I had the honor yesterday of cleaning up a friend's WWII bring-back yesterday. As the story goes, it was taken from a dead Japanese officer. It has a 4-digit serial number (~2,600). I was a bit gummed up, but a little Hoppe's #9 and some oil got her slicked up pretty nicely. It didn't have a magazine, so that's the next objective.

Questions:
- Any ideas on how a Belgian gun ended up in a Japanese officer's holster?
- Approximate year of production?
- Value? It's got a little bit of surface rust--about what I'd expect, given it's age and the fact that it's been in somebody's sock drawer for 60 years. It doesn't seem to have been fired a lot. There's not a lot of wear on the internals. Grips have the FN logo at the top and appear to be made out of a Bakelite-type substance.

Thanks in advance. The current owner isn't much of a gun guy, so he asked for my help. It was a real treat for me. He's not interested in selling, but would like a little more info. I can hazard some guesses based on internet searches, but I'd appreciate somebody more knowledgeable helping me out.

Thanks again,
Herk

__________________
Where's my dad's America?

Japanese Officers, like Officers in other Armies at the time, could carry just about anything they wanted and could obtain. Remember Japan was on our side during WW1 and had long been a global trading entity. Just about anything manufactured before 1940 would have been available.

The FN logo grips are a late feature,,the earliest guns had grips with a small likeness of the pistol and 'FN' in the oval.
They made about 10k Model 1900's the first year, but I'm not sure if production followed a strict serial number sequence.

There was an earlier Model 1889 pistol that looks almost the same but had a longer grip and slightly larger frame. You dont see many at all. also a Model 1889/Compact that was to be the Model 1900,,again a rare pistol.

Belgian military contract was the big deal for these when they were first made along with several other foreign contracts for FN. They were offered for commercial sale though worldwide.

The 1900 as well as other foreign made handguns were common as private purchase sidearms for Japanese Officers in WW2. In a book on handgun holsters of WW2 by Bender there are several pictures of private purchase holsters for FN, Astra, etc pistols captured from WW2 Japanese Officers.

FN exported a lot of handguns to the far east over the years. The FN 1900 model was popular enough that chinese and others copied it. I have owned both original FN's and a couple of the copies. One was a very close copy and only the garbled markings gave it away, others only resembled the 1900 in outline.
The japanese imported and used many foreign handguns since officers often provided their own sidearms, a common practice in those days.

Thanks for the info guys. I'm pretty sure it's NOT an 1899 based on the fact that it has a lanyard loop.

__________________
Where's my dad's America?

You can lock the slide back with the safety on a 1900,,,a feature not present on the 1899 compact model (or the large frame 1899). An easy way to tell which model you have.

There are a very few 1899/1900 transitional models built with some parts from the earlier 1899s.....but those transition pistols have an 'A' serial# prefix.
Or so they're all supposed to have. Not many built. Just a parts clean up.

These were built in the 1902 period while the 1900model was in production. Can't throw any parts away!

Some of these did have lanyard rings,,some not.(no lanyard on the 1899)
Some have 1899 grips,,some 1900 grips,,etc.

The early production 1899 Model magazine has 3 holes thru the walls on each side. Later had 6.
1900 model had 6.
The only difference between the 6 hole 1899 and the 6 hole 1900 mag is the size of the holes. They are larger on the 1899 Model. I forget what the actual size is. I do remember that the difference between the two is only 1mm.
All three magazines are interchangable though. Some small differences in the feed lip contours exist but that doesn't seem to constitute another class of magazines as far as the collectors are concerned.

Interesting pistols. I think they were the first firearm (1899 Model)to be chambered for the 32acp.

While this is an interesting and fascinating thread...it is worthless without pictures....

__________________
Dave

I own a FN 1900..pretty cool little pistol...but hard to see the work of John Browning in it..at least as far as how a FN 1900 is related to his later work.

1. As noted elsewhere, the guns were reasonably popular in the far east, especially China.
2. Also as noted elsewhere, Japanese officers usually bought their own pistols and swords.
3. MANY Chinese copies of the M1900 as well as mutant variations were made.
4. Like the Germans, the Japanese used any and every foreign weapon they could find, either for themselves or for their puppet militias in Manchuria, China, the Dutch East Indies and the Philippines. Given the even more inadequate nature of their industrial base, they were even more desperate than the Germans. Dutch Lugers from the KNIL are also sometimes found.
5. The North Koreans made a copy of the M1900, in both standard and suppressed versions. The suppressed version looks like a hideous kludge.

215hq, I know this is an old thread, but I cannot find much info on the model 1899 anywhere, and you seem to know a thing or two, so here goes...I took my model 1899 to the range the other day, and it performed perfectly, which was absolutely amazing. I'm having problems unscrewing the breech block screws to remove the slide, so I can clean the gun. Is there some trick/procedure I'm missing, or should the screws just turn out with a screwdriver, like on the model 1900? From my pics you can see that I'm not the only one who's had trouble removing these screws over the cours of this gun's long life.

Attached Images

	20120502_233330.jpg (218.0 KB, 183 views)
	20120502_233356.jpg (138.9 KB, 125 views)