Not much chance for practical hobby stuff yesterday, as I was off to Hull for my annual eye checkup. Having time to listen to stuff on the train, I was continuing my way through D-Day Through German Eyes Book 2 (link to Kindle version) - interesting stuff. Basically, it's pretty literal transcripts of interviews with German survivors of D-Day, that were conducted in the 50s by the author's grandfather while writing for 'Die Wermacht' magazine. A wide range of accounts, many with vastly differing views on the war, the French, the British, the Americans...
The interesting one yesterday was an interview with German military policeman Niklaus Lange, and his account of a resistance assassination of a Panzer officer using a Browning FP-45 Liberator, essentially a one-shot pistol dropped for the French Resistance's use. Lange (judging from the transcript) clearly was still suffering from PTSD, but it remains a fascinating account.
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| Browning FP-45 - CC BY 4.0, from https://digitaltmuseum.se/011024251246/pistol-fp-45 |
During my time study the SOE and the European Resistance movement, this gun was extremely unpopular with de Gaulle and the Free French. They wanted to control the supply of guns going into Europe and this was a very uncommon weapon to be found in France.
ReplyDeleteActually the among the most common rifle supplied to the Resistance was the Italian Carcano. Well they had a lot of them lying around.