1909 Match 1903 with Winchester A5 Scope

[Marine A5 Sniper Rifle]

You are looking at yet another 1903 with a WRA modified scope attached, probably one of the WWI WRA sniper rifles. Note the round black dots in the center of the adjustment knobs and the absence of the Grasshopper. That round black dot is actually a blued screw head that holds the knob. This is a postbellum photo, but I don't know the date or location offhand. I have it in my files, and I think it was taken at Sea Girt.






I, too, have noticed the differing lengths of the rear base on the WRA sniper rifles. I suspect it is a result of their manufacturing process. The extra length is excess, but a man like Niedner would want a neat appearance, and would probably make them the same length as the receiver ring. I got nothing, and am just guessing.

As for who built the 500 WRA sniper rifles, you seem to forget the contract with Winchester for the rifles. If Philly built them, why would Winchester get paid for them. Winchester was building all kinds of arms for the War Department. No way in hell would they farm out a 500 rifle contract for modified scopes that they made. All they had to do was modify their existing mounts and tap the receiver and barrel and mount the scope and do some QAT. The Corps Philly Depot did indeed state they could make any part for the 1903. I suspect they were looking for work like everyone else. That is what depots do.

I worked at the MCB Albany Depot in 1970 as a Marine (Albany, Georgia). If all depots operate as Albany did, civilians run the depot and tolerate the Marines by giving them the menial jobs to keep them busy. I cleaned out blown up AMTRAKs that came in on rail cars about once a week. We had to remove all ordnance, ammo, weapons, and body parts from the AMTRAKs before the civvies started working on them. The two most interesting things I found were a 45 and a foot in a boot. An AMTRAK has a huge CO2 fire extinguishing system that is tripped by a switch at the drop door. Every new Jarhead got the treatment. The other Jarheads would let the new guy go into the interior and they would trip that switch. The new guy would come out with frost on his ear lobes and white as a ghost from frost. It was amazing how cold it got in an instant when those bottles went off. I got into the habit of tripping that switch on every AMTRAK I inspected to the detriment of my fellow Jarheads. I also safety wired the bolts that held the observation port windows to the body. I had to make the same number of turns between bolts or those old men (to me at the time) would make me redo the job. They could just look at the finished job and tell if it was right. I can now safety wire a dog's nuts to a cat's tail.

Keep 'em coming, Steve. You definitely have my attention.

jt

[Promo]

The bad quality picture: I assume it shows a lense attachement to the rear, for a higher contrast or something like that. I have a lense attachement for a British Aldis WWI sniper scope. Looking at this picture it appears to me that the scope is a regular Winchester A5 with the Winchester bases and also the original Winchester adjustment knobs - they have holes, plus the handguard doesn't seem to be shaped to remove the scope towards the rear. This is how an inletting for the Neidner bases should look like: http://collections.centerofthewest.o...d_metallic_ca5 where as the Winchester "inletting" would look like this: http://collections.centerofthewest.o..._cartridge_322

Steve, if the factory picture M1903 with scope blocks from Winchester went to the Cody museum, I can only suspect it to be this rifle: http://collections.centerofthewest.o..._cartridge_322 . The reason is pretty simple, it has the same inletting, and it only matches the "swivels" also shown in the picture - all others have either also the sling swivel missing or the stacking swivel in place. And this rifle also has the second cross bolt. And I wouldn't expect the museum to re-complete rifles with stacking swivels/sling swivels.

Besides this, does anyone knows if the original Neidner bases were blued or parkerized? I once bought a Neidner modified A5 scope with the original leather lense covers and original bases (in fact even with the screws). The screws were staked in the bases.

PS: His name is Adolph Otto NEIDNER and not NIEDNER, the FBI documents now clearly document that (yet still his Wikipedia entry is also wrong, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolph_Otto_Niedner). Also makes more sense to me, it sounds more German than "Niedner".

To me it was very interesting to read that he told the FBI he was about to get another contract for 1500 additional sniper rifles. If he didn't do this, they must have tried to make this work done in another manner.

[cplnorton]

To me it was very interesting to read that he told the FBI he was about to get another contract for 1500 additional sniper rifles. If he didn't do this, they must have tried to make this work done in another manner.

I agree with everything you said George. The FBI investigation started at the end of June, 1917. I went back and edited it to the issue I found it. But I found again where I found the Marines being sent to Winchester to be trained on the Telescope sight, and it was in the July 1917 issue of the Marine Magazine.

If someone would go dig in that July 1917 date in the archives, in the official Marine correspondence, and look for anything to or from Winchester. I bet they will find the proof that the Marines turned to Winchester for the 2nd part of that Marine sniper contract.

It all fits.

I really bet the proof is in July 1917.

[Marine A5 Sniper Rifle]

The bad quality picture: I assume it shows a lense attachement to the rear, for a higher contrast or something like that. I have a lense attachement for a British Aldis WWI sniper scope. Looking at this picture it appears to me that the scope is a regular Winchester A5 with the Winchester bases and also the original Winchester adjustment knobs - they have holes, plus the handguard doesn't seem to be shaped to remove the scope towards the rear. This is how an inletting for the Neidner bases should look like: http://collections.centerofthewest.o...d_metallic_ca5 where as the Winchester "inletting" would look like this: http://collections.centerofthewest.o..._cartridge_322

Steve, if the factory picture M1903 with scope blocks from Winchester went to the Cody museum, I can only suspect it to be this rifle: http://collections.centerofthewest.o..._cartridge_322 . The reason is pretty simple, it has the same inletting, and it only matches the "swivels" also shown in the picture - all others have either also the sling swivel missing or the stacking swivel in place. And this rifle also has the second cross bolt. And I wouldn't expect the museum to re-complete rifles with stacking swivels/sling swivels.

Besides this, does anyone knows if the original Neidner bases were blued or parkerized? I once bought a Neidner modified A5 scope with the original leather lense covers and original bases (in fact even with the screws). The screws were staked in the bases.

PS: His name is Adolph Otto NEIDNER and not NIEDNER, the FBI documents now clearly document that (yet still his Wikipedia entry is also wrong, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolph_Otto_Niedner). Also makes more sense to me, it sounds more German than "Niedner".

To me it was very interesting to read that he told the FBI he was about to get another contract for 1500 additional sniper rifles. If he didn't do this, they must have tried to make this work done in another manner.

Georg, I can assure you the handguard on a Niedner 03 looked nothing like the one in the Cody museum. Ditto the WRA. The scoped rifle at Cody is scoped with a Grasshopper A5 in #2 mounts. If you compared a Niedner Corps sniper rifle to a WRA Corps sniper rifle, they look identical to each other except for certain stamps in the stocks, and they weren't scoped with Grasshopper A5's. I don't now how you can see the portion of the handguard altered for scope removal, as the man's hand covers that part of the handguard. If that is a "regular" A5, where is the Grasshopper?

As for the spelling of his name, Otto spelled it "Niedner" as shown by his manufacturing stamps, signature, grave marker, and a whole mess of other stuff.

The original request was for 1500 sniper rifles in three batches of 500. Most of these were delivered. The man that ordered the rifles intended for Niedner to mount scopes on all of them. Niedner was correct in his statement, but his big mouth cost him the remainder of the jobs.

And yes, the scope has one of the original accessories attached, a colored lens for target enhancement in low light.

jt

[louis]

I was on the internet last night and ran across this rifle that was sold in auction. Thought you might be interested in seeing it. It claims to be one of the early experimental A5 svoped 03's.

http://www.icollector.com/Extraordinary-Documented-Experimental-Springfield-Model-1903-Sniper-Rifle-with-Winchester-A5-Scope_i15827961

[Marine A5 Sniper Rifle]

I agree with everything you said George. The FBI investigation started at the end of June, 1917. I went back and edited it to the issue I found it. But I found again where I found the Marines being sent to Winchester to be trained on the Telescope sight, and it was in the July 1917 issue of the Marine Magazine.

If someone would go dig in that July 1917 date in the archives, in the official Marine correspondence, and look for anything to or from Winchester. I bet they will find the proof that the Marines turned to Winchester for the 2nd part of that Marine sniper contract.

It all fits.

I really bet the proof is in July 1917.

The fact is that Winchester contracted for 1500 rifles (3 different batches of 500). The man in charge of the sniper program convinced Niedner to mount 150 rifles in time to meet the departure date of the 6th Marine Regiment. Two different contracts. I don't believe Niedner would ever have gotten that 1500 rifle contract (but he was obviously aware of it) because he couldn't complete the job fast enough. It took Niedner 42 days to complete 150 rifles. That is 3-4 rifles per day, or 125 to 167 more days to complete 500 rifles if he worked every single day without a break. That would be around Christmas Day, 1917. Instead, Niedner took a vacation. I believe Niedner got the contract for the first 150 and WRA got the contract for the remainder of the rifles. Remember, No one knew when the OSD facilities would be completed at this point. Everyone had to be going balls to the wall to avoid being late with deliveries. To show how resourceful the guy running the sniper program was, he arranged for sniper training at another range until OSD was open. I know the name of the range and its location, but I have been unable to find one word about this particular range.

Why not just pull Winchester's original contract?

jt

[cplnorton]

****Edit 4/18/16. All this below about Winchester not creating the WRA Marine base, I am wrong on. Tracing all the documents, WRA did make them and looks like they started in 1917. I just know people go back and review these and I don't want them to see wrong info. I will leave all I wrote for reference, but whatever the rifle team used in 1909, was not the WRA Marine Blocks. ****



I think I might have figured out the mystery of the "Winchester" Marine blocks for the 1903 Springfield. I do not think anymore that Winchester created them. I think they were developed by a Marine on the rifle team in 1909.

As John said, he thought the rifle was a star guaged 1909 match rifle, but it was a mystery on the when/where/why on the Marine telescopic bases being added. The main reason is, the rifle really predates the A5 telescope by almost a year. And there just wasn't any scopes or scope mounts made for a 1903 Springfield at this time.

Well as said earlier in this discussion, 1st Sgt Victor Czegka was credited with the 1st Marine Corps Telescoped 1903, in 1909. This was the first time a telescoped 1903 had ever been used in a high power Match from what I can tell. Many have long thought that since it predates basically everything, he created that scope from scratch, because there just wasn't another scope or mounts he could have used. Victor was very mechanical though, and could have about created anything he wanted. In fact, he later developed a lot of items for the Marines, and was awarded a Navy Cross twice for these inventions. But this is the quote from the History of the Marine Corps Rifle Team put out by the Marines in 1961.



I think the author of book made one little mistake in his account of the scope. And I would say the key word to me that we need to focus on is, Victor created the "Mounting."

Now looking through Newspaper clipping from back then, I found a mention in the August 19th, 1909, Washington Post, that said the whole Marine team had telescopic Sights. So now instead of just Victor having just one scoped rifle, we now have a mention of the whole 1909 Marine team having telescopic sights. Which this has never been documented before. Here is the newspaper clip from the Washington post in August 1909.




Again this predated the Winchester A5 scope by about almost a year, and there are no scope mounts for a 1903. That is also why so many have said he had to create the scope he used to win the Wimbledon Cup. Because nothing else existed back then that Victor could have used.

Well going through the NRA Magazine of the day, Man at Arms, I found the answer. This is in the 9/09/09 issue of the Man at Arms, and it is a article of Victor and the Marine team using Telescopic sights for the first time in matches at the 1909 Wimbledon Cup.






The key word in this article, it details for the first time that a a SCHUETZEN scope was fitted to Victor's Rifle. Which that term instantly clicked.

Winchester was at this time, marketing a Schuetzen rifle, which was just a smaller bore target rifle. They were meant for target shooting at a very close range and were not high power as far as I know of. They were meant for short distance target shooting. Well Winchester had a Telescope that was also made for this Scheutzen class, and it seems only marketed towards smallbore. Winchester never seemed to intend for this scope to be used on high power, or longer ranges. That is why I think they were developing the A5s at this time, but it the A5 not offered for sale till mid 1910.

These are the Winchester ads for the Scheutzen rifle and the scopes that were marketed for this class. There are Winchester Ads for this class littered in the Man at Arm's magazines from that 1909 timeperiod. And the pattent on that scope is from 1907 I believe. But If you know the A5 scope really well, you will see a simple version of the A5. The scope would fit the same rifle mounts as the A5 would have. They are the same design. The only real difference cosmetically between this scope and the A5, the A5 had a beefier micrometer design, probably to handle the recoil of high power.

[cplnorton]

****Edit 4/18/16 I proved myself wrong. The WRA Marine blocks appear to be made starting in 1917.****


The Winchester Springfield Marine mount drawing from 1926, I now believe were only reference drawings and probably filed. The Cody Museum website has a link that takes you to all the Winchester patent numbers and descriptions for all their firearms and scopes. Which you can take those patent numbers, go to the Govt Patent website, and type them in, and it brings up not only the image of the patent, but the description.

I can see WRA patent drawings for a Winchester block that fits on the rear sight base of a 1903 Springfield about of the time of the A5 coming out. But there are not any patents that I can locate for a 1903 Springfield Marine block like mine, or detailed in that 1926 drawing. I went though every WRA telescope mounting patent, all the way into the 1940's, and nothing.

The other thing, just like what Jim said, every picture I can find of a non Marine mounted A5 pre WWI, has that mount attached to the rear sight base at that 6'' on center position. Which is also what all the books state as well. And there are two 1914 (A5) SRS hits at the Springfield Museum. Both have the 6'' on center spacing. And possibly the final piece, the 1915 US Army official report on the testing of the A5, as a potential Army sniper, also mentions that a 6'' on center base was a weak point in the design.

As mentioned earlier, Victor is credited with making a "Mounting" in the Marine Team history book in 1909. I now think Victor created that Springfield Marine mounting, and attached it to the team rifles, to to attach those small bore Schuetzen scopes. I think that is the reason why Winchester was only producing the 6'' on center blocks up till almost that WWI timeframe. I don't think the Marine mount was their design. I think it was the property of the Marine shooting team and Victor. And maybe the Marines let Winchester use it when the Niedner mess happened. Or Winchester trained the Marines to install them and maybe Philly built some of the A5's with the Marine mount. That 1917 timeperiod still needs investigation to figure it out.

After WWI, you see a explosion of scopes, mounts, and about everything else. There were even Steven's scopes which were a cheap knockoff of the A5, and I don't think you could tell one apart in these old pics. Unless you could see the markings.

But I now think John hit the nail on the head on my rifle. The 1909 Marine team, with the telescoped rifles, used them in mid to late August 1909. It would seem that timeframe would correspond nicely to my rifle, and might be a very plausible explanation for it.

[Marine A5 Sniper Rifle]

I was on the internet last night and ran across this rifle that was sold in auction. Thought you might be interested in seeing it. It claims to be one of the early experimental A5 scoped 03's.
http://www.icollector.com/Extraordin...cope_i15827961

I have seen this rifle before, Louis. I always wondered why a rifle built in Jan 1918 had a SA 6-17 bbl and no inspector's stamp. Of course, we have no way of knowing when the scope was attached unless Brophy so states (my Brophy is upstairs). This rifle has the Springfield Marine bases obviously, and would be a neat data point if we could date the scope attachment date.

jt

[cplnorton]

Why not just pull Winchester's original contract?

Anyone live near Cody, I think I know the box number it would be located. I just can't access it online or travel out there. But if someone is local and wants to investigate this, I can give you the box number and Cody will pull it, and you can view it in person. That correspondance in 1917, and why the Marines were traveling to Wincehster in July 1917, might just solve the sniper equation.

[Marine A5 Sniper Rifle]

.... The 1909 Marine team, with the telescoped rifles, used them in mid to late August 1909. It would seem that time frame would correspond nicely to my rifle, and might be a very plausible explanation for it.

Steve, If the Springfield Marine mount was available in 1909, why in the world would the various teams still use the 6" spacing? Let me see if I have this right, you are saying that Victor developed the Springfield base, but we have never seen Victor's base or even his system for adjustment? Isn't that a bit of a stretch?

There is probably a picture of Victor's rifle someplace.

jt

[Marine A5 Sniper Rifle]

.... might just solve the sniper equation.

Exactly what sniper equation are we trying to solve at this point? I'm serious.

jt

[cplnorton]

Victor was basically a very good machinist from everything I can research. So to me, measuring the base of the Winchester scope, and the receiver and barrel off a 1903, and making a simple set of bases would be an easy thing for him to do. It probably was a piece of cake for him.

I'm still looking for pics of ANY Marine scoped rifle pre 1917. I can't find any. All the pics I can find, you can't see enough detail to see if the rifle has blocks. And I have not seen one for sure Marine scoped rifle pre 1917. But we know they had them. That is for certain. A picture would for sure document my hunch.

The only other two sets of blocks I can find for the 1903, pre 1917, were the Mann Niedner tapered block style. And the 6'' on center used by Winchester. And I think this Springfield Marine type. There is possibly a Stevens too that I'm trying to research, but it's on the rear sight base as well.

[cplnorton]

Exactly what sniper equation are we trying to solve at this point? I'm serious.

jt

Marines were being sent to Winchester in July 1917 to be trained in the "setup" and repair of the Winchester Telescope sight. There are also two for sure, 1917 dated Springfield rifles with USMC bases at Cody. Why were Marines being sent to Winchester in July 1917 for Winchester Telescopes? That is a question I would love to know, just for my own curiosity.

[cplnorton]

I just got off the phone with Jim. What a damn good old Salty Marine. lol I wished I lived closer. I would bug the crap out of him.

It's really nice talking to you Jim.