Posted May 8, 2020 8:05 am by Comments

By Chris Eger

Storeroom at Solar aerodrome, Stavanger, holding some of the estimated 30,000 Mauser rifles taken from German forces in Norway after their surrender. (Photo: Imperial War Museum)
Victory in Europe Day, or simply just VE Day, saw the acceptance of the German general surrender in World War II, and the return of Freedom to half of the Continent.

Celebrated on May 8, 1945, after the fall of the Third Reich, millions of German troops still needed to be disarmed across Europe and fresh stacks of Mauser bolt action rifles, along with the first generation of intermediate cartridge assault rifles such as the StG44 and semi-auto rifles such as the G43, grew around the continent.
Besides their own domestically produced rifles, the Germans absorbed and used guns from countries they overran such as Danish and Norwegian Krags, French MAS rifles, and even Russian Mosins.
Added to this were piles of MG34 and MG42 general-purpose machine guns along with  MP40 submachine guns.
There were not only German MG34s and 42s but also everything from 1918-vintage Bergmann SMGs to Austrian Schwarzlose machine guns and Hungarian Danuvia sub guns
Handguns of all sorts were collected, as the Germans not only adopted foreign guns they captured and manufactured their own, but also

Source: Guns.com

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