glad it's in his hands.

This will be fun, for many years.

 

OCM

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I wonder if the seller Frank G. was the seller of record or a consignment seller.

I always ask for and get a copy of the current transfer form before I make the purchase.

I guess Frank could also redact it if the past owner had problems with it.

Darryl

Edited by darrylta
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However, I see the numbers have been removed on both the receiver and lower on your Thompson. We need to find out if the two captured Nelson Thompsons had the same as they are listed by the FBI as two El Paso traced guns, # 6315 & 6141.

This to me would indicate the numbers were visible on the Thompsons captured-

Conclusion: the one pictured here at the garage after the little Bo battle could possible be yours. Let's find out....

 

No, the two guns found both had their serials obliterated and were only latter found to be #6141 and #6315. I also doubt that the FBI found more than those two at Little Bohemia and somehow forgot to mention them. Granted, a few guns from the list of Dillinger-Nelson guns seem to be missing. We must assume they disappeared with Carroll and other pals inbetween, or finally after Barrington, when Nelson was claimed to still have four "machine guns." The FBI files list only two Thompsons in Little Bohemia and there are only two visible on all the photos. Together with the one taken by Van Meter (#7387), that makes only three. Does that seem a low figure for five "shooters" (Nelson, Dillinger, Van Meter, Carroll, Hamilton). Yeah, perhaps. Then again, they only just escaped from several near desasters and had recently lost two Thompsons (Green's #6444 and Van Meter's #obliterated). The FBI files are often faulty but I rather doubt they would have missed four Thompsons. They were pretty stubborn trying to trace all the guns they seized, finding four guns and then never mentioning them again would be extremely sloppy police work.

 

As to #5487, this gun is mentioned in the FBI files by Silva, one of the suppliers of Lebman, and thus definitely a Lebman/Nelson Gang gun. Where did it go? There are four possible routes:

 

1. It was Carroll's gun. Carroll was the primary recipient of the guns, as Lebman sent them all to the brother of Carroll's wife. Carroll would have lost it on 11-NOV-1933 to the Minneapolis Police Department. This might be possible to clear up by contacting the MPD.

2. It was Van Meter's gun. Van Meter was close to Nelson, initially. Van Meter would have lost it on 31-MAR-1934 to the Bureau of Investigation. The serial was obliterated. The files don't say whether they could raise them (sometimes they couldn't). This might be possible to clear up by contacting the FBI.

3. It was some other Nelson Gang member's gun. Doubtful, but possible.

4. It was Nelson's gun and still in possession of Nelson when he died on 27-NOV-1934. He was supposed to own four "machine guns" after the Battle of Barrington, which were concealed in Niles and put up for sale on the black market, but supposedly still available in 1937.

 

Personally, I'd start with the MPD and FBI angles.

 

Cheers

 

HANS

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Hans,

 

Good research, I agree with your assessment of the Little Bohemia recoveries. I would take slight exception to only one comment you made, indicating the the FBI confiscation of Van Meter's gun may be # 5487. I believe if the FBI confiscated the gun it would not been subsequently released for resale, the FBI wasn't in the habit of releasing firearms. I would agree that the Minneapolis Police Department would be a better place to start. They may have traded firearms years ago for upgrades in equipment, something that was fairly common in police agencies. The other alternative is it was one of Nelson's guns turned over to law enforcement after his death and subsequently registered.

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Hans,

 

Good research, I agree with your assessment of the Little Bohemia recoveries. I would take slight exception to only one comment you made, indicating the the FBI confiscation of Van Meter's gun may be # 5487. I believe if the FBI confiscated the gun it would not been subsequently released for resale, the FBI wasn't in the habit of releasing firearms. I would agree that the Minneapolis Police Department would be a better place to start. They may have traded firearms years ago for upgrades in equipment, something that was fairly common in police agencies. The other alternative is it was one of Nelson's guns turned over to law enforcement after his death and subsequently registered.

 

Yeah, I thought about that after I had posted. Generally, I agree with you in that it is less likely than the Carroll gun or a "lost" Nelson gun. However, the "old" FBI seemed to trade guns with PDs (we know about one trade with the Tucson PD) and even gave guns away to friends of Hoover (though probably not submachine guns), so it's not completely impossible.

 

Cheers

 

HANS

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Hans,

 

Good research, I agree with your assessment of the Little Bohemia recoveries. I would take slight exception to only one comment you made, indicating the the FBI confiscation of Van Meter's gun may be # 5487. I believe if the FBI confiscated the gun it would not been subsequently released for resale, the FBI wasn't in the habit of releasing firearms. I would agree that the Minneapolis Police Department would be a better place to start. They may have traded firearms years ago for upgrades in equipment, something that was fairly common in police agencies. The other alternative is it was one of Nelson's guns turned over to law enforcement after his death and subsequently registered.

 

Yeah, I thought about that after I had posted. Generally, I agree with you in that it is less likely than the Carroll gun or a "lost" Nelson gun. However, the "old" FBI seemed to trade guns with PDs (we know about one trade with the Tucson PD) and even gave guns away to friends of Hoover (though probably not submachine guns), so it's not completely impossible.

 

Cheers

 

HANS

Hans,

 

Agreed, not entirely impossible. As you point out the FBI did occasionally furnish firearms to local law enforcement on joint operations.

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Got to remember the Tucson guns, after the arrest the Tucson PD kept the guns that were not claimed and later loaned them back & forth to the FBI for their display. # 7731 & # 5878 are still there, Lebman & Peru PD guns I think. If in fact, Pinkston is correct, we have four missing Little Bo Thompsons. Were these serial numbers acid raised and not the ones pictured, I have no idea.

We know Dillinger took # 7387 with him, pictured two weeks earlier , April 7, at the farm and recovered in Lake Michigan.

 

Nelson could of taken it, we know he had at least a Colt mini, and as I remember, there was a Thompson found at the Barrington battle and used for evidence. The Monitor poof ! However Helmer said there was some possibility that it was hidden by locals, where they took the body ( or something close )

 

Hoover gave a Little Bo pistol to a movie producer as a thanks for something, maybe Jack Warner, can't remember. When we were tracing the Colt 380 Dillinger had on him, I went to the Red Skeleton family executor, as there was a rumor that Hoover gave Red the Dillinger " death gun " Wrong- an Urban Legand.

The post findings of Colt Chopper's new find will be interesting-

 

Chuck, I asked Helmer, will ask you, why didn't Goddard or someone know about the secret number on Colt Thompsons ????? Acid raising of numbers seems rather old school by 1934. ???

 

Sandy

 

One more thought here- It's seemed to me thru the years, that Lebman guns had the numbers removed, of course a smart practice from The Lebman Saddle Shop. We see this on Dillinger related weapons, think the Tucson 07 that the FBI has now, the shipments to St Paul... I assume the Van Meter Thompson was supplied by Lebman, the Colt minis... ( some) . A Lebman trade mark of sorts.

Edited by OCM
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Chuck, I asked Helmer, will ask you, why didn't Goddard or someone know about the secret number on Colt Thompsons ????? Acid raising of numbers seems rather old school by 1934. ???

 

Sandy

Sandy,

 

Actually, Marcellus Thompson visited the Chicago Police Department after the McSwiggin murder in 1926 and informed them about the "production/secret" number on Thompson Guns. People were aware of it, but , laboratory people are sometimes interested in protecting their livelihood. The acid method worked, so they used it, even though it may have been simpler to remove the barrel on a Thompson. The Thompson was one of the few guns of the period that had a hidden production number, they used the acid method on other guns, why not the Thompson? There was little thought at the time that they were destroying a valuable collector's item, it was a murder weapon as far as they were concerned, just evidence in a criminal case.

 

In fact, some of the gangster armorers were aware of the number under the barrel. There was a Thompson that was on display at the old Chicago Police Department Headquarters in their Crime Laboratory (the descendant of the former Northwestern Crime Laboratory of Calvin Goddard fame). It was an early gun with the Aut-Ord-Co logo and early fire select markings and had the serial number ground off similar to the Von Frantzius guns. The barrel had been replaced on the gun and it had a barrel similar to the type used on the failed 1923 heavy-duty military model Auto-Ordnance tried to market. When I used to frequent the CPD Crime Lab in the 1970's I used to ask about the gun and it's history, all they knew was it had been confiscated from the "gangsters". Sometime in the 1990's the Chicago Police Lab merged with the State of Illinois Crime Lab and a new facility was built on Roosevelt Road near Racine Ave. in Chicago. All the reference guns were transferred to the new State of Illinois Crime Lab, including the display Thompson mentioned. I knew one of the firearms forensic scientists at the lab and was able to inspect the gun in person (I'll post some pictures of it in the near future). Anyway, I convinced the firearms technician to pull the barrel and try to get the hidden number because I was trying to assist Gordon at the time with updating his reference work. The barrel change must have been the work of a gangster armorer, because low and behold, the secret number had been ground off also. The State Lab tried to raise the number (using a newer technique than the acid method) but the grinding was too deep and they couldn't identity it. The grinding on the side was very deep also and the gun had been refinished years ago, so I suspect that originally the laboratory had tried to raise the number with the acid method and ruined the original finish. They probably refinished it when they put it on display.

 

So, occasionally even the bad guys knew about the hidden number. Lot's of history in these Colt Thompson Guns.

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Thanks Chuck-

Talked to Bill this morning, he said about the same, who knows why they did that, maybe law or something. New Fed laws etc.

 

Bill's thought's were, this could be the Nelson Thompson from the Barrington battle, just a thought. I asked about the one recovered for evidence, he didn't remember, could of been someone else.

If in fact, this were to be the Thompson used by Nelson in the famous shoot-out , it would be an extreme piece of gangster history.

 

The phase II of CC's search may be more interesting then the first.

 

 

 

OCM

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