More "Serbian" Mauser info, and some questions?

[rum_runner]

Had a chance to research my earlier M24 find this week.
From what I can find out....there was NO Serbia after WW1. Just a combination of states called Yugoslavia.
This rifle was produced at the Artillery Technical Institute in 1930, according to the Cyrillic markings and serial#. I have documented the marking and provided pics.

There is what appears to be a "b" on every visible metal part of the rifle. Bolt handle,safety, bolt sleeve, all bands, rear sight base, rear/front sight, sling swivels, bolt release,recol lug, floor plate, front of mag well, butt plate, bayonet lug, and extractor. Haven't disassembled the rifle, and probably won't. Pics below.

There are a few more markings as well. a faint one on the bolt knob. a "K" on the front band, and a "A'" or "J" with what appears to be a crown over ot on the bottom and right sides of the stock. The stock is almost "as new" The bore is bright with strong rifling.
All numbers match. There are NO import marks anywhere.

My questions. Every search I have done for an M24 for sale have come up nil, how did this one miss being upgraded to a 24/47? There are plenty of those around.

How and when would it have gotten to the US without an importers markings? I can find no history of who might have imported it.

No 3, what does the wood type appear to be?

Thanks!

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Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Eaglelord17]

Unfortunately I can't see the photos (links don't work) but I can give a brief history on Yugoslavia and the M24s.

So basically trying to keep it brief, the Ottomans and the Austro-Hungarians had a large hold on the Balkans. In the mid to late 1800's the hold the Ottoman Empire held on the region was starting to weaken which was resulting in these new countries popping up. One of these countries was Serbia which had gained there nationhood though the Serbian Revolution (which started in roughly 1804 and went on until 1835). Over the years Serbia went about expanding (as did many of the other new fledgling Balkan States) until around WWI (look up the Balkan Wars for some exciting reading on constant betrayals, side switching, and war).

Serbia was a major player in WWI in the sense that they were one of the major causes of the war. Austria-Hungary wanted revenge for the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand which done by a Serbian Nationalist group (the Black Hand) which wanted to separated some of Austria-Hungary's southern holdings to become part of Serbia. Austria-Hungary gave Serbia some demands which all but one were accepted, however that one was what Austria-Hungary declared war over.

Up until 1915 Serbia was actually hammering the Austrian-Hungarians (it was pretty embarrassing for a Great Power) however eventually they couldn't hold out any longer. Many Serbians retreated in to Greece and in 1918 helped liberate there lands from Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria. This war cost them 16% of the overall population of there nation (and Serbia accounted for 8% of the total Entente deaths in the First World War).

After WWI Serbia ended up forming a new nation with many of the smaller states in the area, this new nation was called Yugoslavia (basically in the aftermath of the war they took advantage of the crumbling Austrian-Hungarian Empire, and some weakened smaller states and forced them into a union). This forceful union laid the initial seeds for the Balkan Wars in the 90s.

So where does the M24 come in? Well in the aftermath of WWI the Yugoslavians were armed with a variety of weapons, M95s, a variety of Mausers, likely some Carcanos etc. So come the 1920s when things have stabilized a bit they wanted to re-arm and standardize there weapons. They went to Fabrique National in Belgium (FN) and ordered some M24 Mausers. Historically the firearm of choice for the Serbians was Mauser firearms and most nations were buying Mausers at that time so it made sense (if you look up pre-WWI Serbian Mausers you would be shocked at the variety of models and calibers they had).

So they bought some M24s from FN and also bought the tooling to make M24s in Yugoslavia from FN as well (they also did things like the M95M which was a conversion of M95s into a similar pattern to M24s in the same 8mm caliber). In 1941 WWII started for Yugoslavia. They were invaded by Germany, Hungary, Italy and Bulgaria. This resulted the creation of Croatia, and much of Yugoslavia being divided up into puppet states. At this time there was also tons of partisans fighting the invasion and each over depending on what political allegiance they followed (Communists fighting the Monarchists who were fighting the Fascists etc.). At the end of WWII the Communists had won and it was reunited under Tito.

Now you are asking why there are very few M24s and many M24/47s the answer is the M24/47 is a post-WWII rebuild of the M24s with the new communist crest on top of the rifle (the Communists ended up in control after WWII). The M24 was used for years in WWII and many were in poor condition on top of the fact that since there was a government change they wanted to remove the Monarchy's crest and replace it with there own.

So M24s that are in the original configuration are few and far in between as most were converted to M24/47s. Those that weren't were war trophies, captured by other nations, or just somehow kept out of the Yugoslavian governments hands. In regards to why there is no import marking it is because it would have been imported before import markings were required by US law (so I believe it is 1968 or earlier).

Hope this helps.

[rum_runner]

In the Serb Mauser thread.

Posted the pics from Photobucket as I always do. Preview as always , then posted as I always do. Left the forums,and the net. Came back and the pics were there. Came back to a reply...and no pics. Never had this happen before.

[Badger]

What happened to my pics?

I'm not sure...

I've never seen that before, but it could be the result of a recent major server upgrade we're in the process of doing, or something about the redirected IMAGE tag links from another site that the import code didn't like.

If you post them again, I'll watch the thread and monitor what's happening to see if we can see a pattern.

Also, if you could email your pics to badger@milsurps.com, I'll have them ready here just in case they need to be replaced again, should the same disappearing issue happen the second time.

Thanks ..

Regards,
Doug

[rum_runner]

I'm not sure...

I've never seen that before, but it could be the result of a recent major server upgrade we're in the process of doing, or something about the redirected IMAGE tag links from another site that the import code didn't like.

If you post them again, I'll watch the thread and monitor what's happening to see if we can see a pattern.

Also, if you could email your pics to badger@milsurps.com, I'll have them ready here just in case they need to be replaced again, should the same disappearing issue happen the second time.

Thanks ..

Regards,
Doug

Thank You. I'm not at my PC at the moment. I appreciate your reply!

[rum_runner]

[Badger]

Yup ..

Those pics in your last post imported just fine and display correctly!!!

Regards,
Doug