Sir, I have seen you upon occasion comment upon the AM marked .22 SMLE MKIII conversions; it seems to be your opinion that the rifles were converted for an “Air Ministry contract”. After examining a number of these rifles, I doubt that story for a few reasons as follows.

1) The action body is not marked as No 2 MK IV rifle. From the Parker-Hale markings that are on all of the rifles I have seen, the rifles were converted in 1936 or later. Having seen one No 2 MK IV with a dated RAF stock disc from 1937 that does have the NO 2 MK IV marking (not one of the AM contract), the lack of No 2 MK IV marking seems troublesome on a rifle intended for the RAF or any Britishicon service.

2) Having seen a RAF marked No2 MK IV from 1937, why are none of the AM-xxxx serial range rifles marked with any sort of information on the stock disc? Not one of the rifles I have seen has any RAF or other unit markings, which seems to be common these rifles.

3) The action ring was ground on every rifle I have seen to remove the previous serial number range and so mount the new AM-xxxx serial number range. You have previously described in depth how the REME regulations always required the old markings to be visible, and that old serial numbers were always lined out.

4) The rifle barrels I have examined on the AM contract are all Parker Hale rifles, that is sleeved old .303 barrels. Every other variant of (Lithgowicon, Isahapore, Enfield) No 2 MK IV barrel I have seen has had a solid barrel. Not sure if that is at all significant, but I have never seen a tubed barrel on a British contract No 2 MK IV rifle.

5) In Ian Skennertonicon’s book on British contracts from 1935 to 1945 he identifies two contracts from Parker Hale, one for 2000 rifles recovered from DP rifles and one for 2,975 rifles taken over from Enfield. Ian Skennerton does mention in his book that these contracts might not be complete listings. I have seen rifles of Parker Hale vintage that match the characteristics of both of those contracts (some DP marked, with those marks lined out and other No 2 MK IV rifles without any DP marks visible). Both of those rifles types meet all of the other No 2 MK IV characteristics, including the action body markings and all retain the old serials numbers 9though I have never really looked for sleeved barrels on these rifles). As such I doubt that the AM-xxxx marked rifles fall within either of these contracts.


Of course I do not have the background or access to information that you have, and as such I was wondering if you could address these issues. Is there a clear contract for these rifles from the “Air Ministry” and if so how did they end up in Ireland? I ask as a student and if you do not have the answers that is no problem, but I am curious if you have some information on these rifles that might not be currently common knowledge.

Thanks in advance

Frederick 303
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