Relic Browning Hi Power, from St Mere Eglise.

[Johnny-D]

...you might be stretching things a bit trying to pin it down to a specific unit.

This is where proper recording of finds is vital. With an exact location, you do stand a real chance of pinning it down.

Cheers again Ade,

This morning, I fired off an email to the seller (he actually recovered it himself) asking for a precise location. I wasn't really trying to connect it to a specific unit, it was more of a curiosity thing. It makes sense knowing that Fallschirmjager were in the area.

[Zeller]

Nice relic! I would also not touch it. Maybe just a clean with a brush and with some product to stop the corrosion without altering the colour. I am afraid the products I use here are not available in your country so it wouldn't help being more specific

[talltom]

thanks ade for correcting me there was also the luftwaffe AA batterys batterys around so it could possibly have come from an officer over there. even without the history it is still a briliant pistol and worth a lot of money my bet would be on cleaning it a little bit but don't black it as it will could ruin the history of the pistol
tom

[Zeller]

One product I use is called Evapo-rust. I think it has the same name in the US. But you have to test it first on other metals and learn how fast it cleans the rust. For a piece like that, if you don't want to destroy the patina, I would say no longer than 15-20 mins.

[Walkwolf]

A great piece.................!

It usage was definitely German. On Inglis-made Browning pistols, the rear sight is
contained within a rather large projection machined onto the top of the slide.

( Don't go crazy cleaning it up or adding anything as preservative. Perhaps just
a light 'scrub' with an old toothbrush. It really looks fine the way it was found )

[Johnny-D]

Cheers chaps.

I've now decided against 'blacking' it. I don't want to ruin it. I've given it a rub down with a soft wire brush, and coated it with a clear lacquer. I know it kind of takes a bit of the history away, but I do want it preserved... 'speculate to accumulate'.

My collection will be passed onto my kids when I kick the bucket, so I want to ensure that I've done everything I could to stablise the fragile items.

AND HERE IT IS


It's only a temporary display. I'm gonna buy a nice piece of velvet to back the board. I'm fairly certain that it's connected to the Fallschirmjager, and the digger is checking through his dig records. I know it can't be linked with 100% certainty, but if the find location matches that of the 2nd Battalion's encounter with the Americans outside St Mere Eglise, then I'd say it's pretty likely to be Fallschirmjager.

[Walkwolf]

The result is nice. Perhaps you can have have a small brass plaque
engraved with pertenent information on it.

[PMKS]

The 9mm Browning Hi Power was not used by the US Army. As Tom mentions, it was issued to British and Canadian Forces. These were made by John Inglis in Canada. I have one in my collection.

The German issues were made by FN.

Cheers, Ade.

I know that the U.S. Army was never issued the Hi-Power, but there are pictures in a Time Life WW2 book series in the local library that show a U.S. OSS officer teaching French Resistance fighters how to shoot a Hi-Power pistol.

However it could have been captured or maybe the OSS acquired Hi-powers for use due to the availability of 9mm vs .45 ACP in Occupied countries. I know the OSS had special versions of the U.S. issued M3 "grease gun" built in 9mm.

just my 2 cents, I'm not an expert.

[Adrian Stevenson]

Looks great. Recording relic item is really important.

PMKS: you are totally correct re the ammo issue.

Cheers, Ade.

[Blackpowder44]

It may be a Polish Radom pistol, John.