How Russian orders helped American weapons, in innovation and manufacturing. Part 2. Or: John Browning’s inventions in the service of Czars’ armies

By Al Palladin – speech at the Seattle Olympic Club, January 20, 2021.?From the upcoming book “America’s arch ally: Russia’s forgotten role in the founding, development and defense of the United States”.

The American-made Berdan II rifle, which incorporated 25 improvements thanks to the Czar’s Military Attachés, had served Russian soldiers well, up to a point. In 1877, during the Russo-Turkish War, also known as the Liberation of Bulgaria from the Ottoman Empire, the forces of Czar Alexander II suffered heavy losses, from a smaller opposing army. During the Siege of Plevna the Turks had inflicted many times more casualties than their adversaries, who were armed with single-shot rifles. The Berdan II, which was nicknamed “the Russian musket”, was outgunned by another American-made firearm – the Winchester 1866. This repeating rifle held 15 bullets in its tubular magazine and was, for that time period, amazingly quick to reload, thanks to the lever-action. While the Russian soldier had to stop after every shot, in order to eject a spent cartridge and then load another bullet inside the gun by hand, and only then bring his rifle up to his shoulder to aim again, a Turkish warrior used the American innovation, which gave him much faster target acquisition and shooting speed.

The American inventor John Moses Browning is regarded as the most prolific innovator in the history of firearms. Building on the lever-action foundation, his designs for the Winchester 1886, 1892, and 1894 models were met with great customer demand. The company, seeing the potential of innovative smokeless powder developments, requested that Browning create a new lever-action rifle, specifically for new high-pressure cartridges. His gun became known to the world as the Winchester model 1895. This firearm had a number of safety features that distinguished it from its predecessors. Of particular interest for military use was the fixed 5-round box magazine, which replaced the tube mag seen in pervious models. Browning’s box magazine allowed the use of pointed bullets in the rifle, as the bullet tips would not be resting against the primers of other cartridges.?

The Russian Imperial military showed a keen interest. In 1915, in the midst of their second year of heavy fighting in World War I, the Czar’s armies were in great need of firearms. Emissaries approached most of the major American gun manufacturers. Remington and New England Westinghouse both received contracts to make Mosin-Nagant Rifles, and Winchester struck an agreement to produce 300,000 Model 1895 rifles, modified to fire the standard Russian military 7.62x54R cartridge. Unlike the Mosin-Nagant orders, all of the Winchester rifles were delivered prior to the Russian Revolution. This was by far the largest sale of model 1895 rifles for the company – and they received a special designation, as M1915. Later, in 1916, Winchester also sold, via the J.P. Morgan Company, hundreds of Model 1907 rifles along with 1.5 million rounds of ammunition to the Russian military.

Browning was known for his immense capacity to work on a number of innovative designs at the same time. While fulfilling his 1895 obligation with Winchester, he introduced to the market another advance, which also drew demand from the Czar’s armies. The Colt-Browning M1895 machine-gun was the brain-child of John and Matthew S. Browning. The brothers had previously been working together on?lever-action?rifles for Winchester, such as the?Model 1886. They figured out that an evolution of the lever-action principle could lend itself to automatic fire, and in 1892 they filed a patent, which became the cornerstone of the initial gas-operated machine-gun that was adopted by the U.S. military. The M1895 was used in combat for the first time when the U.S. Marines realized the significant boost in firepower, during the Spanish-American War and the Invasion of Guantanamo Bay. This firearm could shoot at a rate of 450 bullets per minute, and was air-cooled. During that same conflict in Cuba, Theodore Roosevelt’s Rough Riders had received M1895 machine-guns, which were purchased for the volunteer cavalry regiment by their family members. The U.S. military continued to use the weapon during multiple conflicts, mounted on tripods, horse-drawn carriages, boats, aircraft, and even armored cars. At the outset of WWI, the Russian military became interested. The Czar’s armies placed their first order in 1914, and a total of 14,850 M1895 Colt-Browning machine-guns were purchased.

Another functional concept that John Moses Browning transferred from one category of firearm design to another, was the box magazine. At a time when revolvers were the weapons of choice for small caliber sidearms, the Browning 1903 self-loading pistol was introduced. With more rounds than a typical revolver, a slimmer profile, and the convenience of semi-automatic fire, the FN Model 1903 (produced under Browning’s license by the Belgian Fabrique Nationale) grew in popularity. More than 11,000 were sold to Russia officially prior to WWI, primarily for police use. In addition, the Czar’s officers privately purchased many other Browning 1903s. Curiously, while the pistol handles well even with one-handed shooting, quite a few of the guns that were delivered to Russian preferences came with a wooden holster – which was also a shoulder stock, to benefit effective firing range and accuracy.

The shots that triggered World War I were fired from the Browning 1910. Gavrilo Princip and two co-conspirators were looking for a reliable weapon, and one easy to conceal. On June 28, 1914, by happenstance, the convertible automobile with the heir to the Austrian throne wound up just a few feet away from Princip – it took a wrong turn and was backing up slowly. The terrorist fired a number of ?.380 ACP caliber rounds from his pistol, hitting Archduke Franz Ferdinand in the neck, and his wife – in the stomach. Both passed away before reaching a hospital. With what would be known as the “Great War” now afoot, Russia needed more weapons.

Between 1905 and 1910 John Moses Browning was working on a pistol for a much larger caliber bullet – the .45 ACP (Automatic Colt Pistol). During the Philippine-American War of 1899-1902 the U.S. military became disenchanted with the stopping power of the previously favored .38 Long Colt based revolvers. The Army and the Cavalry commissioned special tests in 1904, and two years later adopted a new cartridge, created by Colt… and Browning. John Moses designed the bullet and the gun – the later formally adopted by the U.S. Army on March 29, 1911 as the “Automatic Pistol, Caliber .45, Model 1911”.

It gained world-wide fame as the Colt 1911. Combat in Mexico and the Philippines demonstrated the highest reliability and easy maintenance of this Browning innovation, with the .45 ACP cartridge demonstrating outstanding on-target performance. The Russian military became the second-largest purchaser of the Colt 1911 during WWI, with 51,000 of these pistols delivered between February 1916 and January 1917. Marked with the Cyrillic ?АНГЛ. ЗАКАЗЪ? on the left side of the frame, these guns were used by Russian officers on all fronts of WWI – and are a rarity, prized by collectors. More than one hundred years later, Browning’s 1911 is still used by military and police units, and civilians in many nations.