After a little research on the www.
There are both RC Romanian VZ24s from the former USSR and refinished Romanian VZ24s from Romania. If they are Russian captures you'd expect a few with King Carol/Michael crests and Russian capture markings..... Also, Romanians were forced to switch sides to the Commies per their surrender agreement.
A mismatched bolt and missing capture screws sounds like Standard Operating Procedure for Russian capture. The Russians marked the stocks with the serial number on the left side of the butt and electrostecilled the other parts during re-assembly. Sounds like RC to me.
After all there were about 10,000 +/- Romanians with VZ.24 mausers at Stalingrad working for the Germans. Makes sense the Russians would have procured a few of these rifles. At least to me - but I don't always make sense.
During the period from 1945 until 1948 Czech troops were issued vz.24s, captured german weapons and new manufactured K98k's from Brno and Považská Bystrica. Even though Europe was flooded with surplus weapons thousands of unemployed workers at Czechoslovakia's two arsenals needed work and the plants were full of half made rifles and tons of parts, so the put to work completing rifles, these new rifles look like late war K98k's (many have winter trigger guards) but instead of nazi marks these rifle had lion crests and Czechoslovenska Zbrojovka Brno side rail address.
Post WW2 - back home in Czechoslovakia vz.24s and Czech K98k's in Czech Army stores were used until they were replaced by the ill fated vz.52 and vz.52/57 and eventually the vz.58 As a satellite country of Soviet Union Czechoslovakia was required to "tow the Stalinist line" and remove all signs of democracy or monarchy (the lion crest was traced its origins back to the King of Bohemia) and that's when Czech communists ground the crests off of their vz.24s.
The same thing happened in Romania, where in 1947, King Michael I was forced by the Communists to abdicate and the new communist government there ordered the crests of King Carol II and King Michael I be ground off of their vz.24s
Finding a nice vz.24 with the rampant lion intact is really cool.
There are both RC Romanian VZ24s from the former USSR and refinished Romanian VZ24s from Romania. If they are Russian captures you'd expect a few with King Carol/Michael crests and Russian capture markings..... Also, Romanians were forced to switch sides to the Commies per their surrender agreement.
A mismatched bolt and missing capture screws sounds like Standard Operating Procedure for Russian capture. The Russians marked the stocks with the serial number on the left side of the butt and electrostecilled the other parts during re-assembly. Sounds like RC to me.
After all there were about 10,000 +/- Romanians with VZ.24 mausers at Stalingrad working for the Germans. Makes sense the Russians would have procured a few of these rifles. At least to me - but I don't always make sense.
During the period from 1945 until 1948 Czech troops were issued vz.24s, captured german weapons and new manufactured K98k's from Brno and Považská Bystrica. Even though Europe was flooded with surplus weapons thousands of unemployed workers at Czechoslovakia's two arsenals needed work and the plants were full of half made rifles and tons of parts, so the put to work completing rifles, these new rifles look like late war K98k's (many have winter trigger guards) but instead of nazi marks these rifle had lion crests and Czechoslovenska Zbrojovka Brno side rail address.
Post WW2 - back home in Czechoslovakia vz.24s and Czech K98k's in Czech Army stores were used until they were replaced by the ill fated vz.52 and vz.52/57 and eventually the vz.58 As a satellite country of Soviet Union Czechoslovakia was required to "tow the Stalinist line" and remove all signs of democracy or monarchy (the lion crest was traced its origins back to the King of Bohemia) and that's when Czech communists ground the crests off of their vz.24s.
The same thing happened in Romania, where in 1947, King Michael I was forced by the Communists to abdicate and the new communist government there ordered the crests of King Carol II and King Michael I be ground off of their vz.24s
Finding a nice vz.24 with the rampant lion intact is really cool.
Last edited:
