AlanDavid

Looks like a commercial London proof house mark on top of the actuator. No idea what the other mark on the face of the actuator is. Regards AlanD

Here are some screen shots showing guns being packed which have been collected by the American Committee for Defense of British Homes. The location is NYC. One of the cases has a Winchester S/L rifle. Could be a .357 or .401. There appears to be a small size of case and a longer one. The Committee did have contracts high places. Are these FBI cases? Regards Alan American Committee 4.BMP American Committee 2.BMP American Committee 5.BMP

What are the markings ion the mag housing, that should reveal the manufacture.

That canal runs right past the front of Central Ordnance Depot Weedon which had massive quantities of small arms pass through its doors in the war. The brick buildings looks to be part of COD Weedon which is now a commercial storage facility with most of the original buildings intact. Why these Sten's ended up in the canal I don't know. Weedon would have had proper procedures for the destruction of small arms, which would have involved the metal ending up in a furnace. If the Sten's ended up being covered in algae on the bed of the canal this would have reduced the amount of oxidation and may have help preserve the metal, to a degree. The Airborne rear grips , if genuine (!) must be worth good money if they are in reasonable shape. No license required for these or the magazines in the U.K. Regards Alan

rpbsps The scan is actually from a photocopy I took of a list of examiners markings in the old Patter Room Collection Library , some years ago. It was dated 1st September 1939. The same list is existent in the collection but dated 1918, so obviously a lot of the markings and stamps did not change that much between the wars. Regards Alan

Its got the yellow felt still in place, which seems to be missing half the time. Regards AlanD

Did you get any photos of Reisings with foreign military markings? Regards Alan

Webley & Scott made fans as well. regards AlanD

I know its a long shot but does anyone know if the firearm sales records for Hudson Sporting Company or J L Galef both of NYC, still exist in an archive somewhere? Both company's went out of business years ago. I am interested in the 1940/44 period. Would the ATF be likely to have them? Regatrdds AlanD

In addition to the Canadian order for .303 Lewis guns with Savage, the British also ordered either 10,000 or 15,000 (reference not to hand) .303 guns from Savage. These were inspected by British inspectors at the Savage plant and marked with inspection stamp of a Crown with the letter A under it 9for america0 and a number. The order was then turned over to the Russians. I am not sure if the magazines for this order were inspection stamped or not Regards AlanD Sydney

David Have you ever seen a British produced manual for the M1 carbine or M2. They were used quite extensively in Malays, as you know. Regards Alan

The two officers. RAF & RN are quite senior in rank. W W Greener had a contract to make 500 of these. Unfortunately, there is no date on the contract. If Greener got an order I assume it would have been a bit more of a complex design than the type illustrated in the OP? Perhaps the second one down in post 6. The photo in the original post looks to be from the IWM collection. If so there will be details of where and when it was taken and possibly the names of the officers. Regards AlanD

I am not sure if 6129 is in Gordon's book. It's in the collection of: Anniston Army Depot: U.S. Army’s Museum Support Center https://www.guns.com/news/2017/05/26/exclusive-inside-the-army-museum-support-center-for-a-peak-at-the-rare-stuff-photos Regards Alan David Sydney

Excellent post. Its great to see the information collated into one post. Regards AlanD

Thanks Michael I have ordered a copy through Amazon. Regards AlanD