The New York Police Department is reportedly moving away from its long-held and much-loathed 12-pound trigger pull on handguns.
Recent field tests by the agency found that officers fire more accurately with a trigger pull of about 5 pounds. For over a century, police in the Big Apple have used the heavier 12-pound weight, even specially ordering its standard-issue Glocks with the so-called “NY-2” or “New York Plus” trigger, which uses a heavier spring that roughly doubles the pull from the factory-normal 5.5 pounds, giving it the feel of a double-action-only revolver.
While some have advocated for the heavier springs for defensive gun use, especially in the interest of cutting down on negligent discharges, they have also long been criticized as contributing towards poor marksmanship.
Does it get any more Vietnam that this image of Marines trying to suppress an enemy sniper, 30 August 1968?
“Firepower: Lance Corporal Harry J. Howell (left) 20, (McKenzie, Alabama) and Private First Class Pete G. Heckwine (right), 20 (Carpentersville, Illinois) fire on an enemy sniper during a sweep and clear operation 13 miles south of Da Nang. The L Company, 3d Battalion, 7th Marines [L/3/7] helped account for 55 NVA soldiers killed and numerous weapons captured during the four-day operation. The Marines also destroyed a fortified NVA complex of reinforced bunkers and trenches (official USMC photo by Staff Sergeant Bob Bowen).”
From the Jonathan F. Abel Collection (COLL/3611) at the Archives Branch, Marine Corps History Division
Taurus announced the new micro-compact semi-auto pistol, the GX4, in May, billed as an 11+1 shot 9mm that was roughly the size of a traditional .380 pocket gun that had half the capacity. The specs of the polymer-framed striker-fired handgun– 5.8-inches long with the small backstrap installed, about an inch wide, and 4.4-inches high with the flush-fit magazine inserted– put it in the same boat as the Ruger MAX-9, Sig Sauer P365, Smith & Wesson Shield Plus, and Springfield Armory Hellcat line.
I’ve been kicking around the new Taurus GX4 over the past couple of months, having run some 500 rounds through it, and have some things to say about it.
The 11+1 shot Taurus GX4 is definitely compact. Micro compact, you could say.
Battle of Long Island by Domenick D’Andrea, via the U.S. Army National Guard’s Heritage Collection
At the Battle of Long Island, the actions of the Delaware Regiment kept the American defeat from becoming a disaster. Fighting alongside the 1st Maryland Regiment, the soldiers from Delaware may well have prevented the capture of the majority of Washington’s army – an event that might have ended the colonial rebellion. Organized in January 1776 by Colonel John Haslet, the Delaware Regiment was noted as the best uniformed and equipped regiment of the Continental Army. Delaware’s blue jackets with red facings and white waistcoats and breeches would later become the uniform for all the Continental troops.
During the Battle of Long Island, the Delaware and Maryland troops were positioned on the right of Washington’s line. They defended the most direct route from the British landing site in south Brooklyn to the American fortifications in Brooklyn Heights. Though the troops faced the fiercest fighting of the day, they held their ground long enough to allow the remainder of Washington’s army to safely retreat to the fortifications. However, the Delaware regiment was outflanked and forced to retreat, taking 23 prisoners with them, through marshland and across the Gowanus creek. Two nights later, Washington entrusted his Delaware and Maryland soldiers to be the rear guard as he secretly withdrew his army from Brooklyn to Manhattan.
Today, the 175th Infantry Regiment, Maryland Army National Guard, preserves the legacy of the 1st Maryland Regiment. The 198th Signal Battalion, Delaware Army National Guard, perpetuates the proud lineage of the Delaware Regiment.
As part of Exercise Noble Union/Large Scale Global Exercise (LSGE), units of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, U.S. Navy’s America Expeditionary Strike Group (with the 31st MEU aboard), and the Royal Navy’s CSG21 task group have been operating together this week.
Notably, this put the 65,000-ton British carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth (R08), the 45,000-ton Lightning carrier/gator USS America (LHA-6), and the 19,000-ton Hyūga-class “helicopter destroyer” JS Ise (DDH-182) side-by-side.
Both HMSQE and America have F-35s on deck, while Ise is sticking with rotary-wing assets, although it is theorized that she and her sister Hyuga could someday operate the little 5th Gen fighter. (Royal Navy photo)
(U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Aron Montano, 210824-N-BG089-0596)
Of interest, RN FAA Merlin helicopters of 820 Naval Air Squadron cross-decked from HMSQE to America during the exercise, as did Marine F-35s of VMFA-211, a historic moment for each type and class.
The first mine disposal class of 24 officers and enlisted Sailors graduated on 22 August 1941, marking the start of the Navy EOD community, the wearers of the “crab.” Today, more than 2,000 Navy EOD technicians serve in the U.S. Navy, carrying forward the legacy of 80 years of distinguished service.
Check out this primer about RADM Draper Laurence Kauffman, the WWII father of Navy EOD and America’s first frogman, as well as hearing from EOD vets from Vietnam and the Gulf War.
In semi-related news, the U.S. Navy announced this week that it has finished the ship-based Initial Operational Test and Evaluation (IOT&E) for the Unmanned Influence Sweep System (UISS) program onboard the littoral combat ship USS Manchester (LCS 14) off of the California coast.
In one of the battleship groups that I am a member of on social media, the subject of the “end of the battleship era” came about with the suggestion that, after the Battle of the North Cape in December of 1943, the importance of post-Washington Treaty battleships had diminished so significantly that any WWI vintage battleship would have sufficed for the remainder of the war as battleships became shore bombardment (which the Iowas were still around for as late as Desert Storm) and anti-aircraft platforms rather than meant to kill other battleships in surface warfare.
As far as my take, I’d argue that the end of the “battleship v. battleship era,” in which opposing vessels of the type could have possibly met in combat, was the mid-to-late 1950s.
Between the three Sovetsky Soyuz-class (Project 23) battleships still somewhat under construction until the late 1940s (canceled 47-49), as well as the elderly Great War-era Gangut-class dreadnoughts (Petropavlovsk/Volkov, stricken 1953; Gangut/Oktyabrskaya Revolutsiya, stricken 1956; and Sevastopol stricken 1957), and the old Italian Cavour-class battleship Giulio Cesare which was taken over after WWII as Novorossiysk until she blew up in 1955, the Soviets had several kinda operational battlewagons as well as some intermittently on the drawing board.
The Soviet battleship Sevastopol underway, circa 1947-48. Note her much-changed profile from the Great War era she came from
Meanwhile, arrayed against the Red Banner Fleet were a number of active NATO-controlled battleships including the Turkish battlecruiser Yavuz (old SMS Goeben, retired 1950, scrapped 1973), two French Richelieu-class battleships (Richelieu and Jean Bart moved to reserve in 1957), the Royal Navy’s HMS Vanguard (retired in 1960), USS Mississippi (still in commission as a test ship until 1956 and retaining her No. 4 turret with working 14-inch guns as late as 1952), and the four Iowas (mothballed between 1955 and 1958, although they would make a rapid comeback). Plus, the reformed Italian Marina Militare (which was a NATO fleet from the organization’s first days) still had the ancient Andrea Doria and Caio Dulio on the rolls as late as 1956. Going even further, the U.S. Navy had 11 very recently modernized dreadnoughts (nine with 16-inch guns) of the Tennessee, Colorado, SoDak, and North Carolina classes in mothballs but still on the Naval List as mobilization assets until 1959.
Jean Bart in true color, anchored at Toulon during the late 1950s after her brief participation in the Suez Crisis and the termination of her short service life
In short, had there been some sort of East vs. West dustup in the early days of the Cold War, especially in the Black Sea/Eastern Med, it could have resulted in a scenario where battleship-on-battleship violence could have occurred as late as 1956 or so.
Or at least that is my take on the debate, anyway.
Florida-based Diamondback Firearms this week announced they have a new handgun inbound, a 9-shot, single and double action rimfire revolver with a swing-out, interchangeable cylinder.
Dubbed the Sidekick, in no doubt because, while it has “cowboy gun” aesthetics, the revolver uses a swing-out cylinder, comes chambered in .22 rimfire, and includes both .22LR and .22WMR cylinders. The Sidekick will initially be offered with a 4.5-inch barrel having 1:19RH twist, 6 groove rifling. The Cerakoted alloy-framed revolver weighs in 32.5-ounces and has an overall length of 9.875-inches.
Did I mention it’s a 9-shot DA/SA that will probably run about $299 at your local gunshop?
Here we see the Improved A-class/River-class destroyer, HMCS Saguenay (H01/D79/I79) entering Willemstad Harbor, Netherlands Antilles, during her 1934 cruise. The Royal Canadian Navy’s first “new” warship, she would lose large portions of herself on two different occasions during WWII but prove to be one very tough tin can.
In 1927, the Admiralty ordered nine new A-class (Active, Acasta, Arrow, Ardent, et. al) destroyers from a series of five firms around the UK– spread out those contracts– all laid down within a few months of each other. Powered by two Parsons geared steam turbines, each with their own shaft, using steam provided by three Admiralty water-tube boilers equipped with superheaters, these 1,350-ton (standard) 323-foot greyhounds were extremely fast, able to hit 35 knots. Armed with four QF 4.7″/45cal Mk IX singles and a pair of quadruple 21-inch torpedo tubes, they could hold their own. Able to (kind of) sweep mines, they initially carried little ASW gear as, after all, when they were designed, the Versailles Treaty had barred Germany from making or owning U-boats.
By 1928, Ottawa moved to order a pair of modified A-class destroyers of their own. Dropping the superheaters, they had a slightly longer range while keeping the same speed on an improved hull that was both three feet shorter and better suited to withstand ice– a very Canadian problem. They also had a redesigned superstructure to keep the ships drier, among other minor changes from both the builder (slab-sided funnels) and the Canadians. These two new vessels, Saguenay, and Skeena were named after Canadian river systems and were never “HMS” but rather “HMCS” vessels. As the other A-class ships had “H” pennant numbers originally, Saguenay and Skeena became H01 and H02 on the RCN’s list.
Tadoussac Landing and mouth of the Saguenay River 1901 via LOC ppmsca-18100-18111
Built at Thornycroft in Hampshire, Saguenay launched on 11 July 1930 and was commissioned on 21 May 1931, with sister Skeena, crafted at the same yard, taken into service three weeks later.
They were the first warships built entirely to Canadian specifications and made a big splash when they arrived “home” for the first time on 3 July.
A Happy Peace
Canada’s Navy Arriving! Destroyer Saguenay leading Skeena and Champlain. 3 July 1931. By J. Hayward. H.F. Pullen Nova Scotia Archives 1984-573 Box 1 F/3
Great profile photo of HMCS Saguenay near Montreal, P.Q., 1932. LAC 3399174
HMCS Saguenay, Montreal, P.Q., 1932. LAC 3399173
HMCS Saguenay at Montreal, P.Q., 1934. Note her early H01 pennant number. LAC 3399179
HMCS SAGUENAY (K156) visiting Chicoutimi, present-day Saguenay, in Quebec
In the winter of 1934, HMCS Skeena, HMCS Saguenay, HMCS Champlain, and HMCS Vancouver took part in Winter exercises off South America.
Two years later, the RCN escorted the pilgrimage to and provided the Royal Guard for King Edward VII at the Vimy memorial unveiling, the first such honor for the service. As it would turn out, that detail was provided entirely by Saguenay’s tars. It should be noted that this detail was the first armed Canadian military contingent in France for the first time since the end of the Great War.
The Naval Historical Section would later emphasize the significance of the decision:
” …here was something more than a ship; here was a symbol – a symbol of Canada’s faith that her future was inexorably bound to her sea-borne trade – of a maturing nation’s acceptance of responsibilities commensurate with her development as a world power – of a people’s belief that peace and prosperity were rooted firmly in pre-paredness and the ability to defend, if necessary, her ocean seaways.
The dedication of the Vimy Memorial. HMCS Saguenay provided the Royal Guard, seen to the far right – 1936. Courtesy of Bob Senior. Via For Posterity Sake.
“The Royal Guard represented roughly one-third of the Saguenay’s entire complement and consisted of three officers, three petty officers, and 60 ratings (sailors). The Officer of the Guard was Lieutenant (later Rear-Admiral, OBE) Hugh Francis Pullen, RCN, while Lieutenant Morson Alexander Medland, RCN, served as the Colour Officer (the guard carried a white naval ensign ashore with it) and Gunner (T) Patrick David Budge, RCN, served as the Second Officer of the Guard. The three petty officers were Robert Brownings (who formed the right guide), Charles J. Kelly, and Frederick W. Saunders (who, by 1953, was a chief petty officer honoured with the George Medal and the Distinguished Service Medal). The remainder of the guard incorporated five leading seamen, two leading stokers, 30 able seamen, 11 stokers, 10 ordinary seamen, one signaler, and one telegraphist, all of whom were RCN regulars.”
Ship’s company, HMCS Saguenay in the King’s Guard of Honour, at Vimy Memorial unveiling, July 1936. LT Hugh Francis Pullen, future RADM, in command (source: Canadian Geographic Journal)
WAR!
When Canada entered WWII, Saguenay and Skeena were part of the soon-to-be famed “Barber Pole squadron,” Escort Group (EG) C-3, operating out of St. John’s, Newfoundland, so named due to the red and white band carried on the aft funnel. Both ships had their ASW armament increased considerably.
She began the war as D79, later changed in 1940 to I79
She was part of the very first Halifax convoy, HX001, sailing 17 September 1939, just over a fortnight after the war started.
Taking a break from her convoy work, Saguenay, working with the cruisers HMS Orion and Caradoc, intercepted the German tanker Emmy Friederichin the Yucatan Straight on 23 October. Formerly the Clyde-built tanker Borderer, Friederich was sailing from Tampico loaded with cargo to keep the pocket battleship Graf Spee in the surface raiding biz but scuttled herself at the sight of the Allied warships. As remembered by every naval history nerd, it was Graf Spee’s lack of fuel that forced her endgame in the South Atlantic seven weeks later.
HMCS Saguenay I79 with a disruption paint scheme. From the collection of CPO Lloyd Wallace. Courtesy of Peter Hanlon. Via For Posterity Sake.
HMCS Saguenay (I79), between 1940 and 1942 note her “barber-pole” ring on her stack and the new I79 pennant on her side
Returning to Halifax to resume local escort duty, over the next 25 months, Saguenay would ride shotgun on a whopping 84 Atlantic convoys, mostly to and from Halifax and Liverpool but also Sydney, Nova Scotia (SC) convoys, as well as Halifax-to-St. John coastwise runs (HJ).
You can’t walk on glass that long and not get cut.
Sailing from Axis-occupied Bordeaux, the Italian submarine Argowas part of the Italian BETASOM group, the submarine was a member of spaghetti wolfpack “Giuliani,” along with the Giuliani, Tarantini, and Torelli, assigned interdiction duty off the coast of Ireland.
On 1 December 1940, while some 300 miles from the Irish coast during escort of HX47, Argo sighted our little destroyer and hit her with a torpedo, removing 20-25 feet of her bow structure and killing 21 of her crew. Remarkably, good damage control allowed the ship to withdraw from her escort duties and proceed to Barrow in Furness under her own power with HMS Highlander in escort. She would spend the next five months in extensive repair and reconstruction.
HMCS Saguenay, likely at Barrow-in-Furness, after catching an Italian torpedo and losing all her bow forward of her guns. Via the Alberta Maritime Museum
At 04.49 on December 1st, Captain Crepas sighted a silhouette very low on the horizon. Concerned that it could be another Italian submarine, Captain Crepas sent a message with the on-board light. Once the ARGO was close enough, the unit was recognized as a two-stack destroyer and the attack commenced immediately. A single torpedo (the Italians tended to use only one weapon and this was often not sufficient in sinking the enemy vessel) was launched and it hit the target squarely. A second torpedo was also launched later on, giving the impression that the target was destroyed. Once back to the surface, the crew of the ARGO picked up numerous debris indicating the vessel in question as H.M.C.S. Sagueney (D79). Only 10 days later, the German submarine command (B.d.U.) received information that H.M.C.S. Saguenay, despite having been seriously damaged, had been towed back to England. After the war, the Royal Navy added that the destroyer was part of the escort for convoy HG.47 and that it had reached Barrow in Furness on December 5th (five days after the attack), confirming this information.
Four days after hitting Saguenay, Argo sank the British freighter Silverpine (5,066 tons) while on the same patrol, her only “kill” of the war. She was scuttled in September 1943 after Italy left the war and the Germans arrived at Monfalcone.
Remembering the loss of Saguenay’s brush with Argo. Via the CFB Equimalt Museum VR1991.83.4
Back to work
Returning to Atlantic convoy work, in August 1941 Saguenay was part of the escort for the battleship HMS Prince of Wales, carrying Churchill to Newfoundland to meet with FDR.
Able Seamen Brignull and E. Groombridge relaxing aboard the destroyer HMCS Saguenay at sea, 30 October 1941. Note the gun mount. LAC 3576679
Personnel preparing to fire depth charges as the destroyer HMCS Saguenay attacks a submarine contact at sea, 30 October 1941. Built without any such weapons, by 1940 she carried 70 depth charges for use in her stern racks (more on this later) and projectors. LAC 3576681
In January 1942, while on Convoy OS52, she suffered more damage at the hands of Neptune, taking heavy wave hits to her superstructure which required another four-month stint in crowded, overworked repair yards. (The fact that the Atlantic itself was a combatant against all sides in the Battle of the Atlantic was not to be overlooked. Sadly, Saguenay’sclosest sister Skeena was storm wrecked in Iceland in 1944.)
Saguenay returned to service with Convoy HX191 in May.
Her last convoy duty was with HJ018, during which on 15 November 1942 she was accidentally rammed by the American freighter SS Azra (the requisitioned 1,700-ton Danish cargoship Marna) 50 miles Southeast of Cape Spare, Newfoundland. In that collision, Saguenay lost her stern when her depth charges exploded but, in a weird twist of fate, took her assaulter with her, as two of the fused charges exploded under the hull of Azra, sending the freighter to the bottom. The reeling Canuck in turn took Azra’s waterlogged crew members onboard.
The damaged stern of the destroyer HMCS Saguenay. Saguenay was rammed by SS Azra south of Cape Race and lost her stern when her depth charges exploded. November 18, 1942. LAC 3264016
HMCS SAGUENAY I79 after collision Azar
Saguenay, disabled but amazingly suffering no casualties, was taken in tow to St John for repair. After a survey, the battered destroyer was declared beyond economic repair and her structure was sealed to allow the vessel to be towed to Halifax.
HMCS Saguenay stern in dry dock, Via CFB Esquimalt Museum VR993.59.10
Still, most of her equipment was intact and, although not able to steam, was useful as a training hulk, a mission she spent the rest of the war accomplishing at to HMCS Cornwallis at Digby, Nova Scotia. There, she was used in the shoreside schooling of new ratings in seamanship and gunnery from October 1943 until July 1945 when she was paid off, meaning thousands of Canadian tars cycled through her compartments on the way to the fleet.
Further, her first two skippers, Percy W. Nelles and Leonard W. Murray, both served as admirals during the Battle of the Atlantic, with the former rising to Chief of the RCN Naval Staff during the conflict.
The Canadian role in the Battle of the Atlantic is often overlooked but was key to the overall Allied victory in WWII. As noted by the Veterans Affairs Canada:
More than 25,000 merchant ships safely made it to their destination under Canadian escort, delivering approximately 165 million tons of supplies to Europe. The Royal Canadian Navy helped sink more than 30 enemy submarines but at a steep price. They lost approximately 2,000 sailors during the war. The Royal Canadian Air Force was also hit hard, losing more than 750 personnel over the Atlantic. More than 1,600 merchant mariners from Canada and Newfoundland were killed during the battle. Civilians were not spared either. On October 14, 1942, 136 people died when the ferry SS Caribou was torpedoed as it crossed from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland.
Epilogue
After the war, Saguenay was sold for breaking up by International Iron and Metal at Hamilton, Ontario, and was towed there in early 1946.
Of the 11 A- and Improved A-class destroyers, besides Skeena, six were lost during WWII to include two, Acasta and Ardent, sunk in a surface action with Scharnhorst and Gneisenau off Narvik; Achates lost in the Barents in a one-sided fight with the German cruiser Admiral Hipper; Acheron lost to a mine, Arrow wrecked in an explosion in Algiers, and Codrington sunk by German bombers off Dover during the Battle of Britain. Of the remaining three “As” — Active, Antelope, and Anthony— obsolete for postwar work, they were soon paid off and scrapped by 1948.
Saguenay has an extensive entry maintained at For Posterity’s Sake, a Royal Canadian Navy Historical Project.
Relics of Saguenay exist today, such as her bell, which is on public display in Halifax.
The bell for HMCS Saguenay H01/D79/I79 is located at the Naval Museum of Halifax, CFB Halifax. Photo courtesy of Brian Lapierre, via For Posterity Sake
The old “Barber Pole” badge of Saguenay’s St. John’s-based squadron was retained with pride by the postwar Canadian Navy and is still in use by Atlantic units.
Halifax class frigate HMCS St. John’s. Note the “barber pole” on her stack. Photo By: Corporal Connor Bennett, Canadian Armed Forces Imagery Technician
And the “Barber Pole Song” has passed into Canadian military folklore.
In 1956, the Royal Canadian Navy commissioned a new Halifax-built St-Laurent-class destroyer HMCS Saguenay (DD/DDH 206). Like her WWII namesake, she specialized in ASW and, in a funny coincidence, while on a 1986 NATO exercise in the Baltic Sea, she collided with the West German Type 206A coastal submarine U-17 (S196). Gratefully, there were no fatalities on either side and both warships went on to serve several more years.
HMCS Saguenay was paid off on 31 August 1990 after 34 years of Cold War service and was scuttled four years later for use as a recreational divers’ wreck off Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. (Photo: RCN)
Specs:
Destroyer HMCS Saguenay Canadian Navy Heritage website. Image Negative Number E-80027
Displacement: 1,337 long tons (1,358 t) Length: 321 ft 3 in o/a, 309 ft. p/p Beam: 32 ft 9 in Draft: 10 ft Speed: 35 knots (as built), 31 knots by 1943 Complement: 181 Radar: None originally, Type 286 search and Type 271 range finding by 1943 Armament: (1930) 4 x QF 4.7″/45cal Mk IX guns (A, B, X, Y mounts) 2 x 4 tubes for 21-inch torpedoes 2 x QF 2-pounder 40 mm pom-pom guns (1942) 2 x QF 4.7″/45cal Mk IX guns (B, X mounts) 1 x QF 3-inch 20 cwt 12-pounder AAA gun (in place of aft torpedo tube turn stall) 1 x 4 tubes for 21-inch torpedoes 6 x 1 20 mm Oerlikon AAA guns Hedgehog anti-submarine mortar (in former A mount) Depth charges (70) and Y-guns
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My homie Ben has been doing a great job chronicling the Big Sandy Shoot and Knob Creek Shoots over the years and he just completed this 5-minute piece on the only operational Israeli M50 in private hands.
For a more detailed look at how BV runs their big guns, check out this deeper dive as well.
