I give you, the M-Lok compatible Auto-Ordnance Tactical Tommy Gun.
Yes, it is still .45ACP, still a semi-auto carbine (which is A-Os specialty these days post-Hughes) and still uses 50-round drums and 20-round sticks.
But everything else is, well, different.
More in my column at Guns.com if you are curious
For all of you with a hard hat diving interest, the Navy’s new MK29 Mixed Gas Rebreather system, shown below, was recently developed at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division. Designed to conserve increasingly valuable helium, it is undergoing testing at the Naval Experimental Diving Unit (NEDU) in PC.
Also, and completely unrelated, is a video the Navy just released on the Mark VI patrol boats, which are mad sexy from a littoral standpoint
One of the most interesting submersibles ever to not take up a slot on the U.S. Navy List was Deep Submergence Vessel NR-1, a nuclear-powered testbed for Rickover built by Electric Boat in the 1960s.
Isn’t it cute?
The 400-ton 147-foot vessel, typically referred to as Nerwin during her uncommissioned existence was only retired in 2008 and may or may not have performed several classified Cold War-era missions.
Defueled and scrapped, some of her components were later put on display at the Submarine Force Library and Museum in Groton and now the U.S. Naval Undersea Museum at Keyport has her salvaged control room.
As originally installed
Now landlocked
“It’s a proud moment for us to be able to present this to the museum,” PSNS Commanding Officer Capt. Howard Markle told the Kitsap Sun on the occasion of its transfer to the museum last week. “We’re grateful for their willingness to accept it for eventual display, and we’re especially thankful for their commitment to educating the community — and our Navy family — on the men and women, the vessels, the mission and the legacy of our Navy’s undersea warfighters.”
A watercolor of the HMS Terror exploring the Canadian Arctic, which she would never leave (Canadian Museum of Civilization)
Ownership of the two ships, Adm. Sir John Franklin’s ill-fated HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, two of the most archaeologically important wrecks in the world, was formally transferred to the Canadian government with the signing of a Deed of Gift at a ceremony last month with the Inuit of Nunavut, who played a key role in their discovery, recognised as joint owners of the wrecks and artifacts.
After a local Canadian Forces Ranger pointed out where Franklin’s lost Arctic survey ship HMS Terror was in 2016, a group of 17 Inuit was enlisted by Parks Canada last year to camp out in rotating four-person shifts to protect the historic site and that of Franklin’s other ship, HMS Erebus, which was discovered in much the same way in 2014.
The two ships, under the command of Sir John, set sail from England in 1845 through the Canadian Arctic to find the Northwest Passage. During the treacherous journey, the ships became trapped in thick sea ice. The crews abandoned the ships to trek overland to safety, but tragically none survived.
Painting depicting the fate of Sir John Franklin’s expedition. ”They forged the last links with their lives’ by William Smith Via Royal Maritime Museum Greenwich
“The story behind these vessels is both fascinating and incredibly important to the history of both our nations. The UK joined forces with the Canadian government and Inuit population to search for these ships for 172 years and I’m delighted they will now be protected for future generations,” said UK Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson.
Artifacts from the wrecks will be available for display at museums in both countries. Currently, there are examples on display at the Canadian Museum of History as part of the “Death in the Ice” exhibit.
The Expedition’s timeline, from the Canadian Museum:
Franklin’s expedition and the dozens of follow-on missions to find him made headlines around the world, such as in this German print, for decades
May 19, 1845: The Franklin Expedition departed from Greenhithe, near London, England.
July 4, 1845: The ships arrived at the Whale Fish Islands, Greenland, after a stormy Atlantic crossing.
July 12, 1845: Officers and crewmembers mailed their last letters home.
July 29 or 31, 1845: HMS Erebus and Terror were sighted in Baffin Bay by whaling ships. This was the last time the ships and their crews were seen by Europeans.
Winter 1845 to 1846: The expedition spent its first winter in the Arctic off Beechey Island. Three members of the crew died and were buried on Beechey Island.
Summer 1846: The expedition headed south into Peel Sound.
September 1846 to Spring 1848: The ships were beset — surrounded and stuck in ice — northwest of King William Island.
June 11, 1847: Sir John Franklin died. He was 61 years old and had served in the Royal Navy for 47 years.
April 22, 1848: The expedition had been stuck off King William Island for over a year and a half. Fearing they would never escape, the men deserted the ships.
April 25, 1848: The men landed on King William Island. Nine officers and 15 seamen had already died. There were 105 survivors. Officers left a note stating their plan to trek to the Back River.
January 20, 1854: Franklin’s Expedition is missing for more than eight years. The Admiralty announced that its officers and men will be declared dead as of March 31, 1854.
1847–1880: More than 30 expeditions sailed, steamed or sledged into the Arctic from the east, west, and south. Very few found any trace of the expedition.
2008: A renewed search for Franklin’s ships began under the leadership of Parks Canada.
September 1, 2014: An important clue is found on an island in Wilmot and Crampton Bay: an iron davit pintle (fitting). Parks Canada refocuses its efforts near that island.
September 2, 2014: 167 years after the British Admiralty’s search began, the first wreck, HMS Erebus, is found.
2016: Almost two years to the day after the discovery of Erebus, Terror is located in Terror Bay, off the southern coast of King William Island.
The military of the Philippines had warehouses full of vintage M1 rifles. Getting them back to the U.S. was an epic struggle.
The Garand Collector’s Association, which has been helping the Civilian Marksmanship Program inventory and classify a literal shipload of repatriated M1s, produced the below video chronicling the return to the states of some 86,000 Garands loaned to the Philippines over the years. Fighting poor storage, threats of critters and hazardous materials, the CMP invested millions in cleaning the guns, packing and sending them via truck, train and ship back to Alabama.
Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places.- Christopher Eger
Warship Wednesday, May 16, 2018: Schermerhorn’s contribution to naval history
U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. NH 53955
Here we see the pride of the New York Yacht Club, the steam patrol yacht Free Lance, in her newly-applied gray military scheme on duty off New York City, probably in August 1898. The brand-new pleasure craft would, oddly enough, be called upon not once, but twice, to defend her country.
But first, let us speak of that great knickerbocker, Frederick Augustus Schermerhorn.
As a young man, Schermerhorn came from a prominent Empire State family and, after a string of private schools and tutors, was accepted at what was then Columbia College for the Class of 1865. However, as the Civil War evolved, he promptly dropped out of school at the ripe old age of 20 in 1864 and sought an appointment to West Point, which was denied. Not to be outdone, he applied to a series of New York volunteer units and was enrolled to the roster of the newly-formed 185th New York Volunteer Infantry regiment’s C Company in the fall of 1864 and shipped off to the Petersburg Campaign in Northern Virginia.
Portrait of a soldier F. Augustus Schermerhorn standing, via the Massachusetts Digital Commonwealth collection
By the end of the war, the bloodied and decorated 1st Lt had been breveted a captain and was assigned as the aide-de-camp of MG Charles Griffin, the V Corps commander during its final campaign, and was present in the yard when Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House. In all, Schermerhorn served less than a year, but it was a hell of a year.
MG Charles Griffin and staff officers posed in front of the Cummings House. Our fellow is to the right
Returning to New York after the Grand Review of the Armies in Washington, Schermerhorn went back to school, picking up his mining degree from Columbia in 1868, and continued his service with the famed “Blue-Bloods” of the 7th New York Militia regiment for another several decades. By 1877, he was a Columbia trustee and member in most of the clubs and societies in The City that meant anything including the Riding, Knickerbocker, Metropolitan, and Tuxedo clubs. He rose to become a Director of the N. Y. Life Insurance and Trust Co.
The good Mr. Schermerhorn was duly nominated and confirmed by the membership to the New York Yacht Club on 25 March 1886 and by 1897 was elected to a position as a flag officer with that esteemed organization, a post he held through at least 1903. During his time with the NYYC, he was one of the backers of the 1893 (eighth) America’s Cup contender Colonia but was beaten by Nathanael Greene Herreshoff’s Vanderbilt-backed centerboard sloop Vigilant.
Schermerhorn’s Colonia via Detroit Publishing Co, LOC LC-D4-21915
Moving past cutters, Schermerhorn commissioned Mr. Lewis Nixon of Elizabethport, NJ’s Crescent Shipyard to construct him a beautiful screw steam schooner designed by A. Cary Smith for personal use. As noted by the Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers at the time, his new ship, Free Lance, was 108-feet on the waterline and 137 from figurehead to taffrail with a cross-section “different from all other steam yachts” due to its long bow and lapped steel plating. A pair of Almy water tube boilers drove a 600 IHP triple expansion steam engine.
Yacht Free Lance in civilian livery, 11 June 1896, most probably on Long Island Sound. Note her guilt bow scroll and extensive canvas awnings over her twin deck houses. Also note her yacht ensign on the stern, NYYC pennant on her foremast, and Schermerhorn’s Maltese Cross pennant on her after mast. Photo via Detroit Publishing Co. 8×10 glass negative photographed by Charles Edwin Bolles LOC# LC-D4-62113
Her 25 September builder’s trials report made the Oct. 12, 1895 issue of Forest and Stream which noted that with a forced draft and 200-pounds of steam she was able to clear 19 miles in 62 minutes. By the turn of the century, she regualry hit 17 knots in civil use and utilized the novel Thorne-patent ash ejector, which gave steady work for her stokers.
However, the Free Lance only got two seasons in before war came with Spain, and Schermerhorn freely volunteered the services of his yacht to the Navy, which were promptly accepted.
The armed yachts of the Spanish-American War are fascinating reading as they were often very handsome sailing ships such as past Warship Weds alum Peter Arrell Brown Widener’s custom-built schooner-rigged Josephine and Massachusetts textile magnate Matthew Chaloner Durfee’s rakish and very well-appointed steam yacht, Sovereign.
At the time the Navy needed to rapidly expand and among the ships acquired for Spanish-American War service were no less than 29 armed and hastily converted yachts, primarily drawn from wealthy Northeast and New York Yankees such as our very own Mr. Schermerhorn. A baker’s dozen of these former pleasure craft were rather large ships, exceeding 400 tons. With relatively good gun-carrying capacity and sea-keeping capabilities, these bigger craft saw service off Cuba where they were used as auxiliary cruisers, scouting vessels, and dispatch ships.
Others, such as our newly commissioned USS Free Lance, were used in what was termed the Auxiliary Naval Force, keeping a weather eye for Spanish raiders just over the horizon of the increasingly undefended U.S Eastern Seaboard.
USS Free Lance underway off New York City, probably in August 1898. A small sailboat is just astern of Free Lance, and USS New York (Armored Cruiser # 2) is in the background. Also, note that her awnings have been stripped away, she is no longer flying her yachting pennants, and she has guns on her pilot house and stern. NH 53953
Her armament: a pair of .65-caliber Royal Navy contract 1870s-vintage Mark I 10-barrel Gatling guns mounted atop the yacht’s pilothouse and on her stern, reportedly picked up through the offices of local NYC military surplus guru Francis Bannerman.
USS Free Lance (1898-1899), Gatling Gun Crew, 1898. Note the “Free Lance” bands on their flat caps, the .45-70 rounds and Springfield Trapdoor bayonets on their Mills belts, and the gun’s hopper which held 20 rounds. Detroit Publishing Company.
Each Gatling gun weighed 725-pounds, not including the mount and fired a 1,421-grain projectile at 1,427fps. The rate of fire (theoretically) was 1,200 rounds per minute but the gun was limited by the speed that assistant gunners could drop rounds down the beast’s top-mounted Bruce Feed-style chute.
USS Free Lance (1898-1899), Petty Officers 1898. Detroit Publishing Company
With her unconventional armament and small relative size, she was used as a harbor patrol craft during the conflict, commissioned as USS Free Lance, 12 May 1898.
USS Free Lance at anchor off New York City, probably in August 1898. Note the small sailboats in the left background and Free Lance’s pilot house-mounted Gatling gun. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. NH 53954
Her term of service was short, decommissioning on 24 August 1898 after just 14 weeks on active duty.
Returned to her owner, when WWI came the aging Schermerhorn once more contributed his love to the Navy, with the yacht leased for $1 on 19 July 1917 and commissioned as USS Freelance (SP-830) with no space between the two words. This was because from 1905 on, her name was spelled “Freelance.”
Freelance Underway, prior to World War I. This yacht served as USS Free Lance in 1898 and as USS Freelance (SP-830) in 1917-1918. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. NH 102819
Under command of Ensign J. B. Nevins, USNRF, and armed with a pair of recycled 3-pounder guns (Gatling’s were reserved for museums by 1917) she was once more put in service patrolling in the New York area. Her DANFS record is slim.
USS Freelance (SP-830) In port during the World War I era. The original print is in National Archives’ Record Group 19-LCM. U.S. Naval History and Heritage Command Photograph. NH 101720
Freelance was decommissioned on Christmas Eve 1918 and returned to her owner the same day. Schermerhorn passed in March 1919, age 74, during a speech he was giving before the Union Club and is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn.
His epitaph is Psalm 37:37: “Mark the perfect man and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace.”
Schermerhorn’s 1915 portrait by August Franzen is in the Smithsonian‘s National Portrait Gallery.
I cannot find what became of his cherished Free Lance, but I would like to think she is still in Gotham somewhere, perhaps on the bottom of the Arthur Kill Ship Graveyard, which in a way would be fitting.
Specs:
Displacement 132 t.
Length 137 feet overall
Beam 20′ 8″
Draft 7′ 6″
Propulsion: One 600ihp steam engine (3cyl, 11,17&29×20 Crescent), one shaft. Two Almy WT boilers
Speed 14 knots in naval service, almost 19 on trials
Complement 18 (military service)
Armament: Two .65-caliber Gatling guns (1898)
Two 3-pounders (1917)
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China’s new unnamed home-built aircraft carrier leaves Dalian in northeast China’s Liaoning Province for sea trials Sunday, May 13, 2018. (Li Gang/Xinhua via AP)
China’s first aircraft carrier built entirely in its own shipyard, the giant unnamed Type 001A modified Kuznetsov-class flattop, set out from Dalian (old Tsarist Port Arthur from the Russo-Japanese War for those military history buffs) on builder’s sea trials Sunday morning.
“Our country’s second aircraft carrier set sail from its dock in the Dalian shipyard for relevant waters to conduct a sea trial mission, mainly to inspect and verify the reliability and stability of mechanical systems and other equipment,” Reuters quoted the official Xinhua news agency as saying.
Unlike Type 001 carrier Liaoning, which was originally laid down in 1985 for the Soviet Navy as the Kuznetsov-class aircraft cruiser Riga and only completed in 2012 after an epic 27-year saga, the new Type 001A was built wholly in China and could be a sign of things to come.
Laid down in Nov. 2013, she is expected to be operational sometime next year, a production cycle that took just six years and rivals that of the current Ford-class (although it should be pointed out that class-leader, USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), had her first steel cut in 2005, was officially laid down in 2009, commissoned last year, and is not expected to deploy until 2020)
So I ran across this at the NRAAM in Dallas earlier this month. Increasingly, carry guns are coming standard with RMRs…even very small ones.
The parallax-free red dot is a slimmer version of the Shield RMS designed for subcompact carry pistols, a category that Walther’s PPS M2 fills nicely. The 1-inch wide single-stack 9mm uses a 3.18-inch barrel and goes just 6.3-inches overall, specs that are comparable to the Glock 43 and Smith & Wesson Shield. The factory-standard red dot model has its top slide milled to accept the RMSc with no overhang but ships with a cover plate should the user want to just rely on the co-witnessed iron sights.
My buddy Ben Philippi with Guns.com hangs out with Dangerous Bob Bigando firing a fully-functional WWII-vintage British Ordnance QF 2-pounder (40mm) that was amnesty registered under the NFA in 1968.
During WWII, the U.S. Army’s M3 Gun Motor Carriage (GMC) produced a self-propelled artillery piece from the WWI-era M1897A4 75mm gun mounted on the M3 half-track chassis. The result was billed as a tank destroyer and, while it did make mincemeat of light Japanese Type 95 Ha-Go and Type 97 Chi-Ha tanks in the Pacific, it was best used as a mobile gun system for fire support to the infantry.
Well, fast forward to today and the Jordanians are mounting Vietnam-vintage M102 105mm towed howitzers on KADDB’s latest Al-Wahsh MRAP style truck to make a mobile artillery system that looks really cool. Capable of rolling around with a gun, crew, and 24 shells ready to go, the concept vehicle was on display at SOFEX 2018 and Janes has the low down.
The Saudis, who are the world’s biggest user of the M102 at this point (after the U.S. replaced it with the M119 in the 1990s), may be very interested.