FTR/rearsenal question

Hi All, We know thousands of No.4s were FTR'd and rearsenaled following WWII, but what about the No.1s that served during WWII? Were they all sent to India?

Brad

I have a 1917 SSA marked Osterr Gendarmerie which I do believe means it was issued to the Austrian Police after the Allied occupation.

I would imagine many were given to other countries as UNRAA AID post WW2.

When I joined the CCF at school in the early 1960s we still had No1s, mostly of Great War vintage. I think that we got No4s in about the mid 1960s.

Many of the private/public school CCF's had their SMLE's taken off them in 1939/40 for the duration of the war. They were replaced in the late 40's but many CCF's purchased large quantities of SMLE's on the open market. My sons school CCF, Radley College plus Kelly College and Sherborne school bought hundreds and kept and used them for decades.

I think I mentioned it some time ago that when the L59 DP No4 rifle was being formulated, it was planned to do the same with the No1 rifle because some were still sloshing around in the Cadet world.

As a matter of interest, 6 SMLE's were actually converted (but one was destroyed on the machine table) to test the feasibility of the system and were due to be called the DRILL RIFLE L60A1 but in the meantime, because progress was slow, the DP L1A1 SLR overtook it and became the DRILL RIFLE 7.62mm L60A1 so the DP No1 rifle became the DRILL RIFLE L59 A2. Numerically, this makes the DP No1 rifle the very, very last Lee Enfield

There, another useless bit of Lee Enfield knowledge

Large quantities were stored at COD Weedon and other sub-stores in the area until the early Sixties by which time Sam Cummings of Interarms had cleared out most if not all of what the British had.

Don't forget that we kept using the No 1 and didn't change over to or make the No4. We used the No1's untill the SLR was issued.