New No4 MKII's...consecutive serial numbers

[Frederick303]

Hate to say this as I hold Capt Laidler in the very highest regard but.......
The following records exist:

1) Initial trials procurement of 500 rifles in 1953. The record is a letter referring to an initial lot of No 4 MK II rifles and Karl Gustav M45 submachine guns to be trialed in 1953. No idea if actual trial lot occurred but a sampling of supposed Irish lot rifles indicates a number outside of the generally listed serial number lot came out of Ireland.

2) Letter stating the full procurement of rifles was 50,000 MK II rifles (with the serial number ranges some in the UF 55 A series) and that the type was entered into service in October 1954. This letter was from a colonel of the Irish army, the data from the Irish military archives.

3) Records of use that indicate the active army was equipped with these rifles from October of 1954 until ~1961 (FN-LAR replaced it) and the FCA was equipped with this type from around the fall of 1957 until replacement with the FN-LAR in 1988.

4) Recollections from a well known UK Firm involved in the inspection of these rifles, in Ireland (initial used rifle sales lot). The rifles were located in Ireland at the time of first inspection (late 1989 or early 1990).

5) Sales records from the Irish archives that indicate between 48,900 and 49,889 of these rifles were sold between 1991 and 1997. The differences relate to the quantities of No 2 MK IV riles which were sold off in the first sales lot in 1991 (5,889 rifles, of which some percentage were No 2 Mk IV rifles).

6) Records of FCA soldiers who were involved in the shipment of the rifles out of Ireland which match the time of the last sale.

7) Records from a large sporting rifle firm in Germany (Frankonia) that purchased a number of these rifles from Century Arms. These rifles were shipped out of the UK and not the US or Canada, so at least a portion of the rifles went through the UK or so this one firm indicates. This firm had both PF and UF serial number rifles in the importation lot.

8) Confirmation from Century that they did buy rifles directly from Ireland, and from the distributors that they sold too data on the importation of these rifles in the US (directly) and the secondarily; last lot (1997) was imported into Canada, then sold from there in the US around 2002

Now it may well be that these records are in some way wrong, but that is the official records that myself and other researchers have found. If so I would be very interested in knowning the exact reason these records are in error. I posted the official records of the serial number ranges on this board a year or so ago. Those records came directly from the Irish military archives.