Where are all the vet bring backs?

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For almost a decade now I've had a k98 on my wish list. I've passed on beautiful east german and yugo captures and skipped the Norwegians and the RC's because I thought that Id get lucky some day and find an elderly lady with some goodies she's had in her attic for the past half century. With all the soldiers who brought these back after the war, it doesnt make sense that Ive only ever seen ONE for sale on cgn. Is it just a case of a handful of collectors hoarding a lot of them, or a lot of collectors with 1 or 2 of them? Or, are there just not that many up here to begin with? Ive seen plenty of p38's and lugers so I find it strange that the most common german rifle of ww2 is nowadays so uncommon. :mad:
 
My father and 2 of my uncles served in the second world war.Bringing back weapons was severely frowned upon by the Canadian brass.One of my uncles said he had 15 different pistols and rifles on board on the way back.10 miles out of Halifax they were told they would be searched upon docking.He said all you could here were splashes all the way to harbour.They weren't searched.
 
A rifle is not as easy to smuggle back as a pistol. Probably why there are alot of P-38's and Lugers out there. I would also bet that some people do not even know there rifle is a vet bring back. As mentioned above, a lot were probably brought back for hunting rifles. Since they were probably gonna put another stock on it, they would lose the stock and its easier to smuggle back.
 
I would suspect this is correct. Of all the k98 rifles I have owned over the years, only four were apparent vet bringbacks, and I am only sure (as sure as I can be, meaning I trusted the source) on two of them. Both of those were bolt mismatches only, and both were sold on CGN in the last couple years.
My dual code and DOU44 were both reportedly bringbacks, and are all matching, but there is no way to verify this. Unmolested rifles are few and far between it does seem.
As for pistols, I still have the S42 1937 P08 my Dad brought home from the war (along with an Iron Cross First Class). I also have a BYF41 that came from a vet of the South Saskatchewan Regiment. There are quite a few pistols out there, definitely more than rifles it seems.
desporterizer said:
I bet there are many vet bring back sporters out there.
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RR said:
My father and 2 of my uncles served in the second world war.Bringing back weapons was severely frowned upon by the Canadian brass.One of my uncles said he had 15 different pistols and rifles on board on the way back.10 miles out of Halifax they were told they would be searched upon docking.He said all you could here were splashes all the way to harbour.They weren't searched.
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I didnt know that, I thought we were as lenient as the americans back then...thats sad :mad:

get the scuba gear!
 
My grandfather disarmed a German officer in the Falaise gap, and the 1937 perfect Luger has been a cherished family heirloom ever since. He just mailed the pistol back home to my great grandmother. He told me that he had other stuff off of captured Germans but then what do you do with it all so he just dumped it or traded it because he could not carry it around with him. He would have had zero interest carrying an extra captured long rifle around on top of his Lee Enfield. According to him the biggest interest was getting a Luger.
 
RR said:
My father and 2 of my uncles served in the second world war.Bringing back weapons was severely frowned upon by the Canadian brass.One of my uncles said he had 15 different pistols and rifles on board on the way back.10 miles out of Halifax they were told they would be searched upon docking.He said all you could here were splashes all the way to harbour.They weren't searched.
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My uncle was a vet as well. He brought, he said, about 30 guns back. Most were pistols and he sold or traded them all away. I do wish he'd hung onto his broomhandle Mauser with shoulder stock/holster.
 
The troopies were not allowed to bring any firearm back. The Socialist F**ks were in power then.
"...told they would be searched upon docking..." I know a guy whose Da's unit was searched. Handguns were particularly frowned upon. Registration of them dates from 1935.
Neither Canadian or American troopies got to keep their issued firearms either.
 
It's amazing the difference in attitude toward weapons before World War II and after. Heck before the Boer war you could equip your own militia with whatever weapon you thought was best and Canadians who served in the Boer War got to keep everything, including their rifles.
 
We are about two generations too late for the big sloshing waves of veteran's bring back guns. I have a Mauser sporter (WWI receiver, double set triggers and toothpick stock) that came to me third hand from the man who brought it home. What ever was any good has gone into private hands and into the collectors' market. Everything else was abused and their stories forgotten.
 
As a kid on the prairies in the 1950s and early '60s I got to admire and shoot some very interesting "bringbacks" in the farm neighbourhood including a Thompson,an MP-40,a couple of STENs,and an M3 Greasegun(my favourite at the time).There were P-38s and Lugers galore and I well recall a stone mint Browning HP that I learned eventually wound up in a wood burning stove. I sometimes wonder what ever happened to all this stuff.I remember of of the guys telling up how he had cleverly wedged a dismantled Luger into his canteen and gotten it past the powers that were. I suppose most these souvenirs ended up in a slough bottom or got buried when the owners lost interest or moved on. I remember saving up to buy 9mm and .45ACP ammo so that the owners would take us out to the back 40 to shoot these pieces.I never saw a M98 or any other long gun that came back from Europe. I suppose that they were just too bulky to try to get them home in a kitbag. My grandfather's hired man was a US Army vet from WW1 and my father hunted with the M1903 Springfield that he had brought home after the war.

My late uncle was a RCEME tank fitter who served from Normandy through to VE Day in Germany. He mailed 3 handguns home in pieces;a pre-victory model S&W that was his own personal issue weapon,an identical S&W that he retrieved from a knocked out Sherman tank,and a P38 that he picked up in Normandy. I was fortunate to inherit them after my uncle died.
 
How about an attempted bringback

Back in the 1970s we had our QM stores on the Golan heights burn down one night. Needless to say it was kind of stimulating to wake up at 0300 to the crackle of the small arms ammo, which was stored there, cooking off in the fire. In addition to the ammo, we also lost our reserve stock of weapons as well as the signature cards which kept track of personnel weapons which everyone kept handy in their quarters.

I thought one of my brighter moves at the time was to tell my CQMS to get some Aquitance Rolls from the pay clerks ASAP and to then personally verify every man's rifle s/n and have him re-sign for his weapon on the AR. The CQ got this done pretty quickly and reported back that we had accounted for all of our small arms by s/n,including the pieces that had been cooked in the QM stores.

A few years later I was telling this story to another officer who had commanded the unit a couple of years after my tour. I was surprised when he told me that they had torn down one of the old barrack buildings and had found an FN rifle which did not appear on the inventory. Obviously some "gunnut" had nicked the piece in the confusion and stashed it in the attic of the building with the intention of bringing it home or sending it home in pieces. I guess he lost the heart to go through with it and did not want to go through the do-do which would have been involved in turning in the weapon after the fact.
 
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