Polar Bear History

Thanks for the post. I would not be surprised to learn that the then russian Czar, while still in power, had authorized friendly to him forces from the US and England to come to Russia, and give him military support.

Semilarily, Charles I, of England, knowing he was losing to Oliver Cromwells, parlamentarian forces, attempted to bring in Irish Catholic soldiers to Britain to turn the tide in his favor. He was, among others, beheaded over this.

The Czar and his family were executed by the Bolchewiks.
 
A bit of trivia on weapons here. US troops were equipped with both standard US small arms and US made Westinghouse Mosin Nagants. Canada was also involved as a sub-set of the British intervention against the Bolsheviks. Just over 4000 Cdn troops were deployed to Vladivostok in 1918/19 and some remain buried there.
 
purple said:
A bit of trivia on weapons here. US troops were equipped with both standard US small arms and US made Westinghouse Mosin Nagants. Canada was also involved as a sub-set of the British intervention against the Bolsheviks. Just over 4000 Cdn troops were deployed to Vladivostok in 1918/19 and some remain buried there.
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when i recieved my grandfathers military records he was an american but joined the canadian army in cleveland ohio? he was from michegan in 1918 and was in royal canadian engineers .
sadly he managed to get injured on the boat over and spent a year in military hospital in vladivostok before being returned to canada and discharged.
my father said he could speak ruski quite well.
 
Speaking of Polar Bears

(The furry kind)
One polar bear's comment to another about Igloos.
Really love these, Hard and crunchy on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside!;)
 
John Sukey said:
(The furry kind)
One polar bear's comment to another about Igloos.
Really love these, Hard and crunchy on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside!;)
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Gary Larson phoned.....wants his joke back....:D

Gary%20Larson%27s%20cartoon.jpg
 
My great uncle was one of the old contempt-ables, he found combat so addictive that he volunteered to do this duty in Russia, survived the trenchs, russia and then volunteered for the infantry in Canada for WW2.
 
Yep - why do you think there are a bunch of ross rifles squirreled away in Russia?

There's a good movie about this called Admiral, part one here (And a massive naval battle):

[youtube]_v_rqYZJk6A&feature=related[/youtube]

Some absolutely amazing scenes. Lots of stuff in there that we as westerners have never been taught or noticed.
 
From what I can understand from these documentaries, is that the US troops in Archangelsk was under british request and command, which did not go over well with the population, back in Detroit, when the british general send these US soldiers to the frontline in Russia, who then started a petition to bring them back home.

Also related to WW1, I included a visit to a Canadian war cemetary in Vladivostok, where twelve canadian soldiers are burried.

Interestingly, many Czech soldiers of WW1 is also burried in Vladivostok, who due to the changes of political fortunes of war, ended up traveling the full length of the Trans Siberian Rail Road, fighting the Bolchewiks all the way, who feared the well armed 35.000 Czech soldiers could decide the fate of the Russian Revolution.

Does anyone, in these fine pages, know more about the fate of these Czech soldiers of WW1, Russia ?
 
H Wally said:
Yep - why do you think there are a bunch of ross rifles squirreled away in Russia?

There's a good movie about this called Admiral, part one here (And a massive naval battle):

Some absolutely amazing scenes. Lots of stuff in there that we as westerners have never been taught or noticed.
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Holy carp!

Thanx for sharing this find, it looks interesting. :)

I also found this via the info from the vids snowhunter found...

http://www.polarbeardocumentary.com/museum.html
 
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Running Deer,ISSF rifle competition, Moscow 1958

H Wally said:
Yep - why do you think there are a bunch of ross rifles squirreled away in Russia?

There's a good movie about this called Admiral, part one here (And a massive naval battle):

Some absolutely amazing scenes. Lots of stuff in there that we as westerners have never been taught or noticed.
Click to expand...
Ross rifle actions, used by Russians in competition 1958, and before then.

QUOTE
6,5 Russian Vostock ammo.
One of the many "Wildcats" developed to better use the 7,62x54R (53R in Finland) case, for both Hunting and Competition.

In Finland, the .25(6,35x53R) , 6,5x53R and 8x53R are all factory rounds ( at least up to the 1980s) by various of the Finn Ammo Makers.

It is easy to make your own...take a 7,62x53R case (brass,) and run it into a .264 Short Magnum type Die ( this gives the necessary clearance for the large 7,62R case body, and necks the case from .30 cal to .264). It may be necessary to have an intermediate(.270) step in the necking Process. Unless of course you can get proper 6,5x53R Russian case sizing dies...not unknown...
The Load and fire form....simple case conversion.

I suppose the confusion in case designation comes when one simply mentions "6,5x53R."..which most shooters recognize as the Dutch Mannlicher cartridge, with a .450 head diameter.... NOT the Russian case with the .485 head diameter...and which only the Finns call a "53R" ( every one else calls it a "54R"). Adding "Vostock " or "Russian" will clear up the ambiguity.

As to "Running Deer" or "Running Boar" rifles, the Russians also used WW I Ross Rifle M1910 actions to make competition Rifles in the 1950s ( whether from ex- Czarist stock (1917) or from Estonian confiscation(1940) is uncertain. The Straight-pull actions were used in both 7,62x54R and some of the lesser diameters ( .25 and 6,5 are known).

Some of these Ross versions showed up at the 1956 Olympics at Melbourne and the Aussie team then did a similar job using a Garand M1 action, converting it to straight Pull, and had the Ammunition Factory make special , semi-rimmed .303 cases for them to load up for potential use at the 1958 World Cup shoots ( for Running Boar and Running Deer competition...even the Russians were impressed.) Nothing further came of this development...I heard it from a retired Engineer who had worked on both the Gun (in his own Workshops in Melbourne) and had consulted with the AF on the design of the Cartridge case.

UNQUOTE
 
The movie first clip about the "339th Infantry regiment in Northern Russia 1918-1919, clearly shows US soldiers carrying Mosin-Nagant rifles, while on duty in Russia.
 
There is the large Polar Bear Memorial at a cemetary in Detroit from where one of the US infantry regiments was created.

In Frankenmuth Michigan, there is a Michigan Military Museum for veterans of the state where there is a small section of the display specializing in the US part of the expedition.
 
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Remington Mosins

snowhunter said:
The movie first clip about the "339th Infantry regiment in Northern Russia 1918-1919, clearly shows US soldiers carrying Mosin-Nagant rifles, while on duty in Russia.
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A very good, and now sadly deceased friend, once had two Remington made Mosin-Nagants as part of his estate.
IIRC, he purchased them at an auction near Woodstock, his hometown.
 
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