Most Marlin owners know of their long legacy of lever action rifles, .22 rimfire guns, and others. However, what most donÂ’t know is that the company was one of the largest manufacturers of machine guns in World War One.
In 1915, during World War I, a New York syndicate bought the company from the sons of John Marlin, the company’s founder, and renamed it the Marlin Rockwell Corporation (MRC). In that same year, MRC obtained license to the 1895 Colt Light Machine Gun. Colt had been manufacturing their ‘potato-digger’ machine gun for twenty years and the weapon had been made in a half dozen calibers not only for the US Army and Navy but also for Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, and Imperial Russia. With World War I becoming a boom for Colt and other firearms manufacturers producing weapons for Western European clients, the company was anxious to rid itself of the old Model 1895. Colt sold all of the rights, tooling, plans, and patents to MRC and washed their hands of the old potato digger.
The rest in my column at Marlin
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About laststandonzombieisland
Let me introduce myself. I am a bit of a conflict junkie. I am fascinated by war and warfare, assassination, personal protection and weaponry ranging from spud guns and flame throwers to thermonuclear bombs and soviet-trained Ebola monkeys. In short, if it’s violent or a tool to create violence it is kind of my thing.
I have written a few hundred articles on the dry encyclopedia side for such websites as History Times, Firearms Talk.com, GUNS.com, Suite 101 (where I am the contracted Feature Writer for Military History) and Combat Forums; as well as for print publications like England Expects, and Strike First Strike Fast. Several magazines such as Sea Classics, Military Historian and Collector, Mississippi Sportsman and Warship International have carried my pieces. Additionally I am on staff as a naval consultant and writer for Eye Spy Intelligence Magazine.
Currently I am working on several book projects, including a section in the upcoming Mississippi Encyclopedia (to be published by Ole Miss this summer), an alternative history novel about the US-German War of 1916, and a biography of Bennett Doty. My first novel, about the coming zombie apocalypse was released this Spring by Necro Publications and can be found at Amazon.com.
In my day job I am a contractor for the US federal government in what could best be described as the ‘Force Protection’ field. In this I am a certified Firearms, and less-than-lethal combat instructor.
