Larrydaley

I noticed a "golden gun" (an automatic pistol) since Interarma's Samuel Cummings, whose favorite gift was a golden gun, is long dead. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html...756C0A96E958260 Does anybody want to speculate as to where that pistol \ comes from? take care and be well Larry Daley

Apparently the anti-aircraft machine gun which shot down three planes at Gibara, Cuba in August 1932. It is reported made by Colt thus presumable using the Browning design. Here (below) is a report from the New York Times, carefully corrected and annoted by me. Please advise of any errors of fact or interpretation. Larry New York Times Staff 1932. Cuban Rebel Arms Here For Evidence. Munitions Seized After Battle In October To Be Used In Federal Inquiry. Sent From Washington. Government Received Exhibits From Havana Following Arrests Last Fall. New York Times, January 20, 1932. “Twelve cases containing rifles, machine gun, pistols and ammunition seized from insurgents in the battle of Gibari (Gibara L.D.) in Cuba last October, arrived yesterday at the Federal Building, where George Medalie (the man said responsible for promoting Dewey’s career in politics L.D), United States Attorney, is investigating an alleged attempt by revolutionists to ship arms to Cuba. The arms and munitions had been expressed from Washington, D.C, where they had been received following a request made by Federal authorities that they be sent here from Cuba for tracing. Although Mr. Medalie withheld all details of the shipment, and Thomas J. Todarelli, his assistant, in whose office some of the machine guns were wounted, also refused to discuss the matter, it is known that a Federal grand jury has been investigating alleged gun-smuggling by Cubans in New York. Five Cubans Arrested to Date. The investigation has resulted in the arrest of five Cubans, three of whom, Rosendo Collazo, former Senator (Camaguey and former independence fighter and who captured the leader from the putative pro-German Liberal revolt in 1917 L.D), Aurelia (should be Aurelio) A. Alvárez (accented on incorrect syllable), former President of the Cuban Senate, and Emilio N. Robaino (should be Robaina), Cuban newspaper correspondent, were held in bail ranging from $5,000 to $10,000, (this left Emilio Laurent a left winger in charge of expedition, he would refuse to cede his command to senior rebel Manuel Balan on landing, and undertake rather unadvised military tactics which lead to the defeat of the well supplied guerrilla movement. This resulted in the defeat of the traditional patriots and allowed the 1933 revolution to fall into far more left wing hands. L.D.). Robaino(sic), according to United States Commissioner Cotter, purchased an anti-aircraft gun from the Colt Arms Company (a .50 caliber weapon of apparent Browning design L.D.). The defendants, Mr. Todarelli charged, planned to transport 100 men from New York to Atlantic City, which was to have been a base for the shipment of arms to revolutionists. Prior to their arraignment Federal Agents operating in Atlantic City had arrested a group of Cubans after they had returned from what they described as a fishing trip in a heavy sea that had made most of them ill. Reported Alleged Gun-Runner. Las August, John Topping, member of the crew of the steamship Isle (Ise) Vormauer, escaped from his vessel off Nassau and reported to officials that the ship was a gunrunner which lay off Atlantic City from July 17th to Aug. 11 to make contact with Cuban expeditions. The name E. A. Prieto appeared on the crates shipped to Washington and addressed “Judge Z, Medalie, Federal Building, New York.†Captain Enrique A. Prieto is the Cuban military attaché (for Dictator Gerardo Machado) in Washington. When he (Prieto) was questioned in that city about the shipment he said he had no idea how it had arrived in New York(;>). The Cuban Embassy also denied any knowledge of the shipment. It was pointed out at the Federal Building that the shipment could have been sent from the Department of State, having been first received by the Cuban Embassy.

Found a list of rebel machine guns and rifles (some caution since this is a Cuban government source with quite some propaganda): de la Peña Rubio, Nicolás 2004 Gibara: Combates bajo el sol de agosto. Ediciones Holguín, Holguin, Cuba pp. 133-134. Rebel weaponry included 20 Vickers, one .50 antiaicraft machine gun, a photograph suggests it was a Browning, 25 Lewis guns with drums, 24 .45 caliber Pistols, also probable Brownings, and 1000 rifles, at least half Springfield model 1903 or similar model. Ammunition was in excess of 1,000,000 rounds (confusing entry under 750,000 under “municiones†and 1,000,0000 under tiros) plus 200 machine gun belts. Apparently this weaponry was supposed to be distributed to Conservador Party rebels already in the field, but instead it was hogged by left winger Emilio Laurent who kept almost of it, and thus a good number of veteran conservador rebels were denied these supplies. As a result almost all of the weaponry were eventually captured by Dictator Machado's troops

Additional information on the machine guns of the government planes was provided official sources, will identify sources when permission is given. This information in part is: "The P-6E was a frontline pursuit fighter, it carried a crew of one and both weapons were synchronized, fixed, and forward facing. The Vought O2U was a two-pace observation aircraft w/ one forward facing fixed in place machine gun and two rear facing swivel machine guns." and "These aircraft were not armed with World War I era Lewis machine guns, but rather .30 and .50cal Browning machine guns of the same general construction and design as can be found in US Army Air Forces aircraft of the Second World War.: The P-6S was an export version of the airframe; as such we cannot confirm the specifics of its armament configuration. The P-6E, the most likely Army Air Corps equivalent, carried the following weapons configurations: two .30cal, or one .30cal and one .50cal, Browning machine guns. Under usual circumstances the aircraft was not reloaded in flight. The airframe carried the following ammunition loads: 1,200rds .30cal (600rds/gun); 200rds .50cal. The ammunition was boxed and was loaded under and inboard the guns. The boxes could be removed without special tools. The Vought O2U was procured by the U.S. Navy, rather than U.S. Army Air Corps (later USAF). Secondary source information indicates that it was armed with three .30cal Browning machine guns (one forward mounted, two rear). ... " It still do not understand how these rear facing machine guns did not shoot off the rear assembly of the planes. This gives a different aspect to a reconstruction of events, since I know from other sources that the invading rebels had only one .50 anti-aircraft machine gun, plus the supporting 40 or so Lewis machine guns. There is mention of an undefined number of Vickers which were they used professionally in an anti-aircraft role may well have had a not inconsiderable effect. Take care and be well Larry

Bob: Your remarks turned out to be most useful. I started my reading with: Duffy, Michael 2000-2007 (accessed 2-27-08) Lewis Gun Updated - Saturday, 3 May, 2003 First World War.com http://www.firstworldwar.com/atoz/mgun_lewis.htm Tell me if you think that is an appropriate source. That ambush in the Palm grove outside Holguin must have been something else the Gibara rebels had at least 40 Lewis guns, and some vickers and yet the regular Cuban army drove them back to the railroad tunnel. Right now images of this action are beginning to form in my mind, drawing from my memories of action in Cuba, knowledge of the terrain, and Cuban history. Such combat encounters although small scale had significant effect on the later history of the Island and eventually to such matters of US interest such as the Bay of Pigs and Missile Crisis. It is difficult to get images from Cuban sources, however I did obtain through interlibrary loan: de la Peña Rubio, Nicolás 2004 Gibara: Combates bajo el sol de agosto. Ediciones Holguín, Holguin, Cuba. These are the ones I refer to here. While I am still trying to filter out the propaganda from the information in this book the photographs although blurry offer interesting leads. Take care and be well Larry Daley

Just wanted to say thank you Very interesting and I as usual at this site learned a lot some places put such pieces in a museum and collect for display, brings in tourist dollars .... take care and be well Larry

For my manuscript in progress (Narrations of War in Cuba) I am researching the landing at Gibara (Taino the place of the wild woman) in August 1931. The reason for my search is that historians often consider this action be the one that broke the back of the old Mambi independence fighters as a military forces in Cuba, and in addition one of my relatives, a US veteran of WWI, Henry Whitmarsh, may have been there. For complex reasons it was the usual SNAFU, except in this case there is reason to believe that communist activists who nominally were against the dictator Machado too, appear to have engaged in constant betrayal of rivals to the same Machado government. Anyway one interpretation of what happened is that what should have been a carefully organized landing, was disrupted by prior arrests ...both in the United States and in Cuba, and somehow Machado's secret police had excellent information. This event that lasted at high intensity only three days, involved strafing and bombing bi-planes, but the invaders had what appears to be a Browning .50 antiarcraft machine gun which shot down at least three of these planes. The rebel intruders had at least fifty other machine guns including more than 40 hand held Lewis guns, with pans of ninety rounds. My question is what is known about hand held Lewis guns, apparently they were standard .303, since I have a book with images of the rounds and there are some rimmed ones almost but not quite as long as 30.06 (there is no mention of Krags). The arrests had decimated the experienced conservative leadership, and the remaining leader (how convenient (;>) was left of center Lt. Emilio Laurent, who defied advice and took the railroad track to the city of Holguin, AFTER making a phone call to the head of the garrison there negotiating surrender. Of course the colonel in Holguin agreed, then called headquarters and set up an ambush for the invading rebels. The decisive action was that ambush of the rebels lead by Laurent, who had hogged all the supplies taking them with him while riding a woodburning narrow gage steam engine, pulling three flat cars one of them carrying the .50 anti-aircraft machine gun..... Of course the actions were more complicate than above, but this is just an outline. Sad story ... Would very much appreciate any input on weaponry or any other matter Larry

Trying to contribute something instead of just lurking, in appreciation of the kind help I have received here. Thus when I found the following while writing the topic of Rolando Masferrer a thoroughly nasty killer for my manuscript "Narrations of War in Cuba," it seemed appropriate to mention it: U.P. 1952 Cuban Congressmen Kills Two Gunmen Wisconsin State Journal. Friday. February 22, 1952 Page 8, Section 4 HAVANA, Cuba —(U.P.)—Two gunmen were killed and a patrolman was wounded Thursday when a Cuban congressman armed with a sub-machinegun foiled an attempt to assassinate him. The resulting gun battle in the downtown section during the noon rush hour paralyzed Havana’s commercial life for several hours. The dead were identified as Emilio Grillo, 20, alias Pistolita (little Pistol) and Francisco Madariaga, 24, both member of the Guiteras revolutionary action group. Police said both were killed in an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate Rep. Rolando Masferrer, leader of the rival SWocialst revolutionary movement. Hundreds of pedestrians jamming the avenue fled wildly as bullets sprayed along both sides of a three-block stretch. From the venue and date of the action that it is most probable that this was a Thompson. Rolando Masferrer started out as a communist in Cuba, fought in the Spanish Civil war where he was wounded twice. One of the wound was in the heel. And from hence on he was known as El Cojo the lame one. I have heard said that when he was following a victim he was about to kill, the last thing the victim heard was clump dragggggg clumppp draggggggggg of his footsteps. Any way he broke with the communists and in the process began a life long feud with Fidel Castro (they were both gun men at the time). Castro tried to kill him at least once himself, and finally when Masferrer was blown up in Miami in 1975 it is believed that Castro got him. For details on this see: de la Cova, Antonio Rafael 2007 The Moncada Attack: Birth of the Cuban Revolution. University of South Carolina Press ISBN-10: 1570036721ISBN-13 978-1570036729 Page 287-288 Masferrer has become part of fiction for instance as Inspector Fumero in Ruiz Zafon, Carlos (Lucia Graves translator) 2005 The Shadow of the Wind (La Sombra del Viento). Phoenix (Orion Publishing Group Ltd, Penguin Group) ISBN-10 0753820250 ISBN-13 978-075382025 take care and be well all p.s. I never met him, thank G-d Larry

Please tell me more I would guess the beach might be long beach on the Island of Anglesey near Valley (see Valley "aerodrome") and Rhosneigr, my Dad used to be stationed there in WWII he was in Royal Engineers, and had something to do with the Free French. If anybody knows more please write to me at daleyl@peak.org take care and be well Larry

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! Seasons Greetings all! Larry the lurker

In Flanders Field In Flanders Fields the poppies blow Between the crosses row on row That ark our place, and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the dead, short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow Loved, and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders Fields Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high, If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders Fields Lieutenant Colonel John Mccrae, April 1915. taken from http://www.aomda.org/htm/history.htm

Dan: Very interesting, could you throw in a Krag (Spanish American War) is it possible that when fighting up hill the higher trajectory of the Krag, might reach into firing trenches of the Spanish firing Mausers down hill.... Ah yes and the grease gun take care and be well Larry