#thompson submachine gun

[peashooter85]

The Thompson Submachine Gun and Irish Independence

In the final month of World War I a US Army officer named Brig. Gen. John T. Thompson began development of a submachine gun which he called the "trench broom". Spitting out 800 rounds a minute of .45 caliber lead the trench broom was to be used to clear World War I trenches of German soldiers, however the war ended before work on the Thompson could be finished. Development continued after the war until in April of 1921 production of the Model 1921 Thompson began.

Among the first buyers of the Thompson were secret agents of the Irish Republican Army who were looking to buy weapons for Irish forces fighting for independence against the British. At the time there were no laws in the US restricting the sale of fully automatic firearms and thus any civilian could buy one as long as the had the cash ($200 or around $3000 in today's money). Some of the earliest produced Thompsons were purchased, serial numbers 46, 50, and 51, and smuggled to Ireland. There they were tested in a soundproofed basement Dublin. IRA leader Michael Collins, who attended the test firing was like, bruh we need more of these! So a call went out to buy and ship as many Tommy guns as possible.

Most Thompsons were purchased by immigrant Irish fraternal groups and patriotic groups who organized fundraisers and pooled their money together to cover the steep cost of buying the submachine guns. In some cases they disappeared from government armories. An Irish immigrant who was sheriff of San Mateo, California donated two Thompsons for the cause. Many of the weapons as well as magazines and ammunition made their way to New York City, where 495 of them were loaded onto one ship. Unfortunately for the IRA local police and Federal authorities seized the weapons in a raid after a captain grew suspicious of the cargo that was being loaded onto his ship.

While 495 Thompsons were seized, another 158 were smuggled out of the US to Ireland by other means. Most only arrived in the final months of the Irish War for Independence as a truce was agreed upon on the 11th of July and the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed in December guaranteeing Irish independence. The Thompson did see plenty of action in the Irish Civil War of 1922-1923 when factions of the IRA began fighting among each other due to disagreements over the terms of the treaty. In 1925 the 495 Thompsons that were seized by the US Government were returned as there were no neutrality laws at the time and it was not illegal to send weapons to foreign powers overseas. Most of those Thompsons went into government armories without ever being fired in anger until they were decommissioned in the 1960's-1970's. Some remained in private hands, even being used by IRA fighters as late as the 1970's and 1980's

[90ssuperheroes]

[ketchuplaser]

U-S-A! U-S-A!

'Merica Baby!

Woooooooooooooo

[stairnaheireann]

#OTD in 1851 – Birth of American financier, Thomas Fortune Ryan, in Charlottesville, Virginia, with ancestry to Protestant Anglo-Irish settlers in the 17th century.

Thomas Fortune Ryan was born near Lovingston, a small Nelson County community south of Charlottesville, Virginia. Despite certain myths regarding his background, Ryan was neither orphaned nor penniless as a youth and he traced his ancestry to Protestant Anglo-Irish settlers in the 17th century. At age 17, Ryan perceived a lack of economic opportunity in post-war Virginia and so moved across the…

[infactforgetthepark]

[Free Audiobooks] Spearhead by Adam Makos & Tommy: The Gun That Changed America by Karen Blumenthal [WWII Military Biography & YA Invention History]

The annual SYNC Summer of Listening program encouraging literacy among teens by giving away a themed weekly pair of audiobooks—1 modern or non-fiction, 1 classic or drama—returns for another year, courtesy of sponsor AudioFile Magazine and participating publishers.

This 8th week's theme is “Weapons of War”, spotlighting real life deeds of reluctant soldiers and armed civilians, available from Thursday June 15th through Wednesday June 21st:

Spearhead: An American Tank Gunner, His Enemy, and a Collision of Lives in World War II (Adapted for Young Adults) by military historian Adam Makos, read by Johnathan McClain from Listening Library. This is a YA version of his bestselling history/biography of the life and times of American tank gunner Clarence Smoyer whose crew was instrumental to the 1945 Battle of Cologne, and a key encounter during it with his German counterpart, tank radioman Gustav Schaefer, both reluctant soldiers caught up in a conflict beyond their youthful imagining.

Tommy: The Gun That Changed America by the late journalist Karen Blumenthal, read by Maggi-Meg Reed from Listening Library. This is a YA-level history of the [Thompson submachine gunhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thompson_submachine_gun], from its invention during World War I by a Spanish-American army officer, who was dismayed when it became the favoured weapon of US gangsters and other outlaws during the 1920s and 1930s, leading to Congress' eventual attempt to take it off the streets and igniting an early national debate on gun control.

The freebies are available via Overdrive's Sora service (listenable via browser on their website, or via their mobile app for iOS & Android devices).

To claim them, you'll need to register on the SYNC website with a valid email address to use in a Sora account, using the setup code and directions in the instructions in SYNC's FAQ (no need to re-register if you've participated in previous years' giveaways), clicking “Borrow” to add them to your Sora library as a permanent loan. NB: if you need to free up space on your device later, follow the instructions in the FAQ to only “delete files” and DO NOT “Return” the title, which would remove your future access.

Offered worldwide through Wednesday June 21st until just before midnight Eastern Time, available via the Sora website and app. You can also browse AudioFile Magazine's planned season list to see what will be offered in the weeks ahead and if there's anything you'd especially like to get.

[tommygungirls]

[carbone14]

Entraînement de l'Armée Populaire de Libération au pistolet-mitrailleur Thompson M1921 – Chine – 1930's

[theworldatwar]

A British sentry armed with a Thompson submachine gun stands guard at one of the Rock’s many tunnels - Gibraltar, date unknown

[martin22martin22]

Apustaja - Thompson Submachine gun

[rockyp77mk3]

In April of 1945, paratrooper Harry Lorenzo of the 509th Parachute Infantry Battalion clutches his Thompson submachine gun and his puppy “Kaput” near Katharinenberg, Germany.

[sgtgrunt0331-3]

A U.S. Marine fires his M1 Thompson submachine gun at Japanese positions on the island of Peleliu, September 1944.

[frogblast-the-ventcore]

From clockwise right, we have:

Hellreigel 9mm submachine gun (text via IMFDB: "As of current knowledge, there was only ever one example of the Hellriegel and it did not survive the war. Its caliber, capacity, operating method, and whether or not it was even a functional weapon are conjecture based on analysis of the photographs and historical context. It is assumed to have been blowback operated with the projections at the rear being a pair of recoil springs, and the large structure over the barrel is thought to have been a leather-wrapped water or oil jacket for cooling. From what little could be known about the weapon from the three images, it appears that the Hellriegel is a large-capacity submachine gun, firing what seems to be a 9mm cartridge. It would make the Hellriegel one of the first submachine guns made in the world by definition of a submachine gun. It wouldn't be referred as a submachine gun at the time, as the term "submachine gun" was first coined in 1921 to advertise the Thompson Submachine Gun; the Hellriegel was referred to as a machine gun (Maschinengewehr) on the image caption. It could feed from straight box magazines, or from a large drum magazine which was not actually connected to the weapon and instead fed the cartridges through a flexible chute. The unusual appearance of this drum magazine led to some assumptions that it was belt fed, however this is not the case with the rounds being unconnected from one another and are propelled along the drum and feed chute by a spring in a similar manner to the Trommelmagazin snail drum used by the Luger pistol. The drum magazine is believed to be able to hold up to 160 rounds while the box mag is limited to 20 or so. It seems to be crew-served, as one image depicts an ammo bearer with a backpack for drum magazines, and its seeming intention to be used as a stationary weapon given its weighted base for the drum and its machine gun name (making it a "heavy" submachine gun of sorts). The provision for a drum but not a bipod however, means it is unclear what exactly the weapon was intended to be used for. All three pictures were taken from the right side of the gun, so what the left side looked like is a complete mystery."

Tsar tank (absolutely bonkers Russian experimental wheeled tank):

Hand-dropped bomb runs (commonplace during the war until bomb racks were invented for small aircraft):

German cavalry with pikes (note the horse gas masks).

Also this happened:

[stairnaheireann]

#OTD in 1851 – Birth of American financier, Thomas Fortune Ryan, in Charlottesville, Virginia, with ancestry to Protestant Anglo-Irish settlers in the 17th century.

#OTD in 1851 – Birth of American financier, Thomas Fortune Ryan, in Charlottesville, Virginia, with ancestry to Protestant Anglo-Irish settlers in the 17th century.

Thomas Fortune Ryan was born near Lovingston, a small Nelson County community south of Charlottesville, Virginia. Despite certain myths regarding his background, Ryan was neither orphaned nor penniless as a youth and he traced his ancestry to Protestant Anglo-Irish settlers in the 17th century. At age 17, Ryan perceived a lack of economic opportunity in post-war Virginia and so moved across the…

[zooophagous]

I like how in my home state I can buy a human skull, a live anaconda, a Thompson submachine gun and a chunk of raw uranium legally but I can't buy weed.

[tommygungirls]

[homunculus-argument]

Have you heard of the Blish principle? Inventor John Bell Blish, in the 1910s, found in observations of naval guns that, when under very high pressures, dissimilar metals have a tendency to adhere to each other. The Thompson submachine gun was designed utilizing this principle as part of a core locking mechanism. Well it turns out that guy was full of shit and everything I just described is wrong, he thought he was using the "Blish principle" when really he just kinda stumbled onto a whole different functional design. Your last post about using the wrong formulas to achieve the correct answer reminded me of this

I had never heard of that, but now I feel like I have received a 1,5-version of the ol' tumblr "two contradictory pieces of information that cancel each other out" maneuvre.