When it comes to the construction of modern China's military industry, most military fans know the historic Hanyang Arsenal and Shanghai Arsenal, as well as the Shenyang Arsenal, which produces the most artillery. The weapons produced by these arsenals have been serialized and of high quality, although there is still a certain distance from imported weapons, but they are already very good in terms of the industrial base of old China. As for the other arsenals in the country at that time, they were relatively weak, either the factories were small in scale, or the quality of weapons was inferior, or the existence was too short. Today, I would like to introduce to you an arsenal that produced light weapons at that time, which was very distinctive in the production of light weapons, and its light weapons were very good in performance and had their own characteristics. This is the Dagu Arsenal, let's introduce it to you in detail.
Czech light machine gun
First of all, a brief introduction to Dagu Arsenal. The Dagu Arsenal, formerly known as the Dagu Shipyard, was built in 1880 by Li Hongzhang, the governor of Zhili and the minister of Beiyang, and was mainly responsible for repairing ships and building Haikou fort facilities. Later, he turned to the production of munitions, and imitated a batch of breech-loading guns, which were said to be of good quality. After the Xinhai Revolution, the Dagu Dockyard was placed under the jurisdiction of the Admiralty of the Beiyang Government and renamed the "Navy Dagu Shipyard", and many small ships were built in 1915~1925. In the 20~30s of the last century, the Dagu Arsenal mainly imitated light weapons, such as light and heavy machine guns, submachine guns, barge guns, rifles, etc., because of the good quality, there was a proverb at that time: "Hanyang is made in the south, and Dagu is made in the north." ”
Next, I will introduce to you the representative weapons and equipment produced by the Dagu Arsenal, which had a high technical level and a large number of production quantities in China at that time, and were very popular. First of all, the famous Czech light machine gun, since its inception, the Czech light machine gun has been welcomed by the armies of various countries with its excellent performance, and China at that time was no exception, and many local forces purchased a large number of equipment troops from abroad. Due to the high purchase price of Czech light machine guns, it is inevitable to introduce technical imitation to reduce the cost of equipment, and the Dagu Arsenal was the first military industry in China to successfully imitate this type of machine gun at that time.
Bergman submachine gun
The specific time is the 16th year of the Republic of China, that is, in 1927, the Dagu Arsenal first imitated the Czech light machine gun. After the successful imitation, large-scale production began to equip the troops, Zhang Zuolin's Northeast Army was equipped with half of the number of Czech-style light machine guns made in Dagu, and Song Zheyuan's 29th Army was also equipped with a considerable number of Dagu-made Czech-style light machine guns, and each infantry company was equipped with as many as 9 pieces.
Next is the imitation of the German MP18/28 Bergman submachine gun, which at that time was not called a submachine gun, but a hand-held machine gun. In China in the 1920s, due to the warlord civil war, there was an arms embargo, so Bergman submachine guns were mostly imported from smuggling channels. Therefore, the only way to increase the amount of equipment is to imitate, and the Dagu Arsenal successfully imitated it in 1928, and at the same time there was an innovation in imitation, changing the loading port to the bottom. The reason for this is that if the magazine insertion port is on the side, the center of gravity of the gun will change all the time due to the change of the center of gravity of the magazine, and if the shooter does not make corrections all the time, it will seriously affect the accuracy. At the same time, in order to increase the continuous firepower, a 40-round magazine was used.
Mauser C96 pistol
In addition, the Dagu Bergman submachine gun is made of 7.63 mm caliber in order to be compatible with the Mauser C96 pistol, which is widely used in China, that is, the bullet of the barge/box gun. At that time, the elite units of the Chinese army, such as the guard company, each equipped with a box gun and a Bergman submachine gun, had particularly strong melee firepower and could be used as an assault force at critical moments. At that time, many local arsenals could imitate the Bergman submachine gun, but in terms of quality, it was the first to recommend the big sale.
The imitation box gun of the Dagu Arsenal is also excellent, as early as 1918, the Mauser C96 pistol was successfully imitated, and there are two major types: pistol type and carbine type. There are several versions of the pistol version: short-barreled, standard-barreled, and long-barreled. A short-barreled model with a barrel length of only 99 mm. After the First World War, defeated Germany did not allow the production of pistols with a barrel length of more than 100 mm, so the barrel of the original Mauser C96 pistol could only be shortened from 140 mm to 99 mm, which was called a police pistol. At that time, these three kinds of box guns were also called "three boxes", "two boxes" and "top boxes". The "three-handle box" is a 99 mm short barrel type, the "two boxes" correspond to a 140 mm standard barrel type, and the "head box" is a 180 mm long barrel type.
Horse box
The carbine type is commonly known as the "horse box". One of the differences is the barrel length, the barrel length of the C96 pistol of the standard model is 140 mm, while the barrel length of the "Horse Box" reaches more than 300 mm. "The carriage was fitted with a front handguard at the junction between the barrel and the magazine to provide a stable fulcrum for end-gun firing, and the butt was also installed for shoulder shots. Unlike the pistol type, which is used as a butt by attaching a wooden holster, the butt of the carbine type is a solid butt, with a detachable design, which is attached to the rear of the gun by a tenon mechanism. In fact, there are many historical stories about the box cannon, so I won't expand on them here.
The three weapons listed above: Czech light machine guns, Bergman submachine guns, and box guns were one of the weapons that were heavily equipped in the Chinese army at that time, and we can often see them in many military-themed film and television dramas reflecting the Republic of China. The successful imitation of these three light weapons by the Dagu Arsenal and the large-scale production of equipment equipment for the troops have been well received, which can be said to have a deep impact on the history of modern military equipment in China!