Springfield Rebuild Marks

[37patt]

Does anyone know what the single letters represent on the Springfield Armoury rebuild stamps. These are the open bottom boxes with SA in the top and a single letter below ie:

SA
O

SA
C

SA
P

SA
R

I will be picking up a Springfield .22cal M2 soon and it has the "O" mark in the stamp and I'm just curious.

Thanks for any help.

 

[milsurpo]

On pg 568 in Brophy he lists these letters below [SA]. One (GAW) is identified as Col. G. A. Woody who I believe was in charge of the arsenal during '43/'44. The implication is that the others are abbreviations for surnames of individual inspectors or supervisors.

milsurpo

 

[purple]

Puzzling these out is a pretty arcane science. They appear to be late WW2 and immediate post-WW2 rebuild stamps. The different single letters are believed to be initials of armory inspectors who checked the weapons for service at the conclusion of the rebuild process. I've seen the "0" and "R" stamps on Garand stocks incl M1D stocks from the early '50s.

 

[37patt]

Thanks guys, that's about what I thought. A bit unusual to have a single letter for an inspectors mark but not unknown certainly.

I do find it a bit curious that marks this late in time, post war rebuild, are still unknown. Oh well!! The hunt for answers still goes on.