DEVELOPMENT

‘A one-man, hand-held machine gun’

THE ORIGINS OF THE THOMPSON

The trench combat of the Great War spawned a number of weapons that were unique to the conflict and have since become commonplace on the battlefield: hand grenades, sniping rifles, flamethrowers, light mortars and submachine guns. But it was Germany who pioneered the first practical design of what was originally called the Maschienpistolen, or ‘machinepistol’, but is now referred to as the submachine gun, and this was the 9mm Bergmann MP18/1. The Germans quickly realized during the grim fighting for Verdun in 1916, that bolt-action rifles suffered from severe limitations in trench warfare. They were too long, cumbersome to carry, slow to shoot and reload, and actually too powerful: in trench warfare, where combat ranges seldom exceeded 200 yards (183m) and were frequently almost point-blank, a rifle with a theoretical range in excess of 2,000 yards (1,828m) was quite unnecessary. A short-range, rapid-firing weapon with a large magazine capacity was what was needed, so the development of the Bergmann became a landmark in firearms design. Some 30,000 were issued between late 1916 and 1918, and it was subsequently copied by dozens of other countries. The MP18/1 suffered from a few shortcomings, the main problem being the use of the unreliable Luger ‘snail-drum’ magazine, soon replaced by a simple ‘box’ magazine, but in general it performed superbly. The term ‘submachine gun’ arose from the weapon’s use of a sub-rifle calibre cartridge, generally a pistol calibre round, and the fact that it was capable of fully automatic fire.

   The Allies were aware of the need to improve infantry weapons for trench combat, but British soldiers were not thought trustworthy enough to be issued with a personal automatic weapon. It was commonly assumed by the British military hierarchy that Tommies would fire off every cartridge within seconds, leaving themselves helpless. In addition, in wartime few governments were willing to introduce any large-scale form of new technology, as industrial production was invariably straining to supply sufficient weapons and equipment to keep the war machine going. Ironically, it was the French, who had a tradition of producing outdated, poorly performing small arms, who introduced the concept of increased personal firepower with the introduction during World War I of the truly awful Chauchat light machine gun, and the slightly more efficient Fusil Mitrailleur Modèle 1917, a gas-operated five-shot semi-automatic rifle. Neither were exactly compact or light, but the basic concept behind them, of providing troops with additional firepower, was a sound one.

Auto-Ordnance’s Chief Engineer, Theodore H. Eickhoff was hired by Thompson in 1916 to assist in the development of what would become the Thompson submachine gun.

   America, which entered the European war in 1917, was also reluctant to adopt new technology. Its M1903 Springfield rifles were considered, with some justification, to be one of the finest military rifles then in use, and many soldiers were also equipped with the ubiquitous M1911 .45 Colt semiautomatic pistol, one of the best side-arms ever issued. Yet reports reaching US Army command began to indicate that while the Colt was proving excellent as a trench-fighting weapon, the Springfield was less so. This was bad news for Brigadier General John T. Thompson, who until 1914 had been the Chief of Small Arms for the Army Ordnance Department, and in this role he had strongly backed the development and adoption of the Springfield rifle. He had resigned from the army on the outbreak of war to become chief design engineer for the Remington Arms Company for whom he designed a huge new factory at Eddystone, Pennsylvania. Perhaps more significantly for the story of the Thompson, in 1916 he had also formed a firearms company with his son, Lieutenant Colonel Mercellus H. Thompson, which they named the Auto- Ordnance Corporation. He did so with financial backing from the very aptly named Thomas Fortune Ryan. Ryan was a financier of Irish origin, who had made a fortune from having the franchise to supply and run trams for the New York Metropolitan Traction Company, as well as from setting up the vast American Tobacco Company. Ryan had long been interested in firearms development and was intrigued by Thompson’s early idea for an automatic rifle, and he invested heavily in the formation of the new company.
   John Thompson rejoined the army in his previous capacity in 1917, and was given the unenviable position of being in charge of all small-arms production. The apparent shortcomings of the standard military rifle were of particular concern to him, as he was dedicated to ensuring American soldiers had the best possible small arms to wage the war. His response to the problem was typically forthright:

Our boys in the infantry, now in the trenches need a small machine gun, a gun that will fire 50 to 100 rounds, so light that he can drag it with him as he crawls on his belly from trench to trench, and wipe out a whole company single-handed. A one-man hand held machine gun. A trench broom. The nearest to what I have in mind is the French Chauchat 8mm machine rifle [but] it is too heavy [18lb] not enough ammunition [20 rounds] it is a poor design and of wretched construction… I want a little machine gun you can hold in your hands, fire from the hip and reload in the dark. You must use an ammunition now available … and I want it right away. Now get to it. Expense is no object!

General John T. Thompson demonstrating to an interested crowd of officials his new invention, the M1921, in a photograph from May 1922. The butt has been removed and the compact nature of the gun is self-evident. (© Bettmann/Corbis)

BLISH, EICKHOFF AND THE .45

Thompson was capably aided in the development of the new weapon by the combined efforts of several talented individuals. Primary among them was Captain John N. Blish, a naval mathematician and physicist who had discovered important new properties of certain metals relating to adhesion; when machined at very specific angles, these metals became alternately adhesive or repellent dependant on the pressures exerted on them. When applied to the breech mechanisms of firearms, these principles translated into systems of mechanical operation that eliminated the need for lubrication, linkages and similar mechanical complexities. For the development of a lightweight automatic gun, these discoveries had very great potential indeed. Thompson was fortunate too, in hiring a very able designer, Theodore H. Eickhoff, who was to become senior engineer for the new Auto-Ordnance factory. Eickhoff had long experience of firearms design, having worked in the office of the Chief of Ordnance before the war, and he had at one time been assigned to examine the existing automatic rifles then being developed around the world. He was certain that the best calibres available for such designs were not the rifle-sized bullets then in common use (normally of around .30 calibre), but larger, heavier bullets that were of lower power. Such cartridges exerted less pressure on the mechanisms of firearms, were easier to handle when firing in full- or semi-automatic mode and their compact dimensions allowed the firearms to be smaller and lighter. The cartridges also possessed spectacularly efficient man-stopping effect at close range, causing wounds that were, if not fatal, then extremely debilitating.

John N. Blish points to the lock that bears his name. The brochures for the M1919 featured tipped-in copies of this photo.

   Replacing the old .45in Long Colt revolver cartridge with the new .38 revolver cartridge had originally been the choice of the US Army, but experience during the Philippine Insurrection (1899–1902) fighting Moro tribesmen, who were often physically assisted by recreational drugs, proved that the .38 cartridge did not have adequate stopping power. One Marine officer, an excellent pistol shot, emptied his revolver into the chest of a charging tribesman to little decisive effect, and was only saved from disembowelling by the Marine behind him, who brought the man down with a rifle bullet. Eickhoff was convinced the best cartridge for the purpose then in production was a development of the Long Colt cartridge, the .45in Automatic Colt Pistol (ACP) round. The ‘.45 Auto’, as it was known, had been developed as a commercial cartridge by John Browning in 1905 and officially adopted by the US Ordnance Department six years later, when it was used in the M1911 Colt semi-automatic pistol. It used a 234-grain, jacketed round-nosed bullet that had a relatively low velocity of 820ft/sec (250m/sec). In practical terms, however, the weight and velocity meant that the bullet expended virtually all of its energy on the target, rather than going through it. Tests carried out on live animals destined for slaughter showed the tissue damage inflicted was at least as great as that of a rifle bullet at ranges of up to 55 yards (50m) and one soldier, accidentally hit by a .45 bullet, described it as ‘feeling as though a dozen men had rammed him in the shoulder with a telegraph pole’. Clearly, utilizing an existing cartridge as potent as the .45 ACP made sense, but the big question was, what type of firearm could be designed that would use it to its best advantage?
   The answer to that particular question lay in the minds of John Blish and a young man named Oscar V. Payne, although neither realized it at the time. In March 1915, Blish had patented a pistol using the ‘Breech Closure for Firearms’ system.¹ The pistol was loaded, and using his own unique locking wedge system (or sliding breech-block to be more accurate), the breech-block was pulled upwards on a rail to close the breech, and the pistol fired. The breech-block remained solidly locked in place until the chamber pressure dropped to a safe level, allowing it to slide down the rail. It was simple, clever and relatively easy to manufacture, but no-one was quite sure of its application.
   Meanwhile Oscar Payne, a 23-year-old engineer and draughtsman, had arrived at the offices of Auto-Ordnance asking for a job. He had already forged something of a reputation by disassembling a very complex rifle in front of a board of army officers, even though he had never seen the weapon before, and so impressed were they that one had mentioned his name to General Thompson. When Payne arrived in front of Thompson’s desk in spring 1917, he was immediately offered a position with the wonderfully vague title of ‘inventor and designer’. It was to be a prophetic move. In an attempt to utilize the Blish lock in an automatic role, General Thompson had, through Auto-Ordnance and the designs of Theo Eickhoff, produced a prototype light rifle that was chambered for the .30.06in Springfield cartridge, the Thompson Auto Rifle. It was beset with problems, and Payne was immediately assigned to look at and modify the design.

¹ US Patent No. 1,131,319; 9 March 1915

THE ‘AUTO-RIFLE’

In 1917, Auto-Ordnance produced its first prototype automatic rifle, using the Blish lock principle. It was a full-size weapon, looking not dissimilar to the Pattern 1917 rifle, and it chambered the .30-06 US cartridge. While the basic idea was sound, the mechanism was not, for the gun had a tendency to fire before the breech-block was actually in its locked position. As a result, it failed spectacularly, exploding while on the test bench, and Oscar Payne was asked to come up with suggestions for improvements. He and Theodore Eickhoff became convinced that the problem lay in the use of the .30-calibre cartridge, which was unsuitable for a weapon that used a friction lock, so they modified the breech-closing mechanism and Blish lock. All of the design team agreed with Eickhoff that to ensure reliable functioning, the .30 cartridge really needed to be replaced by something less powerful. All ammunition has what is known as a ‘coefficient of ejection’, which simply means that the bigger the body of the cartridge, the more likely it is to stick in the chamber after firing. This effect causes delayed ejection, as well as problems with high chamber pressures, and both Payne and Eickhoff realized that aside from its excellent ballistic performance, the short .45 ACP cartridge possessed the best coefficient of its type for use in an automatic weapon. At their suggestion, Thompson agreed to change the design of the rifle, and in September 1917 the ‘Persuader’ was built. This weapon bore a slight resemblance to the now familiar Thompson, but at the time it was an experimental one-off, and ultimately proved unsatisfactory, jamming after every two or three shots. There were several reasons for this problem, the main being that it used an unreliable belt-fed mechanism. Payne recounted that:

We found the belt to be impracticable and abandoned it altogether ... we had become accustomed to keeping the weight of parts to an absolute safe minimum, so quite naturally we also designed the machine gun as light as possible. Finally we came to the conclusion that the gun parts were entirely too light and movement of parts entirely too fast to drag into position a belt of heavy cartridges. We decided to wipe the slate clean and start all over again.

The prototype ‘Persuader’ showing the basic shape that would evolve into the familiar Thompson.

The ‘Annihilator 1’ was the first prototype incorporating a more ergonomic front and rear pistol grip layout with top mounted actuator, or cocking handle.

Cooling of the barrel was a problem, and the finning first appeared on the Model 1919 ‘Annihilator II’. Note the slots in the magazine well to accommodate a drum magazine.

   Work began anew in late 1917 on an improved design, but it was not until 1919 that a working variant was manufactured. This weapon bore many of the hallmarks of the later guns – a slab-sided receiver, rear and forward pistol grips, modified Colt M1911 box magazine and topmounted cocking handle – and was known as the ‘Annihilator’. There were many alterations made to the original design. It had a square bolt and the actuator, or cocking handle, was offset and machined in one piece with the firing pin, but it could only be fired in full-automatic mode. This new design posed a problem with regard to ammunition supply, as its rate of fire was a heady 1,500rpm and the Colt magazine held only seven rounds. Furthermore the barrel had no cooling fins fitted, vital on a weapon capable of such a rate of fire. In an attempt to solve the ammunition supply problem, a drum magazine holding 50 rounds was produced, and two more guns were manufactured. These second-generation guns also sported finned barrels, a removable front grip and the receiver was machined with slots for insertion of the drum magazine. Curiously, no butt was fitted, the gun quite literally being a ‘machine-pistol’. There was not even provision for a fore-sight, but the weapon was gradually taking on its own momentum, as parts of the guns were slowly modified and adapted to improve function and reliability. One area in which significant improvements were made was in the magazines, as a 20-round box pattern was produced as well as two drums, holding 50 or 100 rounds and named ‘L’ or ‘C’ pattern respectively (these being the Roman numerals for 50 and 100). Further additions to the original design included a selector switch for full- or semi-automatic fire, a rounded cocking handle set centrally into the top of the receiver and a simple blade fore-sight. Altering the angle of the Blish lock helped slow things down somewhat but the rate of 800 rpm was still high. By the end of 1918, some 24 guns had been constructed. (A number of guns with no serial numbers have surfaced over recent years, so the actual total weapons made may be as high as 40.) These early weapons were known as the M1919 and the series was used as a rolling test-bed to smooth out the rough mechanical edges and ensure the basic concept was sound. Both Payne and Eickhoff were satisfied that the gun was practical, but it still needed to be simplified to ensure the least number of working parts for both reliable functioning and ease of manufacture. There was little that could be done to reduce the high machining costs, despite the fact that the final variant of the M1919 comprised only 11 major component parts, and Auto-Ordnance desperately needed orders. The time had come to put the gun into production.

Two New York City policemen pose for a publicity photo with M1919 ‘Annihilator III’ Thompsons.

   Making the gun was all very well, of course, but it still lacked a name and any model designation. It was still, strictly speaking, a machine-pistol, but this was not to Thompson’s taste and it was suggested that it be called a ‘sub-calibre gun’ to show that it used a smaller cartridge than a rifle. This term was already in use, however, for military rifles that were fitted with small-bore training barrels for target use, usually of .22 calibre. It was believed that prospective purchasers would be confused by this term, so during one of Auto-Ordnance’s meetings someone (exactly who was never recorded) suggested the term ‘submachine gun’. Further suggestions about its possible name were bandied about, and it very nearly became the Ryan submachine gun, after Thomas Ryan. Ryan himself disapproved of this name, stating he knew nothing about guns, and suggested it simply be called the Thompson gun – and so it was.

COLT AND THE NEW MODEL 1921

Auto-Ordnance was not capable of volume production of the new weapon, having only a small machine shop with nine staff, so if the new gun were to be manufactured in quantity and at reasonable cost, it needed facilities for mass production. The simple answer was to use the huge engineering potential of the Colt Patent Firearms Company at Hartford, Connecticut, which had already been assisting with the development of the M1919. General Thompson had previously worked closely with Colt on the M1911 pistol, so it was not unsurprising that in August 1920 Auto-Ordnance signed a contract with Colt to make 15,000 guns at the rate of 100 guns per day, at an initial price of $38.25 per gun. Colt was also contracted to produce the magazines.Work began straight away on tooling up, Colt taking one M1919 gun to use as a pattern, and by February 1921 they had the machinery in place to begin manufacture. The first guns were produced by 30 March 1921 and all were checked by Auto-Ordnance’s own inspector, Major John Barrett, a very experienced man who recorded every detail of their manufacture, inspection and shipping. These Colt- Thompsons were made to very high standards of workmanship and began their lives with the nomenclature ‘Model of 1921A’ . Some 15,000 would be manufactured. The guns bore all of the hallmarks of the original Thompson design, with a 10½in (26.6cm) finned barrel and a blade fore-sight; they were also fitted with an adjustable Lyman ladder-type rear sight, which required the centrally mounted cocking handle on the top of the receiver to be slotted to enable aim to be taken through it. There were distinctive walnut fore and rear pistol grips but the most noticeable addition was that of a walnut stock, which fitted on sliding rails under the rear of the receiver and could be removed in seconds by pressing a release button. The stock provided much improved grip for shooting, made for steadier aim and helped control the recoil. There was a fire mode selector switch on the left side, providing either full-auto or single-shot modes, and a safety lever that worked by blocking the sear. The gun could use a 20-round box magazine, but the receivers were all machined to accept the 50- or 100-round drum magazine. As the gun was capable of a theoretical rate of fire of 800rpm, a 100-round drum capacity was not regarded as excessive, although it added 3lb 2oz (1.4kg) to a gun that was already tipping the scales at 10lb 4oz (4.6kg) empty. All guns were serial numbered on the left receiver, under the butt stock on the frame and under the fore-grip. In 1926, Colonel Richard W. Cutts and his son had begun work designing a ‘compensator’ that could be fitted to the barrel of a rifle or machine gun. It would allow the muzzle blast generated by the propellant gases to vent upwards, helping counteract the tendency of automatic weapons to muzzle-climb when being fired. Initially, Cutts tried attaching weights to the muzzle, a system that worked but was hardly practical. The idea for using the muzzle gas to counteract climb actually came from some old-established technology. ‘Falling back on the principles of steam engineering as applied to turbines, we discovered that we could harness the power of propellant gases and thereby reduce the recoil, by attaching an expansion chamber and tube at the end of the barrel.’ Determining the effectiveness of the designs posed something of a problem, however, so Cutts approached Philip Quayle, a physicist working at the Peters Cartridge Company of Ohio, and put the problem to him. Quayle was a gun enthusiast who had developed a high-speed camera that could film bullets in flight. ‘This allowed us to see the results of the changes we were making in the design of a compensating device.’
   Muzzle-climb certainly posed a problem for anyone using an M1921 in full-automatic mode, for unless fired in short controlled bursts the Thompson would invariably end up pointing high and right of the point of aim. Solving this challenge became Cutts’ personal obsession, as he explained:

As the gun recoiled after the first shot and before the shooter could recover from the kick, the gun would fire its second shot and the muzzle would bounce still higher. Successive shots would punch the muzzle up and up, with the shooter himself actually hindering it, because his muscular effort and delayed muscular reaction prevented the gun from dropping to its original level so that its jump started from a higher point after each shot.

   The net result was a simple screw-on compensator with four vertical vent slots that allowed the gas to blow upwards on firing; this system created a powerful down-thrust that helped counteract the muzzle-climb. The Lyman Corporation liked the idea and offered to manufacture the Cutts compensator on the basis of a $1 commission to Colonel Cutts per unit sold. They began to appear on Thompsons from early 1927 onwards and guns supplied with them were advertised as M1921ACs. Further development of the Thompson did not stop with the introduction of the M1921, for a number were converted at the factory to semi-automatic fire only. The rationale behind this conversion is not easy to determine, but it is probable that there was some demand for a cheaper version that was more controllable than the full-auto version. How many were made is not known, possibly fewer than a hundred and original examples today are rare.

1. A view of the Model 1921AC, showing its very distinctive silhouette. Many collectors and firearms historians believe this to be the most classic of all the Thompson models.

2. The beautifully sculpted foregrip, with front mounted sling swivel. 3. The quick-release stock showing the machined slot into which the guide rails on the receiver slotted.

4. The patent markings on the left side of the receiver. 5. Colt’s markings on the right.

6. The Lyman rear sight, graduated to 600 yards. Note also the Auto-Ordnance ‘bullet’ logo on the receiver. 7. The effective Cutts compensator. It is attached by means of a pin visible below the fore sight to the right of the picture.

8. The breech-block and firing-pin aperture. The body was slotted to enable the Blish lock to fit inside it. 9. The Blish lock, showing its very complex shape. Machining this was both time consuming and costly and omitting it from the later guns made for considerable savings without impairing performance. 10. The actuator, or cocking handle. Later models had a heavier actuator fixed to the right side of the breech-block.

THE BRITISH THOMPSONS

In May 1921, General Thompson went on a sales tour of Europe, visiting Belgium, Britain, France and Spain. He was invited to demonstrate the M1921 at the Royal Small Arms Factory at Enfield on 30 June 1921, which he did with some success. The resultant report made by the Chief Inspector of Small Arms makes interesting reading. Although it is too long to reproduce in full, some sections concerning the accuracy and reliability of the gun are worth reproducing. There was some puzzlement expressed about the requirement for the Blish locking system, albeit couched in faintly impenetrable army technical language.

There is an element of doubt as to whether the use of the lock is a positive one. The inclination of the sides of the ‘H’ and the corresponding angle of the grooves in the breech block tend to closure, whereas … the inclination of the outside ‘ears’ and the corresponding angle of the grooves in the receiver tend to release. It is well known that with pistol ammunition the inertia weight of the breech block and the resistance of its return spring afford sufficient resistance to hold up the cartridge [case] while the bullet leaves the barrel, provided such weight and spring resistance are correctly worked out. ²

   In simple terms, the Chief Inspector was questioning the necessity of the Blish lock, as the counterbalancing weight of the breech-block and its recoil spring, matched to the cartridge performance, should in theory provide sufficient delay on opening when operating on a straightforward blowback principle. Indeed, the Small Arms staff at Enfield pre-empted the alteration of the design of later Thompsons by removing the Blish lock completely and then firing the gun remotely under safe conditions. The results were instructive: ‘The rounds were fired, both ejection and extraction being satisfactory. The gun functioned well and the condition of the spent cases was found to be identical with that of the spent cases … fired with the wedge assembled to the gun.’ There was also doubt about the efficacy of the drum magazines: ‘The 20 round box magazines are much simpler than the drum magazines and appreciably lighter for the same number of rounds, 5 empty box magazines holding 100 rounds in all weighing 2lb as against 3lbs 2ozs for the 100 round drum and 2lbs 8ozs for the 50 round drum. The box magazines are simpler for packing and transport.’ There were a few reliability problems when the Thompson was tested, mostly with ammunition failing to fire (not necessarily the Thompson’s fault), and some ejection problems. But overall the British report praised the Thompson: ‘The weapon is handy, compact and is designed in a manner convenient for manufacture.’

George Goll firing an M1921 Thompson in front of an invited audience of British officers at Bisley Camp in summer 1921. The climbing muzzle caused by the recoil on the gun can clearly be seen and Lyman sights would have been of questionable practical use.

Left is a .30in Springfield round which proved too powerful for the initial Thompson design. Next are the .45in Colt ACP and 9mm Luger Parabellum cartridges, both of which were used in Thompsons, and lastly a .32in Colt automatic cartridge for comparison.

   But there were no orders forthcoming, the British government being very reluctant to spend money re-equipping the army with a weapon that was relatively expensive, unproven in combat and went against all of their guiding principles with regard to issuing automatic weapons to soldiers. This was, after all, the same army command that had insisted that the Lee-Enfield rifle be fitted with a magazine cut-off ‘to prevent the unnecessary expenditure of ammunition’, and which refused to countenance the issue of semi-automatic pistols to their soldiers during the Great War for similar reasons. The prospect of actually giving the soldiery a gun capable of such high rates of fire horrified many at the Board of Ordnance, and in the wake of the public’s distaste for anything involving military expenditure after 1918, there was little chance of the Thompson being adopted by Britain.

A military Model 1923 Thompson with fitted bipod and 16in barrel. The Thompson could not cope well in a sustained fire role due to overheating.

   Undeterred, the designers continued to try to find a way to get their gun purchased in Europe. Demonstrations to the French Army in 1921 and 1923 were moderately successful, but the testing was marred by component failure: ‘It was observed that the bolt had broken in two parts. This must have occurred before the shooting [test] was over because the break had very pronounced caulking.’ Unmentioned at the time was the fact that despite this damage, the Thompson had continued to function, whereas most other submachine guns would have ground to a halt. The Belgian Army were quite impressed with the Thompson, when it was demonstrated to them in 1923, but they wanted it chambered for the 9mm Parabellum cartridge, then an extremely popular calibre in Europe.The dilemma faced by Auto-Ordnance was that they could not easily set up manufacturing facilities to make variants of the gun, so they approached the Birmingham Small Arms (BSA) factory in 1925 with an offer that BSA make, under licence, ‘European’ models of the Thompson. Little of the history of these guns has survived, and they are not generally well known outside of collectors’ circles, but the first of the preproduction models was named ‘Model of 1926’ and was chambered for 9mm. It had been designed by BSA’s brilliant engineer George Norman and bore only a passing resemblance to the original Thompson guns. It had a wooden stock and fore-end that enclosed the front of the receiver, an unprotected 300m (328-yard) graduated ladder-type rear sight, a deeper, milled receiver with separate selector and safety levers, and a magazine release catch that was considerably simplified compared to the M1921.
   In January 1927, the first 9mm example was demonstrated to the French military weapons testing facility at Versailles (the VTC). The gun was also supplied with a bipod to permit sustained fire, as crucially its rate of discharge had increased from 800rpm to a blistering 1,200rpm. Yet inexplicably, no drum magazines were available, and it was only tested with the 20-round box magazine. Extracts from the subsequent French report are instructive:

The Thompson submachine gun discharges in single fire or as a machine gun. In the first case, precision [accuracy] is excellent up to 600 metres; in the second the overly rapid rate does not allow the weapon to be shot unsupported without excessive scattering [of the bullets]. The weapon underwent a test fire of 3,500 rounds with 2,500 in automatic fire, which led to only a few minor problems, but inspection … revealed a broken bolt and galling on the Blish lock, on the cocking notch and on the tip of the sear.

   Clearly, the French were not overly impressed with the performance of the weapon, as in single-shot mode it was not as accurate as a rifle, and in full-auto mode it was difficult to control. They concluded: ‘Following an earlier weapon study of this type, the VTC were not interested in guns shooting ordinary pistol cartridges. The latter [test] shows, compared to the same type of weapons studied in France, no marked improvement.’
   Despite the production of the 9mm gun, neither the French nor Belgian Army placed any orders. This lack of response, however, did not stop BSA from working on an improved model, the M1929, which bore a stronger resemblance to the original M1921 design, with a plain wood fore-end and a bird’s head pistol grip on the stock to provide a surer grip. This stock mutated into a more elegant sporting type, with a swell for the trigger hand to aid grip. The magazine was curved and a number of different calibres were offered, including 9mm Bergmann and 7.63mm Mauser, but despite the improvements no major orders were forthcoming, and BSA ceased production of the Thompson in 1930.

² Report by the Chief Inspector of Small Arms, RSAF Enfield (9 July 1921). Courtesy of the Pattern Room Library, National Firearms Collection, Leeds.

POSTAL SERVICE AND MARINE THOMPSONS

Meanwhile, the undeterred Auto-Ordnance sales team had continued to demonstrate the gun across America. Their first major order came from an unexpected source, the US Postal Service, who following a series of brutal robberies ordered 200 M1921A Thompsons to provide security for mail trains. These guns were actually supplied to the US Marine Corps, which was tasked with guarding these trains, and the Marines instantly took the Thompsons to their hearts. It was due to this early ownership that they conducted further tests in 1927. Although impressed, the Marine Corps asked Auto-Ordnance to try to reduce the rate of fire, so Oscar Payne (who had by then left the company) was tasked with finding a solution. This he did in a typically simple manner, by weighting the actuator with a riveted steel block and reducing the strength of the recoil and buffer springs. These measures dropped the cyclical rate to a far more manageable 600rpm and the US Marines’ postal service Thompsons were retro-converted to the new design, as were all stocks of earlier guns, which were re-stamped ‘1928’ over the original ‘1921’. The M1928 was officially introduced on 1 January that year and the left side of the receivers were marked ‘U.S Navy’. Tests were carried out on 12 M1928s by the Chief of Ordnance at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland through mid February 1928, and the new weapon proved very acceptable: ‘2010 rounds were fired with only three malfunctions, these being a failure to extract on gun number 7510. These were perhaps due to both corroded ammunition and a slight burring of the bronze lock.’³ The result was a very favourable test report, with only some faint criticism:

1. The guns which were submitted for test are in excellent firing condition.
   
2. That for tracer firing the mechanism opens a little too quickly this results in the gases getting into the eyes of the gunner.
   
3. That the twelve guns as received from the Auto-Ordnance Corporation are satisfactory for test by the Infantry, Tank Corps and Cavalry.
   

FBI agent on the range at the US Department of Justice building, with a Navy M1928 Thompson fitted with ‘L’ drum magazine.

   The M1928 is probably the most iconic and instantly recognizable of all of the Thompsons, with its finned barrel, bulbous Cutts compensator on the muzzle, drum magazine and wooden double pistol grips. As a result of this testing, 1,500 guns were accepted into US Navy service on 14 March 1932 as the ‘Gun, Submachine, Caliber .45, US Navy Model of 1928’. The Tommy gun was finally beginning its military career.

³ US Ordnance Department report of 7 March 1928.

THE NEW MODELS

The years 1928–29 were crucial for Auto-Ordnance, as General Thompson retired from his position as head of the company in 1928, and the following year Fortune Ryan died. Sales of the Thompson had not been good, the Colt-made weapons having more or less kept the company afloat. Some 10,300 models had been sold in the United States and abroad, but they were insufficient to keep the company viable. The Thompson’s increasing use by the lawless elements of society had done nothing to add to its reputation either, and the Ryan heirs were keen to liquidate the company, which was valued at a mere $412,000 but with colossal debts of $2,200,000. Yet John and Marcellus Thompson (the son of General Thompson), still majority shareholders, blocked any and every attempt to shut down the company.
   This unhappy situation continued for the next decade, with Auto- Ordnance teetering on the brink of extinction but managing to continue on the basis of limited government orders. How long this situation could have continued is debatable, but coincidentally Marcellus died in 1939 and John Thompson the following year, enabling a suave and smoothtalking entrepreneur named Russell Maguire to purchase the ailing company for $529,000, on the understanding that the outstanding debt was written off. He cleverly managed to acquire a majority 50.8 per cent holding in the company, and thus the new Thompson Automatic Arms Corporation was formed. His acquisition did not endear him to either the arms industry or government, for he had something of a reputation for being, in today’s terminology, an asset stripper. However, like it or not, the future of the Thompson was in his hands and there was little that could be done about it.

A 50-round ‘L’ drum designed by Oscar Payne, illustrating the positioning of the cartridges with the front plate and winder removed.

   Meanwhile, events outside of America were set to change not only the fortunes of the new company, but also the course of world history. While the outbreak of war between Britain and Germany in 1939 did not initially involve the United States, it led to a sudden upsurge in demand for small arms of all types from Britain, whose small professional army was woefully under-resourced. (See section ‘Britain adopts the Thompson’ below.) The evacuation from Dunkirk in May and June 1940 resulted in huge losses of materiel and weapons that British industrial production, still on a peacetime footing, was unable to replace at sufficient speed. The constant rises in demand put pressure on Thompson Arms, and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 raised the stakes even higher. Two major problems faced Thompson at the start of 1939: the slow production of the M1928 guns, and their high cost. Larger-scale production was the answer, as large numbers reduced costs, but this step required a manufacturer with the capacity and experience to produce a product as complex as the Thompson. Colt had by this time ceased production of the Thompson, as it was no longer commercially viable, so Maguire approached the Savage Arms Corporation with an offer of manufacturing the M1928 under licence. Despite their misgivings (they had turned down a similar suggestion back in 1920), they agreed on the basis that all the existing tooling was supplied to them by Colt, and that 50 per cent of the contract price was paid in advance. Clearly Maguire’s reputation for being fly-by-night had preceded him. The initial contract of 13 December 1939 was for the supply of 10,000 M1928A guns at a cost price of $32 each ($496 or approximately £800 in current value), less the Cutts compensator or Lyman rear sight, as both were purchased directly from Lyman. Barrels would be threaded to accept a compensator and the fore-grip was attached at an extra cost of 67 cents per gun.
   The initial hope was that production would be started within ten weeks of the contract signing, but there was a complex chain of supply problems that seemingly no-one had understood. In fact, many of the parts for the original Thompsons had not been made by Colt at all, but had been subcontracted to a number of different suppliers. Although Colt had mainly been responsible for machining of the receivers and breech-blocks of the M1921 guns, the unmachined forgings were provided to them by Billings & Spencer of Hartford, Connecticut. The butt assembly, including buttplate, quick-release mechanism and barrel blanks, had been supplied by Remington Arms of Ilion, New York, who bought in the wood blanks from several suppliers. Originally both Colt and Savage had undertaken machining work on the barrels. The compensators were made by the Lyman Gunsight Company, who also supplied the sights, and some of the original tooling was still in use by both Colt and Remington, who were supplying spare parts for existing guns. Savage decided to begin production at its Utica factory in New York, but the proposed start date of January 1940 was very optimistic, and it is to their credit that production actually began fairly soon afterwards, in May 1940. The guns were sold to Thompson initially at $67 each, but this figure dropped to $59 by 1942, as production was simplified. Sale price to the US government was $130 per gun and a whopping $200 to the UK or other foreign buyers, which equated to about £45 at the time (about $3,320 or £2,070 in today’s currency). Almost all Savage-made guns have components stamped ‘S’ and serial numbers prefixed with an ‘S’, with the exception of one contract for 50,000 guns, unmarked for reasons that have baffled firearms historians ever since.⁴ Otherwise, all of the Savagemade guns are identical to the Colt ‘Navy’ Models of 1928, albeit some later guns were parkerized rather than blued.
   Up until this time, the US Army had shown little interest in the gun, but gradually realized that there were no other viable options. Back in March 1932 they had placed the Thompson on a ‘limited procurement list’ for weapons they regarded as useful but non-essential. Initial cavalry interest in replacing their rifles with Thompsons had waned, and while a few guns had been purchased the cavalry formations preferred to wait for the issue of the new Garand M1 semi-automatic rifle. Later comparative tests actually showed that for cavalry use, which by now was predominantly service in armoured vehicles, the M1 was actually ill suited, being too long and overly powerful. They belatedly turned to the Thompson, which in September 1938 was re-designated as the ‘Submachine Gun, Caliber .45, Model of 1928A1’, and was at last placed on the official weapons supply list. Even then, the army did not look seriously at purchasing the guns for infantry issue, and it was not until June 1939 that they issued their first order to Thompson Arms, for 950 guns. Events moved quickly after that, for by late 1940, this number had been increased significantly to 20,405 M1928A1s, although a large number of these were destined for Britain. Post-Pearl Harbor, however, attitudes changed markedly, and the Ordnance Board began to realize that the supply of firearms was inadequate for the army’s needs. By February 1942, half a million Thompsons had been manufactured. Eventually, US troops in every theatre of war were carrying these submachine guns.

⁴ Contract G-4, dated 6 November 1940.

THOMPSON SUBMACHINE GUN CUTAWAY

M1928A1

Thompson Thompson models varied considerably in external appearance as the demands of a war economy forced a change from the traditional rich glossy blue-black exterior to a far more functional matt grey Parkerised finish. While the internal mechanisms were also simplified and cheapened, the basis function differed very little from the early Model 1921s to the last Model M1A1s. Specifications given are for the Model 1928A1.

1. The Cutts compensator, showing the slotted vents that helped keep the barrel down when firing on fully-automatic.
2. The sharp blade foresight. In combat this snagged on clothing and accoutrements and in its final incarnation, the M1A1, the foresight was a rounded pattern with no angular edges.
3. The unique walnut fore-grip. It aided aiming and steadied the weapon but was expensive to manufacture and like the foresight it was not entirely practical in combat.
4. The 10.5 inch (266mm) barrel, with six-groove, right-hand twist rifling. It made the overall length of the M1928A1 33.75 ins (857mm).
5. The 50-round drum magazine. With a cyclic rate of 800rpm this could be emptied in 3.7 seconds, firing its .45 calibre bullets at a velocity of 910 fps (277m/s).
6. The centrally mounted actuator, or cocking handle. Practical for either right or left-handed shooters it blocked the view of the foresight, so had to have a slot machined through it.
7. The recoil or buffer spring. This soaked up recoil but more importantly provided the motive force to return the breech block to the firing position, stripping a fresh cartridge from the magazine as it did so.
8. The walnut pistol grip. A comfortable design that did not change, it was retained by a single large internal screw.
9. The protective wings for the delicate Lyman sight. Omitted from the M1, they were reinstated on the M1A1 models.
10. The walnut stock. A quick-release design, it also held an oil bottle accessed via a small flap in the steel buttplate.
11. The sling swivel. Many combat Thompsons had the rear swivel moved to the side or top of the butt and the foregrip swivel screwed to the left or right side of the grip providing a more comfortable position for the sling.

IMPROVEMENTS, AND THE M1A1

Despite Savage’s initial lack of enthusiasm for producing the Thompson, it was gradually proving profitable, for by the end of 1940 some 20,450 guns had been ordered. But there still remained the practical difficulties in manufacturing a gun with the close internal tolerances required by the Blish system and the amount of machining required for items such as the expensive walnut stocks and pistol grips, finned barrel, compensator, adjustable sights etc. To make a gun soldier-proof is very difficult indeed, as any weapons designer will confirm. It must be robust, have minimal working parts, be simple to strip and re-assemble, have nothing that requires adjustment (if a soldier can fiddle with something to ‘improve’ it, he will do), be relatively unaffected by dirt, sand and lack of oil, and be tolerant of a poor cleaning regime. The M1928s fell short in a number of respects, for beautifully finished as they were, they required a reasonable level of care, the fore-end grip protruded awkwardly and the adjustable rear sight was unnecessary on a close-range weapon. The drum magazines were also awkward to fit and heavy to carry, as well as being prone to rattling, as one soldier reportedly remarked, ‘like a can of ball-bearings’.

 

Left and right side views of an M1A1 clearly showing the cleaner lines of this variant. The actuator has been moved to the right, the plain fore-end and short muzzle make for smoother profile. The under-mounted sling swivels were not ideal though, as the gun tended to hang upside-down when carried across the chest. This weapon was used during the battle of Guadalcanal.

 

The original M1 peep-rearsight (director) on the right, compared to the improved M1A1 with its protective wings on the left.

   From 1940 there began a slow process of evolution that was to lead to the Thompson becoming a much leaner and more workman-like side-arm, but initially there was not a coherent policy. As with any production item, variations occurred depending on when changes were introduced, the availability of certain components and sometimes simply what was in the parts bins at the time. Therefore Thompsons could, and did, appear with any number of parts variations, due mainly to the vagaries of production in the years between 1940 and the eventual production of the wartime M1 models in 1942. This evolutionary period was interesting from the point of view of understanding the shortcomings of the original design when put into military use. Generally, guns commercially supplied to law-enforcement departments or private citizens are seldom given the sort of harsh use that a combat firearm will receive in its lifetime, and weaknesses show up very quickly.
   Internally, the time-consuming machined ejector was replaced with one made of spring steel, with the ejector being riveted over to retain it. The distinctive rounded barrel fins, thought vital for cooling when the gun was used at maximum rate of fire, were first altered to a simpler, squared section, then eliminated altogether. In practice, the Thompson was seldom used with an ammunition supply greater than 50 rounds, and mostly with 20-round box magazines. Changing the smaller-capacity magazines gave sufficient time for the barrel to cool and short bursts of fire were normal in combat, hence the capacity of the larger drums was more hindrance than help. An unfinned barrel was found to be sufficiently robust not to require additional cooling. The Lyman rear sight was discontinued, being replaced with a very simple riveted ‘L’ shaped peepsight that was later given additional protection by the fitting of angular ‘wings’ similar to those used on the Lyman. Lighter, cheaper hardwoods were substituted for the lovely but costly American walnut stocks and the fore-end grip, which often snagged in clothing or on equipment, was eliminated. Instead, a horizontal fore-end with finger grooves was introduced in March 1941. Sling swivels were inserted into both fore-end and butt stock. All of these improvements were based on practical experience in the field, but they did not greatly speed up production, and demand for the Thompson was growing by the day.

Although by this stage in the war the M1A1 was the commonly issued Thompson, this 1943 War Bonds poster still chose to feature the classic shape of the M1928.

Production guns being inspected at the Savage factory.

   A request by the British government for assistance with the supply of war materiel subsequently led to the creation of the Lend-Lease programme in March 1941, whereby ships, tanks, vehicles and small arms were to be sent to Britain in exchange for use of vital military bases in Canada, Bermuda and the West Indies. Initially some 4,700 Colt-manufactured M1921A Thompsons were set aside for shipment to Britain. Clearly production at Savage was going to be insufficient to meet the demand, and the site for a new Auto-Ordnance plant was purchased in August 1940 at Bridgeport, Connecticut. Production did not begin until January 1941 and was limited to the manufacture of receivers and trigger units, with Remington still being the major contractor for the supply of barrels, most internal parts, butts and fittings.
   In the face of complaints from the US government about the high cost of Thompsons, Auto-Ordnance needed to lower the unit price of their guns. Although they had managed to lower it to $108 by the end of 1941, it was still expensive in comparison to other guns – an M1 Garand rifle, for example, was half the price. At this point, Savage engaged the fertile brain of an ex-patriot British engineer named John Pearce, who had become their chief engineer. He and co-designer Nicholas Brewer took a long hard look at the Thompson, in particular its complex Blish lock. They were well aware of the test reports from two decades earlier, in which Thompsons had been successfully fired without the lock in place, and they were sure that workable guns could be produced if it was eliminated. They set to work, and by the winter of 1941 had produced a test piece that they demonstrated to F. Hickey, president of Savage Arms. It was test fired for 10,000 rounds and performed excellently; indeed, so confident were Savage and Pearce that they submitted the ‘New Model’ to the US Army Ordnance Board for testing in March 1942. The most fundamental change internally was the total omission of the Blish locking system, for with the breech-block and recoil spring properly matched to the power of the .45- calibre cartridge, the Thompson functioned perfectly as a simple blowback weapon. As military use of the drum magazine was almost negligible, the locating slots for it on the receiver body were also removed, allowing only the use of box magazines. The centrally mounted cocking handle, always contentious on the M1928, was moved to the right-hand side of the receiver, although this was possibly a retrograde step, as it made the gun more difficult for left-handers to cock and carry across the body. (An experimental ambidextrous M1A1 was manufactured later in the war, but never put into production.) The lovely chequered fire selector and safety levers of the original guns were altered to simple rotating studs with steel pins through them. Internal parts such as firing pins, recoil springs, extractors and trigger units remained basically the same as on the M1928.

TOP AND MIDDLE One of the experimental aluminium-bodied Thompsons with plastic stock and fore-end.
BOTTOM A silenced Thompson. Some were supplied for Special Operations Executive (SOE) use and from experience the author can confirm that they are very quiet indeed.

   These new guns were designated ‘Gun, Submachine, Caliber .45, Thompson M1’. An even simpler variant, the M1A1 model, was devised in late 1942 but differed only in so far as it did away with the floating firing pin and hammer on the breech-block common to the earlier models. It was replaced by a simpler one-piece breech-block and firing pin, further cutting back on production time and cost. The cyclic rate without the Blish lock remained relatively similar, at 700rpm. Most significantly, though, the price of a Thompson had dropped from $225 per gun to $44. As it was, the new gun was only slightly more compact at 32in (81.3cm) and fractionally lighter at 10lb 6oz (4.74kg), a saving of a mere 6oz (170g) over the M1928. A larger-capacity 30-round magazine was also available as well. In a further attempt to cut production time and lighten the guns, early in 1943 Savage produced an aluminium-bodied gun based on the M1928 design. There was considerable logic to this, for aluminium alloy is cheaper than steel, faster and easier to machine, lighter and, if sufficiently thick walled, almost as strong. The use of wood was also believed to be outmoded, for plastic was rapidly becoming the material of the future, for it could be moulded to any shape and was waterproof. Unfortunately, testing showed up a number or potential shortcomings in the aluminium design. The battering given to the rear of the receiver by the recoil spring and buffer deformed the alloy, eventually breaking a large piece of it off. Furthermore, the guns were even heavier than the originals, mainly due to the thickness of the aluminium required to prevent its deformation and the increased weight of the ‘Franzite’ plastic used for the stock. Savage manufactured 40 of these guns, in a mixture of types, most being a direct copy of the M1928, although some were slight hybrids with horizontal fore-ends. Few were serial numbered and at the end of the testing all of the guns were supposedly destroyed. The concept of using alloys and plastics in firearms put Savage light years ahead of other weapons manufacturers, but they were defeated by the poor materials then available.

BRITAIN ADOPTS THE THOMPSON

When war broke out in September 1939, no-one, least of all Neville Chamberlain’s government, had even the remotest idea of the enormity of events that would soon unfold. The ‘phoney war’ period was one of gathering forces, stockpiling existing weapons and frantically placing contracts for more. The Bren gun was in service along with the indomitable Lee-Enfield rifle, but the British Army, consistently underfunded in the 1930s, was bereft of light automatic weapons. Conveniently forgetting its earlier summing up of the Thompson as ‘that tatty American gangster gun’ after earlier testing, the Board of Ordnance requested that the government sanction the purchase of ‘as many Thompson machine carbines as possible’. With the election of Winston Churchill as prime minister in 1940, things began to move quickly. Churchill, an ex-soldier and weapons enthusiast, was also significantly a believer in the Thompson, publicly paraphrasing the Time magazine comment that ‘General Thompson’s gun may be, pound for pound, the most devastating weapon devised for war.’ He immediately sanctioned the acquisition of M1928 guns, and the British Purchasing Commission, based in New York, placed the order in February 1940.

The boxed Thompson kit issued to British units in the early months of the war. (IWM FIR 6362E)

   At first, only 450 were to be supplied, and the subsequent contract did not actually specify a number – Britain needed all the guns it could get. Ordnance inspectors were sent from Britain to check and stamp all export guns destined for Europe, and many guns that remained in the United States but never reached England bear their inspection stamps. They were to be shipped by Savage as fast as possible at $225 apiece, and these guns, finished in commercial blue, were supplied in a transit chest with walnut stocks and two ‘L’ type drum magazines, four box magazines, a webbing sling, 1,000 rounds of ammunition and a cleaning kit. Curiously, the first units to receive the Thompsons were not regular army units, but the men of the highly secret Home Guard Special Units, a small army comprised of professional soldiers and Home Guard men with previous military experience, who together were to become the core of a country-wide resistance in the event of invasion. They had access to a series of specially constructed underground bunkers, cleverly camouflaged in remote areas, in which weapons, food and radio equipment were stockpiled. These units had been formed at the very start of the war, and they received the first deliveries of Thompsons in early spring 1940.

Winston Churchill believed the Thompson to be vital in aiding British forces win the war. Here, he inspects an M1928 during a tour of invasion defences near Hartlepool, 31 July 1940. (IWM H 2646)

   Exactly how many Thompsons were supplied is unknown, but doubtless some still lie, safely packed and greased, in sealed bunkers secreted in woods dotted around the country. It was not until early 1941 that the first M1928s began to find their way into the army, and to begin with only Commando units were issued with them, as one ex-Commando recounted: ‘We were given a new carbine, the Tommy gun, in, I think April or May 1941. We had all seen them at the pictures, of course, Al Capone and the rest, so we went around talking like Jimmy Cagney for a while. In fact they were very well made, beautiful really. But blimey, they were heavy things.’⁵ Commando units were selected for early supply because of their need for a compact, fast-firing side-arm that was reliable and hard hitting, and the Thompson fit the bill exactly.

Seated at the dining table with his wife, a sergeant of the Dorking Home Guard in Surrey, England, gives his Tommy gun a final polish before leaving home to go on parade. (IWM H 5850)

   As the Lend-Lease programme got underway, more and more Thompsons found their way to Britain. By this time, the US government was wholly responsible for the supply of weapons under Lend-Lease, and total British orders for the Thompson stood at 514,000. Despite the depredations of the U-boats on the Atlantic convoys, some supplies of Thompsons continued to reach Britain, but of the guns ordered only 100,000 had arrived by April 1942. However, panic measures to introduce some alternative to the costly Thompson had resulted, by the summer of 1941, in the production of the Sten submachine gun. Unlike the finely machined M1928, with its beautiful finish, the Sten was assembled by unskilled workers from black-painted parts supplied by subcontractors, and cost £2.50 (about £112 or $180 in current values). It was unlovely, crude and dangerous if mishandled, but also serviceable and easy to manufacture and repair. Sten guns became a priority for issue to all European Theatre of Operations (ETO) Commonwealth troops with the exception of the Commando brigades who were mostly supplied with Thompsons – and wanted to keep them. Curiously, despite the availability of the Sten, Thompsons continued to be issued to Home Guard units. For some of these scratch-formed defence groups, the old jokes about taping a butcher’s knife to a broom handle were not so far from the truth, but in reality many units were issued with new Thompsons, albeit initially with no ammunition:

We had two Thompson guns and several dozen Enfield Pattern 1917 rifles, which were chambered for the [American] .30-calibre ammunition, but we were issued with .303 cartridges which were no use. We had no ammunition at all for the Thompsons though, and were told that in the event of invasion we were to apply to the nearest regular army headquarters for a supply of cartridges. This was daft, because they were 20 miles away, which meant we’d have to fight our way to get there with useless guns in order to get our ammunition! Things got much better later on, though, and we eventually became very well armed indeed; we had something like 20 Thompsons, as well as Browning machine guns, mortars and Enfield rifles. When we were photographed we looked like a regular army unit.⁶

During training, a Free-French commando balances precariously on a wire bridge while aiming his Thompson. One hopes he didn’t actually have to try shooting it.

   The available stocks of M1928s were nowhere near enough, of course, and for propaganda reasons guns were often taken from one unit and passed to another so that suitably aggressive pictures could be taken. Indeed, many home service units were supplied with wooden ‘props’ for propaganda purposes, as the Ministry of Defence knew that all pictures released to the public would be carefully examined by German intelligence staff. Even today, occasionally some wooden Thompsons appear in sale rooms, and are normally described as ‘film prop guns’, but their history is often far more interesting.

   As supplies of the M1928 began to dry up, they were replaced with the more basic M1/M1A1s, and these too began to be issued to line regiments. As a result, a great mix of different models were carried into the war, with old M1928s being used alongside the later M1 guns. In regions where supply was problematic, such as Burma and Madagascar, the early guns often saw service with Commonwealth soldiers right throughout the war. Such was the esteem in which the Thompson was held that the Commando badge, worn on the upper shoulder, featured an M1928.
   It was not only Commonwealth troops, however, who were supplied with the Thompson. During the war the French government-in-exile ordered 6,000 guns for supply to the Free French forces training in Britain. Chinese forces fighting the Japanese were also supplied with thousands of guns (the actual number is unknown), and so popular was it that China began to manufacture their own copies, using the simple M1/M1A1 blowback action. Hundreds of these were to see further service against American soldiers when they were supplied to the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War (1964–73). Huge numbers of M1928A1 and M1A1 models were supplied to the Soviet Army following the German invasion of Russia in 1941, most of which were never issued, the gun proving to be troublesome in the sub-zero conditions of Russian winters. In these regions, the fine tolerances to which the Thompson was made worked against them, for the extreme cold prevented the breech being cocked and caused extractors to shear, problems from which the rough but serviceable Russian PPSh-41 submachine gun did not suffer. Many hundreds of these Thompsons are now appearing on the collectors’ market as Russia slowly sells off some of its vast hoarded stocks of wartime guns. Military production of the Thompson finally ceased in 1944, after 1,387,134 guns had been manufactured.

Chinese Communist militiamen, photographed in 1945. One carries a matchlock wall gun of 18th century design, the other a Chinese-made Thompson M1928A1. (Cody Images)

⁵ Sergeant Thomas ‘Tommy’ Dales, ex-No. 2 Commando; interview with author

⁶ Peter Evans, ex-East Yorkshire Home Guard; interview with author.