When America Made Mosin-Nagant Rifles for The Russians
Travis Olander 01.10.24
It is simply inarguable that America makes the best guns, as it has for nearly two centuries (thank you, John Moses Browning). So, in the pursuit of perfect weaponry, it should come as no surprise that these United States have, in the past, considered other nations’ hardware – stacked up foreign manufacturers’ creations against our own, if you will. Nor should it come as a surprise that other countries have themselves turned to American manufacturing to afford firearms for their own militaries. But, given current and past geopolitical tensions, it may seem odd to hear that the U.S. once made well over a million Mosin-Nagant rifles for the Russian Empire. Some of those rifles would later be used by Soviet-backed rebels against American troops, while others would enter U.S. service.
Mosin-Nagant Coverage on AllOutdoor
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Mosin-Nagant Rifles: World War I – The Eastern Front
To understand how a bunch of American servicemen were united with an American version of Russia’s most prolific bolt action in 1919 – pictured above – we have to first understand would would compel a proud, staunchly undemocratic and anti-capitalist empire like czarist Russia to approach the U.S. for firearm manufacturing in the first place. That answer’s found at a time nearly ten years prior, among the bloodied fields of East Prussia. The eastern front of World War I saw nearly ten million Russians killed, wounded, and captured, in large part thanks to Russian General Yuri Danilov’s “Plan 19,” which called for two Soviet armies to amass and invade the German territory, with two more defending against an Austro-Hungarian invasion.
In spite of early success, the Russian Army was repeatedly defeated in the face of German advances. Several offenses aimed at retaking the initiative would fail between 1910 and 1916, resulting in Russian Grand Duke Nicholas – then in charge of the theater – being relieved and replaced by Tsar Nicholas himself. The Russians would later mount the Brusilov offensive, culminating in one of the largest and most lethal military engagements in human history.
The losses during these battles, though key in changing the tide of the war and ultimately sealing Germany’s fate, cost the Russian empire millions of men – and nearly as many weapons. In the midst of this fighting, Russia had quite literally ran out of guns to give to its troops, and so it turned to Lady Liberty in 1915 for her legendary arms making.
Mosin-Nagant Rifles: Remington and Westinghouse Answer The Call
The czarist government turned to Remington Arms and the New England Westinghouse Company in Massachusetts – yes, that Westinghouse, which became the CBS Corporation in 1997 and today makes computer monitors under that defunct brand name – to produce American-made M1891 Mosin rifles for export back to Russia. Remington Arms received a contract to build 1.5 million rifles, while Westinghouse received an order for 1.8 million. Production was immediate. In comparison to the U.S.’s M1 rifles and crew-served weapons, the M1891 was simplistic. Its blade ejector and monolithic bolt were easy to manufacture, and its integrated stamped steel magazine required little precision and effort to replicate. Mosin’s rifle was, in a way, merely a cruder Springfield M1903. As such, production was rampant: At least 750,000 rifles were cut, forged, and stamped on Remington’s factory floors between 1915 and 1917, while Westinghouse made at least 800,000 in the same span.
Mosin-Nagant Rifles: Russia’s Revolution, and an Unpaid Tab
Some accounts claim that only 470,000 of the more than 1.5 million Mosins made in America would be shipped back to Russia before the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 – though serial numbers on US-made rifles later found in Finland after the war suggest that number was much higher (at least 630,000). After exiting World War I and forming a new government to replace the ousted Romanov dynasty, Russia simply stopped paying for its American guns. The rest of the rifles sat in storage until the U.S. purchased the remaining stock from Remington and Westinghouse.
From there, the American M1891s were issued to Army recruits for training, while at least 77,000 guns were shipped to Vladivostock in 1917 to arm the Czech Legion which would, ironically, use those rifles to fight the Bolsheviks in Siberia. Some rifles would also return to Russian territory – though in a bout of strange fate, they’d be delivered to American expeditionary forces stationed in Murmansk and Archangel as part of the Allied intervention in the Russian civil war.
Mosin-Nagant Rifles: What Came of The Other American Mosins
Some of the American rifles that made it to Russia during World War I were captured by the Germans. After the war’s end, Germany was only allowed a small, 100,000-man army. With no need for so many guns, its government sold many of its captured M1891s to Finland, which had finally gained independence from Russia during the war. Though most were of Russian make, some of those rifles were Remington and Westinghouse guns.
Others wound up as arms supplied by the Soviet government to insurgents lead by Augusto Sandino, who attempted to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. U.S. Marines intervened and invariably found themselves fighting guerillas armed with Remington and Westinghouse rifles. At least one of these rifles was captured by American forces, cut in half, and sent back to Washington, D.C. It was used as evidence of the Soviets’ support for the Sandinista rebels. That gun now sits in the National Museum of the Marine Corps.
The bulk of the rifles that remained stateside were eventually sold to the American public through the Office of the Directory of Civilian Marksmanship. If you’re a lover of M1 Garands, you probably know this agency today as the Civilian Marksmanship Program, or CMP. The CMP still sells M1 Garands – and plenty of other U.S. surplus arms – to the public today. Check out our review of a CMP M1 rifle here.
