Hi guys, thanks for tuning in to another video on ForgottenWeapons.com.
I'm Ian McCollum, and today we are taking
a look at the next iteration of the Carcano.
This is the Moschetto Model 1891, and it is the first
short carbine version of the Carcano to be adopted.
Now, this was actually adopted in 1893, and would go on to be
used by the Italians all the way through the end of World War Two.
With one slight twist, which is that this is a Model 1891,
this is actually a 91/38. Technically a different model of the rifle.
But I've lumped them both together in this video because,
well, for obvious reasons, they are very, very similar and I think it's worth telling the story together.
Now the idea here was, of course, you have your standard Carcano infantry rifle which is very long,
well suited to the infantry. But you have other guys who need something shorter, and that's where this comes in.
Now, this is often called a cavalry carbine which isn't actually accurate. It did get issued to the cavalry,
but the Italians didn't have that much cavalry, not compared to some of the other countries.
If there's one unit that's particularly emblematic of these guns early on it was the Bersaglieri, who were, think of them as bicycle cavalry.
And in many ways ... prior to World War One the bicycle kind of made a lot of sense, and a lot of countries had bicycle mounted troops.
And those guys needed something shorter than that gigantic 1891 long rifle.
So they'd get a rifle that has a bayonet permanently fitted to it
so they don't have to deal with a bayonet and scabbard flopping around on their belt.
It's a lot shorter, it's slung across the back instead of over the shoulder, so well-suited to mounted travel, horse or bicycle.
And these went to a few other groups, they went to some militias, they went to the Carabinieri.
They kind of basically went to everyone who had been issued a Vetterli cavalry carbine in the years before.
Which is probably part of the reason why they're often called cavalry carbines.
Anyway, there are only a few differences between this and the 1891, mechanically there are none.
The sights are a little different, the bolt handle has been bent just to make the gun a little less bulky.
They still have gain twist rifling, although the rate of acceleration of the twist is different because the barrel is shorter overall.
Now, we have two models here...
I should also mention they went through like three different variations of bayonet locking attachment,
and that's gonna be one of the main things we take a look at up close.
But before we do that, I want to point out ... the 91/38 here is technically a different model of rifle than the standard 91.
I'm going to have a separate video on specifically the Model 38 Carcanos,
and that video is going to talk about what the deal was with their calibre changes, the 7.35 and all of that.
I'm gonna skip over that in this video, but I'm gonna leave the 91/38 here because anyone who's looking for information
is gonna be looking for information on that Carcano that has the ugly under-folding bayonet on it.
So we'll put them together here, and they really are fundamentally the same gun.
So let's take a closer look, and I'll show you the details that did change
Obviously the folding bayonet is the distinctive thing here, so we'll start on that.
And I actually don't have the first pattern. The first issue had a little sliding latch, right here.
Fortunately, Othais at C&Rsenal does have one, and allowed me to snag a little bit of
video footage from his Carcano video to show you. So that's the first pattern.
During World War One they realised that that had some issues, like it was sometimes tricky to latch,
it would come undone sometimes.
And so they actually changed to a lever system which we see right here.
So for this one you push the lever down, you can then pull the bayonet backwards, you can then unfold it all the way,
slide it back into its notch, and then lift the lever up to lock it in place. And that was better.
This is really a kind of cheesy sort of bayonet, it's just a T-shaped spike.
And it has this distinctive downward angle that you get. I really don't think they look good at all, but I digress.
What they discovered by the end of World War One was that a button style, a spring-loaded button, was really the way to go.
This doesn't come loose under recoil, it's relatively easy to use.
So what you do is push in the button, which releases the bayonet,
allows it to slide backwards slightly, and then you can swing it round the front.
There we go, that goes out to the front. And then it snaps into place.
The markings on these are identical in form to the standard long rifle, so we're going to have our serial number here.
This one is an "AB" prefix. So once again, you have, ... typically speaking, a two letter prefix and a four ... digit number.
Our manufacturer is on the top barrel flat, this one's made by Brescia.
And a date on the other side. So this is a 1918 gun, this is a World War One production gun.
The rear sight is the exact same style as the long rifle, but it is now only graduated up to 1,500 metres.
And once again, with the leaf in the forward position we have a 300 metre zero.
With the leaf in the downward position like that, that is a 450 metre zero.
And then the notches on the long-range section here start at 6.
In order to carry these across the back, they've got a sling bar inletted in the side of the stock instead of a sling swivel on the bottom.
And the nose cap of the rifle has another sling bar, a little rotating metal spacer there.
I should also point out when these were originally initially adopted they didn't actually have an upper handguard,
they just had a stock coming out to here, and a nose cap that fit down onto the barrel.
They discovered within about a year of World War One happening that that was a problem,
that if you were actually moving quickly with this rifle, it didn't take very many rounds to heat the barrel up quite a lot,
and then when you go to grab the gun to move, you have a pretty darn good chance of burning yourself.
So they added an upper handguard, and they retrofitted ... virtually all the rifles with that upper handguard.
So it's actually quite rare to find an early pattern Moschetto 1891 that doesn't have the handguard fitted to it.
And then basically our last change to the Moschetto was the bent bolt handle, which is a pretty simple thing.
You can see it there.This operates exactly the same as any other standard Carcano, same clips,
same safety mechanism and all of that.
Now, of course, they don't have a cleaning rod because there's a bayonet under the barrel instead.
So the butt plate was modified to give it a little trapdoor and there's a hole drilled inside the stock,
and this is where a two-part cleaning rod would be stored normally.
This rifle doesn't have one with it unfortunately, but two short sticks of cleaning rod that thread together.
Now I said I'm going to cover the Model 38s in their own separate video, and I am,
but since we have both patterns of the Moschetto here and since we're talking about the Moschetto,
let me show you the two differences that you'll find between 1891s and 91/38 Moschettos.
The first is the rear sight, pretty obvious. That's the most substantial one.
This has the early style sight, the M38s went to a simple fixed sight.
So on the 7.35 guns this is a 200 metre zero. On the 6.5 guns, because of their different trajectory, this is actually a 300 metre zero.
Just like the 300 metre zero with that folded all the way forward.
Now, at least one of the manufacturers, I think it was Brescia,
did go back to using this style of sight on the 6.5 calibre 91/38s, so this isn't 100% definitive.
But as a general rule, the 38s have a fixed sight and the 91s have an adjustable sight.
The other change, which is even less significant, is the contouring of the chamber area of the barrel.
The 91s had some flats milled in them and they looked kind of nice and fancy.
The 38s, simpler, more efficient to make, they just left them round.
So the markings are all in the same format: you'll have a date, and you'll have a manufacturer,
and you'll have a serial number over here. But they're all done on a rounded barrel instead of having flats.
I should also point out one last thing here.
This is my early M91, and this is a typical front sight assembly. Note that the front sight
itself is set back from the muzzle a little bit. And this whole thing is held on the barrel with this cross ... screw.
My M38 here has a slightly different profiled front sight,
but it's a little bit unusual that it also has the same set back front sight, more typical for a 91/38.
It ought to have a front sight that's set right up at the front, and doesn't have this extra sort of tower on the back.
There are ... exceptions and variations in all manner of surplus firearms, especially ones made in such large quantities
and by so many different manufacturers as the Carcanos. And so that's just a little quirk.
Normally you would see a more forward front sight on an M38.
The Moschetto 1891 would become one of the most common versions of the Carcano, but not until World War Two.
By 1919, at the very end of World War One, only about 286,000 of these carbines had been manufactured.
They really weren't the big popular gun. Now with the end of World War One the Italian military,
along with everybody else, realised that carbines are in many ways a lot better to have than these
gargantuan long rifles. And so they would start to look more seriously at carbines.
It would be in World War Two when the 91/38 really hit its stride, and for a couple of reasons.
By 1940, when they turned back to making these in 6.5 calibre,
they needed a lot of guns quickly and resources were becoming stretched thin.
This ... uses less material than pretty much any other version of the Carcano.
The short barrel is, hey, you can almost make two of these barrels for every one full-length rifle barrel that you could make.
Making the folding bayonet is cheaper and faster and easier than making
a standalone bayonet, plus a scabbard, plus a belt frog.
So this was like the economy version of the Carcano,
and in World War Two they would make some, like, 1.6 million of these rifles.
We have a grand total of about 2.6 million produced. So like 286,000 by 1919.
And then they made another 509,000, basically another half a million between the two world wars,
and that's both the 1891s in 6.5 and also the 7.35 versions.
And then once they threw the 7.35 out went back to 6.5,
... that's when they really pulled all the stops out and made another 1.6 million of the things in 6.5.
So, grand total of about 2.5 million of these made.
I think they're kind of like the ugliest version of the Carcano.
I know Mae over at C&Rsenal really likes the look, I don't like the look so much. But hey, that's just me.
So they are very common out there.
I'd like to give a big thanks to Inter Ordnance Royal Tiger Imports for providing these two rifles
for me to film for you guys today, to show you the ... Moschetto M91.
They imported these from Ethiopia where they've led a rather long and hard life, but still serviceable, still good quality rifles.
So you can head over to Royal Tiger Imports, take a look at all of the interesting and unusual stuff that they have
brought back from Ethiopia. A whole bunch of Carcanos, and a whole lot more as well.
Thanks for watching.
[ sub by sk cn2 ]