Tag Archives: danish police

Bet you have never heard of these before, (or the unsung heroes who carried them)

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Ian with Forgotten Weapons has a great video above on the Danish Schultz & Larsen Model Rigspolitikarabin in/42 (Rplt. 42) in 8x58mm Danish Rimmed.

Made for the Danish Coastal Police (Kystpolitiet) by S&L during the German occupation of WWII, just 600-1,200 (figures vary, with Walter holding that production was lacking due to persistent sabotage by patriotic mill workers at Schultz) of these 22-inch barreled, four-shot bolt guns produced from the company’s M38 target rifle design.

Most were converted post-war so it is very rare to come across a complete martial example.

Photo RIA

Photo RIA

The men who carried these rifles had an interesting story. The Danish coastal police (Kystpolitiet) was formed from officers of the downsizing Rigspoliti (National Police) in 1941, with a very specific mission.

kystpolitiet

Ominously, the coastal police was formed by the Nazis with a two-fold mission: capture those landing secretly on Jutland’s beaches such as Allied spies, and catch those trying to leave without authorisation (i.e. Danish Jews). However, it should be noted that, as noted by Leo Goldberger in his work “The Rescue of the Danish Jews: Moral Courage Under Stress” the coastal police largely neglected their duties on the latter.

Instead, they helped keep a lookout for German patrols and pass that vital info on to resistance and refugee groups and went on strike in August 1943 when the Germans moved to dismantle the Danish military, and replace with the police with the Gestapo-like HIPO corps.

Once that occurred, Danish police and resistance groups helped some 7,200 Jews and 700 of their non-Jewish relatives to escape via boat to safety in neutral Sweden, which accepted the Danish refugees.

A boat used by Danish fishermen to transport Jews to safety in Sweden during the German occupation. Denmark, date uncertain. — YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York

A boat used by Danish fishermen to transport Jews to safety in Sweden during the German occupation. Denmark, date uncertain. — YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York, via USHMM

At the same time, it should be noted that Danish state police guarding undelivered rifles at S&L accidentally “lost” as many as 200 Rplt. 42s waiting to be delivered, these guns making their way instead to the growing underground resistance.

This deed was repaid with the deportation of 1 in 5 Danish policemen to German concentration camps. As noted by the U.S Holocaust Museum, while “some 120 Danish Jews died during the Holocaust, either in Theresienstadt or during the flight from Denmark. This relatively small number represents one of the highest Jewish survival rates for any German-occupied European country.”

The group also contributed directly to the Allied cause. One, coastal police officer, Olaf Jørgensen, wound up in a concentration camp after helping downed British aircrewmen escape on a ferry to Sweden, which he bribed ferrymen to take in exchange for some oranges that “fell off a truck” on the way to German troops in Norway.

Sometimes you have to break a few eggs

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Bjorn Sibbern was born May 18, 1916 in Soro, Denmark and by 1940 was a Danish police officer. When the Germans invaded he remained at his day job– which he as a cover to investigate those suspected of being Nazi informers– while at night he helped manufacture false papers for the underground.

And he also liked scrapbooking.

Bjorn Sibbern danish cop and underground welrod used to assasinate ID card of a female member of the Danish Nazi party photo via holocuast museum

As noted by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum about this page from his scrapbook donated to the museum:

The Danish police played a major role in support of the Danish resistance movement, and some documents relate directly to Mr. Sibbern’s work in the underground. He was in charge of the printing and issuance of false identification cards. There are several examples in the scrapbooks. The albums contain both real and forged cards as well as his forgery stamps. The scrapbooks also contain leaflets dropped over Denmark of Nazi propaganda, anti-Nazi cartoons and photographs of German officials, Danish collaborators, sabotage and demonstrations. Every page is fully annotated in English.

Pictured is a British Welrod, which Sibbern explains was used by Resistance “Liquidation” groups for rubbing out informers and high value targets. Chambered for .32ACP (7.65x17mm), the same caliber as many popular Italian, German, and Japanese pistols, the gun was stated to be able to fire a 72-grain Kynoch leadhead at 920fps.

The firearm developed by the SOE was not a traditional pistol fitted to a silencer—it was a pistol built around a silencer. To keep gas from escaping from a cylinder like on a revolver or a cycling action like on a semi-automatic, the Welrod was bolt action. The simple and effective bolt action could be worked rapidly for a follow-up shot if needed, and doubled as a safety device. The integral suppressor built around the barrel was made up of 12 thin metal washer baffles separated in groups by three leather wipes.

The baffles would start to deteriorate with use and typically was no longer suppressed after about 15-20 rounds, though could still be used as a rather funky pistol. The nose cap of the suppressor was hollowed out to allow it to be pressed into an intended target without undue back blast. The magazine itself, encased in a rubber sleeve like a bicycle handle, formed the pistol grip. With few moving parts, it could be broken down and stored in pieces that did not resemble a firearm. In fact when disassembled it rather looks like a bicycle pump, of which thousands were in common use in occupied Europe.

It was made in two varieties, the MkI and MkII.

“This pistol, only 11.5-inches long, gave off less noise than a pop-gun and was well-suited for ‘attic executions'” notes Sibbern.

Not your typical scrapbook.