Saint Valentine's Day Massacre Thompsons.

[CptCurl]

Currently there is another thread that gave rise to some discussion about the Thompson Submachine Guns that were used in the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre.

I have seen these Thompsons and had occasion to photograph the interesting display. Let me share my photos. I have no connection to the guns or the display.

I haven't even re-sized these, so if you click on any of them you will get a biggie.

These were taken in August, 2011 at the "All Thompson Show and Shoot."

A Thompson is a fun gun to have. I owned a nice Colt for about 10 years and sold it on this forum last May. Here's a link, if you are curious: **SOLD** For Sale: Colt Model 1921 AC #6835 Thompson Submachine Gun


Curly

 

[reddogs]

Very interesting thanks for sharing.

 

[Paul7]

As a 10 year old kid in Chicago when that happened my dad went over to Clark St. to see all the hoopla, of course it was roped off but still interesting, according to him.

 

[Toyman]

In February 2019 one of the Thompsons with drum magazine was loaned to the Mob Musuem in Las Vegas for display.

 

[Rudi]

Really, they are like baseball, hot dogs, and apple pie. Go Tommy!

 

[45Wheelgun]

These were taken in August, 2011 at the "All Thompson Show and Shoot."

I thought that looked like Tracy's basement. I think 2011 was the first I went to, I attended 3 of them.

Great pictures, thanks for the memories.

 

[mscampbell2734]

I shot one once. Heavy, fairly easy to control if fired in short burst, not real user friendly controls, but given the era they were developed it worked and worked well.

 

[03hemi]

Of course you never hear about this one?

 

[batman4706]

My department had a 1928 with case, 50 rd drum and several box magazines. It was in excellent condition except some idiot had taken some pliers on the compensater. I had occasion to shoot it several times, with a loaded drum it was very heavy, but very controllable One of our chief's decided we didn't need it and traded it off.

 

["DOC" Lott]

Really interesting, I wasn't aware of these guns ! Thanks for sharing !!

 

[Baltimoreed11754]

Thanks for posting. I went on a school trip to Washington and toured the FBI and watched a Thompson fired on their range down in the basement. Made a big impression. I also rented a WW2 Thompson at an indoor range in Maryland of all places and shot 50 rds through it years ago. Would have been a lot more fun outdoors. Bought this West Hurley AO 1927 in 2019 and had it sbr'ed and rebuilt into a 1928 [semi]. Neat gun. Built the ukulele case for it too.

 

[charlie sherrill]

We had two of them at the department I started with in 1969. They had both drum and stick mags. A friend of mine was an armorer at nearby Camp Shelby National Guard training facility. I got an "extra" case of .45 ACP from him on several occasions and would check out the Thompson's for some fun at the range. There was a river behind the range and we would drop metal freon bottles upstream and shoot them as they floated by. Fun times. The sub guns were later traded (by a department member who had no idea what he was doing) for S&W revolvers (they allowed about $500 per gun on trade at the time) along with some .351 rifles and several model 97 shotguns. The armorer passed away ending the source for 45 ACP.

 

[Johnny Diamond]

American icon, old technology, but hell so is the 45colt and 45/70 !

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

 

[Fullauto 45]

The first year the STVD guns came to the The American Thompson Association show, we shot the guns. I fired several mags from the guns, not thinking to collect the spent brass. Wish I did. I still have 100 rounds or so from the Dillinger Thompson I shot at another of the Thompson Collectors shows. Fun, fun, fun.
I also have a M1 that has WWII and two PD histories.

 

[Golddollar]

Thanks for posting. I went on a school trip to Washington and toured the FBI and watched a Thompson fired on their range down in the basement. Made a big impression.

I got to do that too when I was in 7th grade. It was great.

 

[dpast32]

ABSOLUTELY AWSOME piece of American Law Enforcement & Criminal History ! I performed my own amateur research into that particular event, & IIRC, they never truly defined exactly who was present at the scene ? ( I could perhaps be wrong, as it was a few years ago that I delved into it. ) Too bad we couldn't dig Fred 'Killer' Burke up & 'put him under the lights' again so to speak. But, he went out the 'way of the gangster', & we don't miss him a bit ! I always used to wonder as a kid why the men always appear on wear those big, heavy Top Coats / Trenchcoats ? I soon figured out that they really needed then to conceal those 40 ounce M-1911's, .38 H/D's, along with the rest of those pre-alloy framed handguns ! At least we know that those particular TSMG's have been preserved & maintained for prosperity, unlike so very many other criminally involved weaponry, which were unfortunately destroyed. And what's perhaps even somewhat sadder, is our own Government is still continuing to purposely destroy some extremely historic & quite useful firearms !

Best, dpast32

 

[DR505]

Thanks for posting. I went on a school trip to Washington and toured the FBI and watched a Thompson fired on their range down in the basement. Made a big impression. I also rented a WW2 Thompson at an indoor range in Maryland of all places and shot 50 rds through it years ago. Would have been a lot more fun outdoors. Bought this West Hurley AO 1927 in 2019 and had it sbr'ed and rebuilt into a 1928 [semi]. Neat gun. Built the ukulele case for it too.

I got to fire Thompsons a lot in my Bureau career. We would shoot them for several special events throughout the year. I probably averaged 1-2k rounds per year. Great firearms.

Whenever someone claims the Thompson "climbs" or is "hard to control" I just shake my head. That tells me they likely have either little trigger time on them, or they have poor technique.

Here is a video I had taken of me shooting 28 rounds full-auto from an M1A1 with 230 grain JHP ammo. Shot from 15 yards, all bullets landed well inside the QIT target. This is also the first firearm my son ever shot, when he was 8, and he used it full-auto.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do87YQKMLt8"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do87YQKMLt8[/ame]

 

[dpast32]

That's a big 10-04 on that DR505 ! If I lived in a State which allowed SBR's for non-Departmental possession, I would have ordered one of the newer examples long ago. I especially like the alloy receiver models, as the TSMG's are quite heavy, as I'm sure you're aware. But, my particular State happens to extremely Democratly led, so that pretty much negates my owning an SBR. I guess those additional 6" of barrel length makes it much less deadly ? THANKS for the video !

Best, Dom Pastore Jr.

 

[pasound]

We have three old Thompsons in my museum. Two have a history of use in the Mine Wars of 1921-22. The third was literally a "toy" owned by an industrialist, who bought it by mail as a catalog item.

 

[CajunBass]

Thanks for posting this. I've had a "love affair" with the Thompson since I watched "Combat" as a kid. I've never fired one though. A range I belonged to had one for rental but it seemed it was always "out for repair" or something whenever I tried to rent it. I came close to buying a semi-auto "pistol" version once. One with the short barrel, and no buttstock, but I backed out at the last minute.

These days, the closest I'll ever come to one I suppose is my Umarex copy of the M1A1 in CO2/BB. Full sized, all metal with plastic stock and forearm, it shoots BB's in full and semi auto. Or so I'm told. I still haven't gotten around to shooting it.

(Kimber Micro 9 for size comparison)