[ Unique 1910 Bergmann ]
Hi guys, thanks for tuning in to another video on ForgottenWeapons.com.
I'm Ian McCollum, and as you may realise I'm
kind of morally obligated to cover
every conceivable pattern of Bergmann pistol
based on a series that I did several years ago.
I actually really like the Bergmanns, and
here at Rock Island I ran into this
slightly distinct Bergmann 1910.
It's got a different grip.
And I'm pretty excited by it, so I'm going to drag you along and show it to you.
Oh my goodness, a Bergmann with a slightly weird grip - someone call Forgotten Weapons!
It's kind of clichéd, but it's also kind of true.
So what happened here is the grip has been manufactured to be just
slightly angled back compared to the standard 1910 or 1910/21 Bergmann.
So here's the standard pistol, and it's honestly a little hard to tell the difference.
But let me pull the grips off, and then you can see it more obviously.
Alright, now we have our angled grip and our standard grip, and if I line those up
exactly, you can see there that the angled grip is, well, angled back.
It's also worth pointing out that this angled grip gun has two grip screws
instead of the standard one.
Obviously standard grips are not going to fit on this pistol
because they don't line up properly.
These angled grips are serialised to the same pistol, 8,800,
and they're nicely carved on the inside, and that looks appropriate and authentic.
There's our number 8,800 on the gun.
Now there are two other slightly different elements.
One of them is that this grip panel has been deliberately
made high enough to cover the safety lever.
If we look at a standard Danish 1910/21, you'll see that the grip
sits underneath the safety lever there.
And the sights on this are ... very much a square rear notch,
and a square front post.
The original Danish pistols have a barleycorn front sight.
And you can actually see there's a slight difference in the front sight profile as well.
And the original Danish gun (on the right here), has a V-notch rear sight.
So in addition to its grips, this has been given,
and it appears to be given from the factory,
a set of sights that are more suitable for target shooting than for combat shooting.
The square post is more precise.
... You'd never see target shooters with barleycorns if they can avoid it.
Now here's one interesting conundrum about this pistol.
When AEP made the Bergmann pistols it was pre-world War One,
and up through a little bit of manufacture during German occupation.
And they were made as the 1910 pattern, ... in which the grips end right about here.
It was not until 1921, when the Danish military wanted to get more of these pistols,
that they made a couple of changes.
Most notably changing this grip to make it taller and more comfortable.
AEP was no longer making pistols, so the Danes put their own into production.
And what's interesting to me is that this, ... as far as I can tell,
this appears to be a factory manufactured AEP version of the gun.
But it has grips that were only designed after AEP stopped making the guns.
So someone, as far as I can tell, retrofitted this gun with a new style of grip
after the ... Danish production pistols, after the Danes made these design changes.
Or was this somehow associated with the Danish purchase?
Perhaps this was a grip style that AEP tested, tinkered with?
This 8,800 serial number puts it right in the middle of the Danish production series,
which ran from the six thousands to the eleven thousands.
Possibly something that the Danes were ... considering that early,
and decided not to adopt at that point during production?
I just don't know, it's a very interesting question to me.
I mean as far as really, really obscure niche questions about
Bergmann pistol production are interesting to anybody.
There are a couple of things that come to mind for me with a pistol like this.
One is that there kind of are no hard and fast
absolutes when it comes to firearms development history.
There's always that one prototype that was a little bit earlier than something else,
or a gun like this that's a one-off variation on an otherwise standard pistol.
And sometimes there's just no explanation for why,
but it is in fact a legit factory-made variation.
I also like the idea that there are people out there who didn't quite like the exact features,
and they wanted it tweaked just a little bit to be just perfect.
And we obviously still see that today, not just with firearms, but especially with firearms.
And so the idea that someone would think, "I really like that Bergmann 1910 pattern,
but I want a little more grip angle, I want the Danish 1921 style of grips,
and by the way I want a square sight notch and post instead of a barleycorn."
Hey, you know what? I get it, I feel you man, it is in fact a really cool pistol.
And I think it ... those three changes really do improve it over the standard 1910,
but the 1910 pattern is what was manufactured.
So anyway, hopefully you guys enjoyed the video.
Hopefully you're not too bored with me covering yet another odd Bergmann.
Thanks for watching.