In order to participate in the GunBroker Member forums, you must be logged in with your GunBroker.com account. Click the sign-in button at the top right of the forums page to get connected.
WWII GI "Bring Backs"
Fairlane66
Member Posts: 336 ✭✭
OK, the previous thread was locked, so I decided to add this interesting story.
I was stationed in Germany from 1987 to 1990. A few friends and I would routinely drive up to Luxembourg and Belgium with our metal detectors to scour Battle of the Bulge battle sites for relics. One day, one of my friends found all the pieces to a complete .30 Cal Browning machinegun, including the tripod. The find occurred in a spot where an American unit fought until they ran out of ammunition before surrendering. The US commander offered a white flag and negotiated a predetermined surrender time with the German commander. Prior to that time, all the GIs disassembled their weapons and either buried them or threw em into the forest. So it was with the Browning.
Over 4 decades later, my friend found a piece of the weapon and surmised what had happened. By searching in ever widening circles, he found all the parts to completely assemble the weapon. Obviously, it was quite corroded after four decades in the Belgian woods. However, my friend put some elbow grease to it. He first took all the parts down to the flightline maintenance area and had one of our maintainers bead-blast them in his spare time. He next filled in all the corrosion with aluminum paste. After it hardened, he sanded it off and then spray painted the whole thing flat black before putting it all together. From ten feet away, the thing looked like new. However, the action was permanently corroded shut.
But, that's not the end of the story. He kept the Browning in his house for a display piece for a year or so. Along with the Browning, he had several derelict Garands, Carbines, 1911s, and some German stuff, too. The s*** really hit the fan when it was time for him to rotate back to the US. The movers came to pack up his stuff and stopped in their tracks when they saw the Browning. They immediately called in the German police and customs officials, who confiscated everything after grilling my pal at local police HQ. Even though it was nonfunctional, my friend barely avoided jail time for possessing an automatic weapon. His commander also contemplated court martialing him for attempting to illegally import it into the US. However, once the Germans lost interest, so did the commander. Everything was confiscated and destroyed, and that seemed to end the matter.
Oh, another friend visited a site in Luxembourg where his father had been involved in a fatal mine-laying accident in Dec 44. His father, a captain, was leading a detail to lay anti-tank mines during the Battle of the Bulge. The personnel and mines were in a convoy of three halftracks parked on a dirt road in a forested area when a mine in the middle halftrack exploded. That explosion set off a chain reaction, destroying the vehicles and killing a number of the GIs. Years later, with his father's help, my friend visited the site. They recovered a number of GI relics, one of them being a mangled M-3 Greasegun with the barrel bent at a 90-degree angle. They donated it to a local village museum and avoided the hassle my other friend encountered.
Thought you all might enjoy these stories about potential WWII "bring backs," albeit decades after the fact.
I was stationed in Germany from 1987 to 1990. A few friends and I would routinely drive up to Luxembourg and Belgium with our metal detectors to scour Battle of the Bulge battle sites for relics. One day, one of my friends found all the pieces to a complete .30 Cal Browning machinegun, including the tripod. The find occurred in a spot where an American unit fought until they ran out of ammunition before surrendering. The US commander offered a white flag and negotiated a predetermined surrender time with the German commander. Prior to that time, all the GIs disassembled their weapons and either buried them or threw em into the forest. So it was with the Browning.
Over 4 decades later, my friend found a piece of the weapon and surmised what had happened. By searching in ever widening circles, he found all the parts to completely assemble the weapon. Obviously, it was quite corroded after four decades in the Belgian woods. However, my friend put some elbow grease to it. He first took all the parts down to the flightline maintenance area and had one of our maintainers bead-blast them in his spare time. He next filled in all the corrosion with aluminum paste. After it hardened, he sanded it off and then spray painted the whole thing flat black before putting it all together. From ten feet away, the thing looked like new. However, the action was permanently corroded shut.
But, that's not the end of the story. He kept the Browning in his house for a display piece for a year or so. Along with the Browning, he had several derelict Garands, Carbines, 1911s, and some German stuff, too. The s*** really hit the fan when it was time for him to rotate back to the US. The movers came to pack up his stuff and stopped in their tracks when they saw the Browning. They immediately called in the German police and customs officials, who confiscated everything after grilling my pal at local police HQ. Even though it was nonfunctional, my friend barely avoided jail time for possessing an automatic weapon. His commander also contemplated court martialing him for attempting to illegally import it into the US. However, once the Germans lost interest, so did the commander. Everything was confiscated and destroyed, and that seemed to end the matter.
Oh, another friend visited a site in Luxembourg where his father had been involved in a fatal mine-laying accident in Dec 44. His father, a captain, was leading a detail to lay anti-tank mines during the Battle of the Bulge. The personnel and mines were in a convoy of three halftracks parked on a dirt road in a forested area when a mine in the middle halftrack exploded. That explosion set off a chain reaction, destroying the vehicles and killing a number of the GIs. Years later, with his father's help, my friend visited the site. They recovered a number of GI relics, one of them being a mangled M-3 Greasegun with the barrel bent at a 90-degree angle. They donated it to a local village museum and avoided the hassle my other friend encountered.
Thought you all might enjoy these stories about potential WWII "bring backs," albeit decades after the fact.
Comments
Sharing stories is a fun thing to do on the forums except in the future, they belong on General Discussion.
Best.