Quote Originally Posted by Patrick Chadwick View Post
From a WW1 war memorial in Klieken, Anhalt-Zerbst district, Sachsen-Anhalt

Names of the fallen
...
Reservist
HINZE
Franz
03.04.1898
27.09.1918
...
I think you may have found one of the very, very few rifles that can be linked to a specific person. As Franz Hinze is recorded on the memorial, there may well still be town records with further information (unit etc). There are several Zinkes in the Zerbst telephone directory. As Zerbst is in former East Germanyicon, i.e. an area with limited mobility after WW2, the chances are good that they are related.

That would make it very interesting = more valuable for some people!

Patrick
+1 Good find.

In many cases this would be such a shot in the dark that the odds of actually finding information of a specific person would be small, not impossible. As a genealogy researcher (records researcher) I know stranger things have happened.

The water has been chummed. The sharks are circling. I predict a feeding frenzy for this rifle.

What bothers me.... is the fact that he died at age 20. How did the rifle get his name on it, engraved, stamped, crudely marked? He "fell" in combat during wartime. How did this rifle get back to his home, where it was subsequently brought home as booty after WW2 by a GI (of this we could make book with)...

Patrick - your find of this information could be one of those times. It could also be a "hint" at where to start looking to research the rifle's history. It's possible to do if you found a living relation in the same town.

It could also be that there have been 4,382 males named Franz Hinz in this same town since 1582.

I hope somebody scores this rifle and shares photos. It certainly sounds interesting. If you go to this auction you best take a pocket full of cash.

Dutch