French arms of the Great War - educate me

tjhaile said:
I think it's the other way around. The chapel at St. Cyr had a single entry for "the Class of 1914" on its WWI memorial tablet, which would imply that all, or at least most of them, were killed in action.

http://books.google.ca/books?id=ELc...v=onepage&q="st cyr" "class of 1914""&f=false
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I was surprised when I read that at first, but I remember the source looked credible. You are correct however, that it doesn't seem likely. Checking a little further I found this:

1914 : Promotion La Grande Revanche : Sur les 774 élèves intégrés, 428 sont tombés au « champ d’honneur ». Concernant les survivants, 87 % ont été blessés souvent plusieurs fois, 12 % réformés pour invalidité, 25 % prisonniers de guerre.
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774 in class of 1914. 428 Killed in action. 87% of survivors wounded several times. 12% discharged as unfit. 25% prisoners of war.

Haven't found out what proportion of Sandhurst cadets of 1914 survived, but 3714 former cadets were killed in action.
 
Well I can say that French arms were used and rode quite hard during WW1.

Many that were retained in France after WW1 were refurbished with existing parts due to the declining military budget. Arms in service during the late 1920s and early 1930s were modified to accept the Balle "N" round used in the Hotchkiss machine guns. This was denoted with an "N" stamped on the receiver.

Another interesting feature of the French refurbishment jobs is that damaged rifle/carbine stocks were retained, repaired, and put back into service. You can see this with the French "patch up" job on a number of different rifles and carbines. There was such a carbine on the EE not too long ago that had close to 30 repair patches on the wood. A number of rifles were sent to French colonies in the Medeterrian and the Far east as well during this time.

By 1940, the French were still putting the Lebel and Mannlicher-Berthier rifles out against a new breed of Mauser rifle and sub machine guns of the German army. Germany captured vast numbers of these now obsolete rifles and carbines and issued them to rear guard units and the Vichy government forces.

Least to say, a rifle that went through WW1, the post war years, and WW2 has enough history to fill more than one book on French military firearms of the 20th century. The stories they could tell if they could speak.
 
That was this Mousqueton d'artillerie Mle 1892 and it had OVER 30 repairs.

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And here is a Mousqueton Mle M1916:
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And the ubiquitous Fusil d'infantrie Mle 1907-15:
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Well, as the OP that kicked off this thread, I've enjoyed all the conversation that's occurred here, but most appreciate the posts (and pics) of the rifles. I have to say that posts about French military arms seem to get even less traffic than posts about Ross rifles.

Looking forward to hearing from others who own, and shoot, these rifles.
 
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