US Model 1917 Enfield

I’ve mentioned the Mauser 98K rifle already, now it’s time to talk – briefly – about this one.  Fittingly, it’s November 11, Veteran’s Day.

My grandfather (mother’s father) served in the US Army, the AEF, during WWI, fighting in France.  Unfortunately he died when I was very little – and I have no memory of him alive – so I didn’t get a chance to ask him about this.  According to my mom, my grandmother threw out all his WWI stuff and he never talked about it.  His discharge papers, dating from May 1919, indicate he served in the 307 Infantry Division.

The AEF is typically shown carrying the 1903 Springfield rifle.  But due to production issues, 75% of US soldiers fighting in WWI were actually issued this one, the 1917 Enfield.  Both rifles are chambered in .30-06 (the .30 caliber rifle round, spitzer, introduced in 1906) – as are the Browning 1917 (water cooled) and 1919 (air cooled) machine guns, the Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR), and last but not least, the famous M1 Garand.

I don’t know for a fact which rifle my grandfather carried, but odds are it was the Enfield.  Even Alvin York, the famous US soldier, carried one, though in popular culture he’s shown with a Springfield, the more popular rifle.

  Apparently, the Springfield Armory could not make enough Springfields (the rifle) to supply the whole AEF, so Winchester and Remington stepped in to produce this model, a .30-06 version of a British rifle originally in .303.  I stopped by the Armory when I visited Springfield a few years ago, and it’s not that big.  The museum is nice.

Anyhow.  Generally bolt action rifles are slammed as long, heavy guns, but I didn’t find this one to be.  It’s not that big, heavy, or long, and is about as fun to fire as any other bolt action rifle.  As noted, it takes .30-06, which is a fairly popular round.  Personally, I find working the bolt after each shot to be fun, so semi-auto rifles like the AR15 and AK47 are not as enjoyable to fire.  The heavy wood, the bolt, even the bayonet, make the bolt-action rifle seem more like a real weapon.  With its combination of steel and plastic, I can see why Vietnam-era soldiers called the M16 “the Mattel gun”.  However, with 30 round magazines and a quicker rate of fire, each of those is clearly a superior military weapon, or a “shit hits the fan” civilian weapon, than any bolt-action.  I do have the bayonet, though, which is long and bad-ass.

After WWI it was effectively retired.  WWII use was limited to UK Home Guards, plus some of the US troops in the Philippines who defended the islands against the Japanese in 1942 were equipped with these.   Nationalist Chinese troops sometimes used them – though they’re usually equipped with Mausers.  Denmark's Sirius Patrol in Greenland still uses this rifle. 

Someone wrote into the National Rifleman about what appeared to be a 1917 Enfield bayonet with plastic grips and a 1960s date marking.  It turns out they used the same bayonet on the 1897 Winchester shotgun.  In the trenches, the US soldiers would hold the trigger down and pump the gun, quickly sweeping any Germans out of that traverse - much to the annoyance of the Germans.  While the rifle was well out of the US arsenal by the time Vietnam rolled around, the shotgun was still in use, so they issued brand new bayonets for it.  Mystery solved!

FYI:  US troops fighting in the North Russia group used Mosin-Nagants, both because it was the local rifle (7.62x54R) and because the US had a surplus of them left over from a contract with the Tsar which could not be delivered before the Russian Revolution.  US troops sent to Vladivostok (east Russia) used Springfields. 

Vs. Springfield.  My understanding is that US troops preferred the Springfield, and most gun writers (self-professed experts) seem to agree that the Springfield is the better rifle, though for all I know much of this could be one writer simply repeating what another said, and so on, until an “everyone knows” consensus is reached which no one bothers to question.  It’s supposedly heavier than a Springfield, but to me it’s a light rifle anyway, so that issue doesn’t ring with me.  To me, a Springfield reminds me heavily of my Mauser 98K, hardly surprising as they simply copied the Gewehr 98 (the WWI version of the 98k) to make the Springfield.  My wishlist for guns includes the Gewehr 98, the Gewehr 43, an FN FAL, and a few others.  If I win the lottery, it’s time to look into Class IIIs.  In the meantime, bolt actions are fun to fire and cheap to buy: including this one.

Movie.  The Lost Battalion (2001) featuring Ricky Schroeder, portrays a unit of the 308 Division which was cut off by the Germans in the Argonne Forest in 1918.  Mostly New York bastards, they refused to surrender even after being not only surrounded but attacked several times.  A German officer complains, "these Americans don't retreat when they're supposed to," to which his superior sarcastically remarks, "how inconsiderate of them."  The main rifle featured - by US soldiers - is the Enfield.