hey guys thanks for tuning in to another
video on Forgotten weapons calm I'm Ian
McCallum and we're here today at the
Rock Island auction company taking a
look at an Astra 300 this is an adorable
little Spanish pocket pistol that
doesn't get a lot of recognition but
it's actually a pretty good little
pistol these were introduced in 1923
just a couple years after the
introduction of the Astra 400 which may
kind of seem backwards but that's how it
went
now the 400 was designed to be a
military service pistol and was accepted
by the Spanish military as such and 300
is basically a scaled-down concealable
pocket pistol sort of version of it now
this was offered in 380 and also 32
caliber or nine-millimeter Kreutz as
well as 765 browning and it's just a
simple plain blowback action nothing
particularly special about it there the
lines and the handling and the styling
really very closely mimic the Astra 400
so these were produced like I said
starting in 1923 they were manufactured
by Astra in the town of Guernica in
Spain which is a notable town because it
was rather famously bombed during the
Spanish Civil War there is in fact a
what a Picasso painting of the bombing
of Guernica now interestingly of all the
potential military targets in the town
the bombing managed to not hit the Astra
Factory so this town had been controlled
by the Republicans before this attack
and these pistols were actually being
manufactured and supplied to Republican
forces before in somewhat limited
numbers but I let's see I believe the
last one made under Republican control
was like November of 1936 and by
September of 37 they had started up
production again under loyalist control
or under nationalist control and after
that the pistols would be sent to
nationalist units as well as
interestingly the German Condor Legion
which was a group of quote-unquote
volunteers advisors who Germany sent to
Spain to assist in the Spanish
war now once World War two started the
Germans would have a very significant
interest in getting guns like this from
the Spanish and from pretty much anyone
else that they could get them from they
would continue to make guns in Belgium
in Poland and Czechoslovakia and pretty
much everywhere else well as of 1940
they established a land overland
connection to Spain through the French
border and that allowed them to easily
bring in guns like this from Spain so
let's take a quick look at how this
works and about the markings on it and
then we'll talk about what the
production ended up being well here's
the Astra 300 and here's the 400 in
comparison so the 400 is also a blowback
pistol in nine-millimeter Largo this guy
is in 380 so you can see how they scaled
it down they retained most of the
features from the 400 including the grip
safety on the back the manual safety on
the side here fire and safe the magazine
release was changed to a push-button
style push that in and then the magazine
comes out you see a little locking catch
there the 400 had a rear heel release
instead and of course the basic blowback
operating system it does lock open on an
empty mag which is kind of nice there's
no bolt release or slide release so to
close it once you've locked it open you
have to pull the mag out and then drop
the slide in 380 caliber these magazines
hold six rounds in 32 caliber they hold
seven the 32 caliber magazines are
generally marked on the back seven point
six five millimeter they all have this
little Astra mark on this grasping tab
on the side of the magazine the the 380
magazines are generally unmarked as four
markings on the pistol we have the
company name which was in set 2 and
compañía and Guernica Spain here on the
top of the slide this is actually a
second pattern or a second type of gun
until about 1929 they also marked the
model name so they'd say Modelo 300 up
here as well
but they got rid of that about 1929 they
also have this astra starbursts logo on
the front of the slide
the serial number is located on the rear
right side both up on the slide and down
on the frame now this one is a German
purchased gun and it's one of the ones
that did get a waffle op mark that is
waa 2 5 1 which is the correct
Vaughn opcode to find on Astra 300s note
that it is different than the code you
will find on Astra 600 s just because
they wanted to be complicated about it
and that serial number seems really
quite high at over half a million
however the serial number of ranges are
actually a little bit complicated on
this they basically in 1923 they started
production at 350 thousand which is just
a little above the top end of their Ruby
pistols and they went to three hundred
and seventy eight thousand seven hundred
they then skipped ahead and jumped to
five hundred and six thousand to start
up again and then they basically ran
those through to six hundred and thirty
thousand four seventy-five at the very
end of production so if you find one
that's between 350 and 378 that's a very
early production gun the vast majority
of them that you find will be 500 500
thousand to five to six hundred and
thirty thousand you can also reality
check those serial numbers and dates by
having a look at the proof marks here
on the bottom we have the standard
Spanish trifecta of proof marks and the
middle piece there in the middle digit
is a date code and n here would be the
code for 1942 so and a last but not
least we can go ahead and take this
apart this assembly is pretty simple
pull the slide back hold it here and
then rotate the barrel around that will
disconnect the barrel from the frame
these are simple blowback so kind of
like browning pistols we have some lugs
on the barrel that lock into the frame
you rotate them around they disengage
the recoil spring is now contracted
inside here you can take that apart if
you really want to but I'm going to go
ahead and leave this one as it is for
the time being and then there's not a
whole lot going on in the frame the
safety pushes a lug up right there it
locks the trigger and also locks the
slide there's a shrouded hammer in the
back of the frame there there's also a
magazine safety so I can't can't drop
the hammer unless I actually have a
magazine in
the gun now it'll go there it is and
reassembly is just a matter of sliding
the frame back on to its rails there we
have to take the magazine back out to
reassemble it bring the slide back drop
the barrel back in just have to get the
slide at the right place here it's the
barrel lugs engage rotate the barrel
back down when it's all the way down it
will release
well the recoil spring will take effect
and there goes in total Astra made about
a hundred and fifty three thousand of
these pistols which is really a lot more
than I think most people suspect it
really was a popular little pocket
pistol they were used by a bunch of
different security organizations in the
spanish government and military you know
police often liked them prison guards
liked them the coast guard the port
guards you name it and a lot of military
officers as well guys like guys in the
cutter bin Jaros they would use these
things as personal sidearms all that
sort of stuff although the bulk of them
actually went to Germany so Germany took
885 bought eighty-five thousand 390 of
these pistols in total between 1941 and
1944 the majority of those being once in
380 caliber 63 thousand of them in 380
and another twenty two and a half
thousand of them in 32 caliber as you
saw most of the 380 ones will have
gotten a German proof mark not all of
them though which of course makes it a
little trickier for collectors because
it is possible to have a legitimately
German contract or German purchased
Astra 300 that didn't get that Waffen
albums down sorry they weren't thinking
about you the collector what they were
processing the guns through so
production of this ended basically at
the end of World War two and in 1946
Astra introduced its replacement which
was the model 3000 instead of 300 which
improved the handling a bit they
redesigned the frame they had at a
loaded chamber indicator and a few other
little details but it was a popular
enough pistol that they just wanted to
make it better
keep on selling them now if you would
like more information about this
particular one take a look at the link
in the description text below that will
take you to Forgotten weapons comm where
you can find access to a rock island's
catalog page where they have their
pictures their description their price
estimate everything else you might want
to know about this guy thanks for
watching
you