Printable View
Hi. I'm the new owner of L42A1 serial number AT5746. The rifle was one of the Navy Arms lot and was one of several hand selected for Navy Arms staff members. It is with chest, tin, strap and some paperwork. One tag, dated 25/07/90 indicates it was in the hands of the 6th (QSO) Gurkha Rifles. An air shipping sticker on the chest indicates it was also in the possession of 5 Royal Irish BFPO 803. If anyone can shed any light on the history of the rifle,nets I'd appreciate it.
Thanks
David
Hi, Snipershot. If you have the NSN the Royal Armouries will be able to tell you something useful. Unfortunately it is hit and miss to whether the NSN is ever scrawled on the chest and it is this that can provide some info on who it served with and where it may have been in the world.
It would appear that the first unit is 6th QEO Gurkhas.
David,
If it helps I was on a course with a lad from the 6th Queen Elizabeth's Own Gurkha Rifles and he was a cracking shot too. They disappeared as a Regiment in 1994 and were I believe amalgamated with another Gurkha unit.
One thing I can tell you is, if you contact ANY QM's Department within the Gurkha Rifles they will bend over backwards to assist you in your search, and unlike other UK units their record keeping is outstanding, as I found out for an elderly neighbour of mine who worked with them in Malaya during the troubles int he early 50's.
They located his service of attachment to them and duly presented him with his own ceremonial Kukri. So I have to speak as I find, very professional, but sadly that comes of having not a lot to do anymore now Hongkongs gone for them and they each do their respective jobs to 110% to keep busy but also to ensure they stay employed here.;)
Snipershot, Gills suggestion must be worth a shot but don't get your hopes up. Don't want to take a great **** on your fire but I have been where you are now and I've sent countless emails and made many, many phone calls and I am no closer to gleaning anything further from what I knew about the rifle when I started. I am very fortunate to have a rifle that was in my old battalion during my service and I contacted our sniper platoon sergeant from back in the day and he couldn't shed any light from what records he still had. My biggest tool was the NSN which confirmed it was in the hands of 3RGJ and returned to Donnington in 1988, this is when we received our L96's.
Good Day Chosenman,
Can you please clarify what you mean by "NSN"? When I hear NSN, I think of a NATO Stock Number or National Stock Number which is a 13-digit numeric code that identifies all the 'standardized material items of supply' within the NATO or US DoD Logistics system.
If there is a number (NSN?) on my transit chest that would help ID the last unit it belonged to, I'd like to find it.
Thank You,
Michael
The NATO stock number or NSN will be on the black label on the inside of the lid of your box as shown in photo one
Snipershot maybe if you post some pictures of the chest, it would allow others who might be able to give you more information? I understand that BFPO can be found online, this might give you another lead on its journey….
Good Day,
Thank you for the info. I'll have to look on the transit case to identify if there is another sticker that identifies a unit as opposed to the NSN which ID's the item as a L42A1.
Regards,
Michael
Snipershot maybe if you post some pictures of the chest, it would allow others who might be able to give you more information? I understand that BFPO can be found online, this might give you another lead on its journey….
FlightRN, if you have a UIN that's perfect, that is actually what I was referring to (bottle of red involved) as the NSN is the same for every L42 that exists. Unfortunately its down to luck as to whether the UIN was hand written on or in a chest. Try the Royal Armouries as they have an extensive list of UIN's and may be able to shed some light.
Michael,
Look carefully around the chest as there will probably be a poorly over painted Unit Call sign Indicator somewhere especially on the ends, may even be a rubber stamp on the inside of the pamphlets shown in your image. There should be something to assist you, if its gobbledegook to you ask on here one of us will be able to help I'm sure.......good luck[COLOR="black"]
---------- Post added at 09:55 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:46 AM ----------
Michael,
1 Bn Royal Irish are now part of 16 Air Assault Brigade at Colchester, if my Regimental history is correct the Gurkhas on amalgamation, would have sent the rifles back to Donnington and from there, they would be reissued to Royal Irish, and it fits in with the date you have roughly anyway.
I can also confirm British Forces Post Office 803 was Armagh, Northern Ireland.........................sends shivers down my spine just remembering that.
So just from the basic info you have found around the rifle, the Gurkhas were issued it in 1990, amalgamated in 1994 and the Royal Irish were then the new owners thereafter.
6th (County Armagh) Battalion, Royal Irish Regiment (formerly the 2nd/11th Battalion of the Ulster Defence Regiment) were housed in Armagh Camp for the duration during the troubles after amalgamation, so it does fit with what you have already
Michael, Colchester was 19 Infantry Brigade back in the late eighties - early nineties, I was 3 Royal Green Jackets in that brigade and all our L42's went back to Donnington in 88 in exchange for the L96. I think all outfits had the L96 by 1992 and in fact I think 92is the official year the L42 was decommissioned.
Thats probably right actually, but at least its a head start. It could be the Royal Irish were users before the Gurkhas of course, which appears more likely now
Thanks everyone. Great intel.
There were still a few L42's floating around in the system until much later. I picked up 4 from the TA down in the South plus one that came back from the Falklands that'd been there for ages. I asked the sniper div if they wanted one (or two) on long loan from the SASC HQ (which meant as 'service' weapons, they could use them!) for historic purposes but they weren't really interested. Then in 2001 or so the last two trickled back to Donnington from ? and we took them just for a bit of history. The VERY last one is now at Warminster with a couple of others and the second to last we gave to the NZ Army at Waiouru and gave one to Singleton too.
The CES's were all (?) stripped of certrain parts that were to be transferred over to the L96 CES such as the cleaning stick, cleaning tin and the slings. The disposal instructions issued from Abbey Wood via EM Andover was that the IWS/IIW bracket and stuff associated with the IWS (I suppose they are referring to the IIW user handbooks and docs as there was nothing else in tyhe rifle chest) should be separated and side loaded to be retained with the IIW/night vision. THat's why there was never one in the L42 chest after disposal. Like I always say. If there WAS, it was added later!
Incidentally, when we talk about the UIN, it's the Unit Identity or identification Number or code. It's a letter A plus 3 or 4 numbers together with another A or occasionally a letter B. So the strange number you need to find would be A-1234-A. The rub is that the identification of the unit that these relate to is restricted info!
Added a bit........... We did originally display the last L42 as 'the last true Lee Enfield' in the UK MIlitary but some Cadet forces were still using the old DP L59's............ thousands of 'em! So when we looked into changing the wording to 'the last service use of the Lee Enfield' thatwas wrong because there were still loads of little No8's still in service. We then decided to call it 'the last full-bore Lee Enfield in service' That was OK for a year - until we found that the Technical Quartermaster still had on charge and on the WOCS books what was REALLY the last full-bore Lee Enfield in UK Miltary service. It'd been on the books since 1955. A No1 Mk3. And that is the last full bore Lee Enfield in UK Military service. STILL on the WOCS/SSR books.
So the next time you read some olf flannell about XY or Z having just acquired this that or the other......... Buy the rifle and not HIS story!