Lee-Enfield Rifle No.4 Mk I*

[mortar_guy78]

I'm currently home on leave and my grandfather gave me this rifle. It is pretty badass. It's not the rarest rifle in the world, but it's just cool having a piece of history. Especially one that is you can have fun with.

Awesome.

Anyone have any experience with this bad boy? Any thoughts or opinions? I haven't even been able to shoot it yet since he gave it to me after our range day, but I'll be taking it out soon. Here's hoping it shoots as well as it looks.

[colt1rgr]

Had one for years. They are awesome rifles having served (in one version or another) the empire admirably thru both world wars and many, countless excursions world wide.

I refinished one I had and it ended up looking brand new and fetching a very fare price when I sold it. Brit .303 is an awesome round!

[rgrokelley]

One of the quickest actions on a bolt rifle there are. It shoots, from my guess, about a 4 minute of angle using the iron sights. This is using the flip up sight and not just the big peep sight. The flip up sight is zeroed for about 200 yards, so you might need to do some Kentucky windage to figure out where to hit.

This was my first rifle I owned, back in 1981. I bought it for $75. Mine was parkerized and could be traced to the Israeli army, by way of the British Army. Still got it somewhere. The .303 is a hard hitting round, similiar to the 30-06.

[mortar_guy78]

I'm back off of leave and had to keep the rifle in Indiana. I should be home again in Sep.-Oct. and I'll shoot it then.

On the plus side, I disassembled and cleaned it and all of the working parts look to be in excellent shape. The stock is a little dinged here and there, but it's got character. I can't wait to shoot it. It makes me want to start collecting WW2 era rifles.

I'm going to try to do some research on the history of my particular rifle. What sort of resources are out there for such things?

[K.Ingraham]

British doctrine a century ago was based on rapid, aimed fire, hence the fast, smooth action. When the Germans first encountered the British Expeditionary Force in 1914, it is claimed that the Germans thought the Brits were using massed machine guns, (possibly mythical and the same myth was promugated by the AEF on the Marne in 1917).

Anyway, I've had a Canadian made sniper for a couple of decades and it's the only piece I retained when I sold off my old military collection (which centered on Korean War weapons). A couple of years ago I loaned it to a co-worker to take deer huunting. When he took it to the range to train with it, he so fell in love with the thing that he set off on a classic military rifle collection himself. And no, I didn't sell him mine, but he returned it in such excellent condition that I've been trying to loan him the rest of my guns and my truck ever since!

It shoots real nice and is heavy enough to keep close to on target, despite the heavy round; however, you aren't going to spend the day plinking with it unless you enjoy a shoulder beat to jelly and can afford one of the most expensive rifle rounds.

WARNING: Collecting Lee-Enfields is addictive! You can hunt variations of the MkIII & MkIV for decades. The things came in a huge variety of variations to include .22 caliber cadet trainers and .410 shotgun 'prison chasers' to production from armories all over the Empire. You can find examples associated with hundreds of campaigns from almost a century of warfare, from Mons & the Somme to Normandy, Korea and Kashmir.
Mumbai police responded with the original Ishopore-produced (sic?) MkIIIs to the 2008 terrorist attack a century after Ghurka riflemen used them to massacre hundreds of civilians in Amritsar. A nice aside is that in terms of collectible firearms, most are shootable and aside from some rare variants, are generaly affordable. The associated ephemera is easy to collect as well; slings, issue maintainence items, regimental stuff, web gear and parts are everywhere - except of course, for "that one" item you really want to complete a display or set, but that is the nature of collecting.

Have fun!

[Jim]

How about something unexpected?

http://www.iwmcollections.org.uk/dbtw-w ... 0&FG=0&QS=" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[rgrokelley]

How about something unexpected?

http://www.iwmcollections.org.uk/dbtw-w ... 0&FG=0&QS=" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Read his book before we went to Desert Storm (T.E. Lawrence).

Moral of the story. The Muslims shouldn't get all homosexual with a guy who can lead thousands of tribesmen and kill all of you. He was a lot more agressive after being captured by the Turks on his recon of Dera'a

[Jim]

He later stated that he stopped cutting notches at five.

[mortar_guy78]

From what I have read, many historians question the veracity of Lawrence's claims of dude rape. I have read the Seven Pillars, but after doing a bit of light research on my own it seems that Lawrence was a fag who liked to be whipped. The consensus in the non-rape camp seems to be that the rape description passage was a big fantasy.

I'm not sure what the basis for this claim is, but it's fairly prevalent.

[KW Driver]

I read a biography that painted him the way Mortar described. lots of unfulfilled or unable to verify gay activity. the book painted him as at least loving the boys if he didn't act on it. but the fact that there was enough supposition from those around him, for the age and time he lived, paints him as being gay, and liking to receive pain. IIRC, the book stated or implied that his penchant for being whipped got him off, and that he'd orgasm from a good whipping, and that his scars from this activity was spun as torture from the Turks, etc.

despite all that, he was a bad motherfucker, compared to his opponents. that comment is based on having seen arabs in action. I used to think the Israelis were some of the best fighters in the world until I saw for myself how Egyptians, and even Saudis acted. now, I think they are/were just better than their opponents.

[rgrokelley]

From what I have read, many historians question the veracity of Lawrence's claims of dude rape. I have read the Seven Pillars, but after doing a bit of light research on my own it seems that Lawrence was a fag who liked to be whipped. The consensus in the non-rape camp seems to be that the rape description passage was a big fantasy.

I'm not sure what the basis for this claim is, but it's fairly prevalent.

One historian (can't remember which one) thought that the whole S&M thing that Lawrence had after the war, was mainly due to what happened during the war. Something probably did happen to him with the Turks, since he admitted it later.