FN Model 1910/22

[Badger]

A friend of mine asked me if I could find out about this piece for him...

Regards,
Doug

Was finally able to take some photos. Please find attached.

Pretty standard weapon…however notice the Belgian Royal Guard insignia on the top. It also has a handful of pure silver bullets and a few brass rounds.

My understanding is that this is a circa WWI era pistol. I can’t get the exact story from my grandfather…but apparently was taken off of a dead German soldier during WWII from someone that knew my grandfather. Has been in our family ever since.

It’s in firing condition. But worn.

Your thoughts on this would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Information

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[browningautorifle]

Love the ammo collection with it. Tell him to use the small ones, the big ones are for your Sten...and he needs the little spring loaded lock for the slide collar at the front.

[Eaglelord17]

A small point, but isn't this a FN-1922, not a FN-1910. I am not to up to date with pistols, but if it is the 1922, it couldn't have been around for WWI.

[martin08]

The German may also have died from natural causes. The particular design of the C/W (Queen Wilhelmina) is a post-war stamp from 1946-1948. Source: FN Browning Pistols, Anthony Vanderlinden, pp.254, 276.

When the Germans evacuated Fabrique Nationale in September 1944, they were not able to clear the factory of German manufactured parts, and pistols with serial A and C suffixes were assemble until mid 1945. In mid 1946, raw materials were once again made available in Belgium, and the new Dutch Contract pistols with small post-war crown began rolling out. Several pistols were also sold to directly American GI's in the late war and early post-war period.

[Badger]

A small point, but isn't this a FN-1922, not a FN-1910. I am not to up to date with pistols, but if it is the 1922, it couldn't have been around for WWI.

How do we tell the differences?

Thanks ..

Regards,
Doug

[martin08]

Below is a pic of my 1930's Dutch Army contract FN1922. Notice the difference in the crown. There is also another crown design from the 1920's, but I don't have one of those yet!

[Eaglelord17]

How do we tell the differences?

Thanks ..

Regards,
Doug

The differences between the 1910 and 1922 are the following. You have that distinctive round cap at the end of the slide to accomidate the new 113mm barrel in the 1922 (as opposed to the 88mm barrel in the 1910). The frame was also lengthened in the 1922 so it could hold larger capacity magazines. And finally they added a lanyard ring to the frame (which has been removed on this example).

Basically the 1922 was intended for military contracts, well the 1910 was more for the civilian market. Some people also refer to the 1922, as the 1910/22 as it is the same basic action, just with some adjustments. Almost like the 1903 Browning has some small civilian variants, as well as larger variants like the Husqvarna 1907 which were intended for militaries.

[Peter Laidler]

Strange little pistols. Quite a puzzle for Armourers and one was passed around the design course. As I seem to remember this little enigma, the ejection is caused by the striker or firing pin stopping at a given point within the slide as the slide recoils rearwards from the fixed(?) barrel. As such, it's the striker that kicks the spent case out of the pistol.

The obvious question from the students was '....... well, what happens if you simply want to eject a chambered but UNFIRED round?'. Good point. In that situation, if you hand cocked the pistol hard enough, the striker COULD fire the unsupported (except for the linear support of the extractor of course.....) round you're attempting to extract. We concluded that while this was possible in THEORY, it was not factual in practice because you could never exert enough momentum on the slide to cause the striker to detonate the round. Before it even got close to that situation, the same striker will kick the live case out to the right.
But NEVER SAY NEVER!

The mathematics and physics plus some range tests using a couple of old ' government buy-in/amnesty' pistols confirmed this. Clever eh! But nice little pistols, especially the .32's

[browningautorifle]

ejection is caused by the striker or firing pin stopping at a given point

You are correct sir...of course...and there were several others with the same design that operated the same. One was the little Beretta 1919 in 25 acp...

[Peter Laidler]

Thanks for that BAR. Nobody in the class ever came up with another example of that method of ejection so we all thought it was a one-off. To be honest, it just feels wrong to me but WO2 XXXXXX told me that they'd bashed the slide back with a rawhide mallet to try to get a primer to crack - but it wouldn't. But like I say, a nice little pistol that we fired on the range afterwards to illustrate the point.